4 Tips for Better Optometric Billing and Maximizing Cash Flow
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Do you wonder where your money is in your eye care practice? With more patients coming in with insurance and vision plans, it’s easy for money to get lost.
At Fast Pay Health, we want you to “get results fast” by upgrading your optometric billing and revenue cycle management (RCM) process, reducing accounts receivable (AR) and aging claims, and increasing revenue. Below are four billing tips that can help maximize your cash flow.
Cash Flow Tip #1: Submit Claims Daily
The first step to maximizing cash flow in any optometry or ophthalmology office is to submit claims daily. Maintaining a consistent submission schedule ensures your office gets paid regularly.
Consistently submitting claims is critical because many vision plans and insurance payers process claims every week or at the same time every month or week. Not only that, if you file claims only once a week, this means a bigger backlog to work through, which leads to a higher chance of errors.
At Fast Pay Health, our billers and RCM specialists frequently get claims submitted either the day of the appointment or within one business day. Never worry about delayed payments, planning for staff vacations, unplanned sick days, turnover, or costly re-training when you outsource optometry billing.
Related: Efficient Optometry Billing Eases Stress for a Busy Practice
Cash Flow Tip #2: Post Remits When You Receive Them
Not only does delaying posting remits keep your AR artificially high, but you could also be missing denied claims. If you think getting EFT payments means you can wait to post, think again. Some payers have strict refiling rules, which limit your time to appeal a claim from the remit date.
You can move the balance to the secondary insurance and bill that much quicker by handling remits within one to two days. Or, you can move that balance that is due from the patient so you can generate a statement. It becomes increasingly difficult to collect payments the longer it’s been since the patient’s visit.
The Fast Pay Health team guarantees consistent, uninterrupted service during your business hours. We keep those remits posted and claims processed daily.
Related: How to Reduce the Accounts Receivable Cycle with Smarter Billing
Cash Flow Tip #3: Scrub Claims to Reduce Denials
Are you focusing on scrubbing those pesky medical claims that don’t go through? Making sure claims are sent correctly from the start greatly reduces your AR—and saves you time. This is especially important if you have a pay-per-claim plan with your clearinghouse. Review all rejected or denied claims to increase your cash flow and make necessary corrections.
Fast Pay Health billers often see rejected claims for one or more of the following reasons:
Invalid insurance information
Invalid member ID numbers
Invalid insured information
The patient is not eligible for the service date
We ensure your medical claims are clean and error-free before we submit them—delivering a positive cash flow for your practice. We analyze unpaid claims and then take the necessary steps to recover the amount due.
Related: How (and How Not) to Use Common Medical Billing Modifiers
Cash Flow Tip #4: Always Research Unpaid Claims
Researching unpaid or denied claims is a time-consuming process—it can take anywhere from five minutes up to one hour to investigate an unpaid claim, only to find out the payment was already received. Or worse, the claim was never filed and cannot be appealed for timely filing.
You can run into timely filing denials if your patients have secondary insurance. Many payers require you to bill a secondary within 180 days or less after you receive the primary payment.
Also, if you file claims through a clearinghouse, typically, rejections are reported within two to three business days. Don’t let those claims slip through the cracks. You should always research rejections on the clearinghouse reports and denials on the remits daily.
Fast Pay Health billing specialists review AR aging claims daily to see why open balances are outstanding. We can help you reduce the number of hours you spend daily on the phone with insurance companies, so you can see more patients and increase revenue. We also verify the receipt of claims with insurance companies.
Related: 6 Eye Care Claim Rejections You Can Overcome
Do You Want to Get Paid Faster?
By focusing on the tips listed above, you can significantly reduce the number of claims that end up unpaid. Our goal at Fast Pay Health is to balance your aging to where the bulk consists of fresh claims that grow smaller in numbers as they age.
Request a free practice analysis, and we’ll schedule a time that works for you. We work with your practice to provide a solid, customized billing and revenue cycle management solution.