How to Organise Insurance Clients
Working with insurance providers can be extremely beneficial to your practice. They can send referrals to you without you having to do any marketing. You do however need to know how to organise insurance clients properly.
The process for invoicing can be time-consuming and therefore costly to your business if not organised correctly. I’m going to talk you through how to organise your insurance clients from start to finish so you don’t waste time or money.
First Things First
It is important that you speak to individual insurers and get approved. That way you can advertise on your website and any directories which insurance providers you can work with. Insurers have different fee schedules in place. Some insurers will pay your standard fee and others will only pay you a set amount. In addition, some insurers will be fee assured. This means you cannot charge your client anything additional if the insurer doesn’t match your standard rate.
Invoicing
You need to know how you invoice. Invoices can be submitted for most insurers via Healthcode. You will need to register and create a profile to be able to send invoices. Bupa has its own invoicing procedure through Providers Online which again you will need to register for. Then there are other insurers that have a totally individual process and some can have lengthy invoicing payment terms. Ensure you do your homework and due diligence before taking anyone on.
Pro Healthcode Advice:
Make sure you get your remittance advice delivered through Healthcode. If not, you’ll never get them without a lot of chasing!
Get Organised
The organisation is the most important thing when working with insurance clients. Create an insurance overview document. It should include all your login details, provider numbers and agreed fees. Include any details about how to invoice for any non-standard insurance providers.
When you take on a client with insurance you should send out a form for them to complete with the practice contract. This should obtain all their insurance policy information such as provider, policy/membership number, pre-authorisation code, number of sessions authorised, policy expiry date. You should also obtain their full name, date of birth and full address including postcode as you’ll need this to process invoices. If you’d like help with client onboarding you can read my blog all about this HERE.
If you are working without an electronic health record (EHR) system you should create a spreadsheet with all this information. You will then add all the clients you have under insurance policies in one place. It is important to keep track of appointments used versus appointments authorised.
Finally, you will need to keep track of your invoices with an invoice log. Insurers will pay at different speeds and it can be really hard to keep track of what payments have been made without lots of organisation. In addition to this, there is usually an excess for the client to pay which could eat into one or more sessions and YOU will need to obtain this directly from the client.
Advise your client when they are coming up to the last couple of sessions authorised so they can decide if they’d like to try and obtain more. Most insurers have a process for this. Sometimes you don’t need to get involved and the client can just request more. Some insurers however will require a report from you so ensure you are giving yourself enough time to complete this so it doesn’t interrupt the treatment.
I Got You
I know that probably seems a little bit overwhelming and possibly off-putting. When starting out especially, working with insurers is a great way to get clients. The therapists I work with getting referrals from insurers weekly if not daily so it can definitely be beneficial to you.
I have created a one-stop template package that includes:
Private Health Insurance Client Form
Health Insurance Overview Document
Medical Insurance Invoice Details Template
Medical Insurance Invoice Log
It is everything you will need to run your practice with insurance clients. I even have a walkthrough video that explains how to use all the templates but they are really simple to start using right away. You can get your hands on these templates right HERE.
Phew, that was a lot of information! Now you know how to organise insurance clients. The details within this blog will save you a lot of stress if you are just starting out and my templates will give you a massive head start.
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