Your front desk is your first step to success!

Your front desk is usually the first face, or voice, your patients interact with at your practice. So it's important for your receptionist to be friendly, helpful and inviting! They wear many hats; they greet your patients, answer the phones, process paperwork between offices or patient's schools, book appointments.. the list goes on. On top of that they are also the starting line to your billing team. A front desk that does not do their job properly can have a huge impact on your reimbursement. Let's breakdown the importance of their role!

At check in, and especially if it's the patient's first time visiting the office, it's imperative to scan a front & back copy of their insurance card rather than just entering the insurance number by reading the card and handing it back to the patient. Having a scanned copy makes it easier to confirm the policy and group numbers have been entered correctly. But the back of the card is so important as it pertains billing information specific to their plan. Claims addresses, electronic payer ID numbers, provider services phone numbers! Without this information readily available your billers will need to contact the insurance, confirm the billing information for the plan and then enter it into the system. It's also important to record the effective date of the insurance plan, usually when verifying eligibility to confirm it's accurate. Knowing the start date for the plan ensures your billers send the claim to the correct plan for the date of service. It also tips off the receptionist to rescan the card after a year, at minimum! Often times members are sent new cards from their insurance and they don't even know something has changed. The co-pay could be different, the group number changed or the electronic payor ID number is new. If any of this information is not updated it could cause a hiccup down the line. And clean claims get paid!

Another important role upon check in is collecting the co-pay or other outstanding balances they may have on their account. Patient payments can account for 18-30% of your revenue, and studies have shown that the chances of collecting a balance after the patient leaves drops by nearly 20%! If the patient does not pay their co-pay at check in you'll need to mail a statement, or a few if it goes ignored, which costs you money. And co-pays should not be waived unless it's a financial hardship! Many people don't realize that waiving balances due is a violation of your insurance contract and can get you dropped from that payer. It's tough to collect a balance when you don't know what the balance is for so it's a great idea to have your billers meet with your receptionists for a few hours of training on the basics of billing; co-pay, co-insurance, deductibles and how to identify them in your system. They can also give the patients gentle reminders for outstanding insurance issues such as coordination of benefit updates that are due or PCP updates that have not been fixed.

Huddle meetings are another great way for your front desk and billing department to be on the same page! Each morning before the office's first appointment the billers can go over the day's schedule - who's insurances is no longer active, who has an outstanding balance on their account etc. It's also sets up the opportunity for the billers to ask the receptionists to discretely let a patient know they need to speak with the billing department for a large balance or a complicated insurance issue. A polite "Could you please pop into our billing office to answer a questions they have for you?" or "Here's our billing department's phone number, could you please give them a call regarding an insurance question?" will get a more positive outcome than your patients receiving a large bill with no notice.

Reception is more than answering phones and booking appointments, as we've gone over today. They're the first and last person your patients see when they visit the office and they are fundamental to your practice and billing department!