Does my office qualify for outsourced dental billing?

You’re a dentist who has been searching and searching for a solution to your low collections percentage and high outstanding insurance aging report. You’re starting to look into outsourcing your dental billing, and finding that there are a few things you may need in order to sign on with a remote dental billing company. 

A common question we receive during our initial conversations with dental offices is, “does my office qualify for outsourced dental billing?”

We’re here to help you figure out whether you can take advantage of remote dental billing based on your setup. There are some important factors that ensure a productive and efficient working relationship with an outsourced dental billing company. Without these, you may not see the full benefits of outsourced dental billing

In this article, you will learn what makes your office “qualified” or compatible with most outsourced dental billing companies, and how taking steps to become qualified is a great stepping stone to increasing your collections percentage and bringing in more money to your practice. 

To utilize outsourced dental billing, you only need these 4 things:

1. Internet speed over 10 mbps
   1. This speed is appropriate for offices with 10-15 devices connected to it plus frequent cloud computing, video conferencing and data backups. 
   2. Go to Google’s Internet Speed Test now to learn how fast your internet is
2. You need to be located in the United States (For Dental ClaimSupport, specifically)
   1. It does not matter which state you are in
3. You need to be utilizing a dental practice management software
   1. Examples are:
      1. OpenDental,
      2. Eaglesoft
      3. Dentrix
      4. Curve Dental
      5. Denticon

1. Digital Charting 
   1. The more digital you are, the more a remote employee can handle on your behalf - digital charting, digital x-rays, electronic claim submission

Did you check yes to all of these things? Boom, then you are qualified to outsource your dental billing.

Questions to ask yourself when considering outsourcing dental billing:

Do I have a strong, quality internet connection? 

This one feels a little obvious, but let us explain. It’s more common than you’d think for offices to come to us for services, and their internet router is a slower, less expensive type. This could cause trouble when running dental billing software, or when more than one user is operating within it at once. Like we mentioned, your speed should be at least 10 megabits per second. 

Do I have up-to-date dental billing software?

Dental offices that have been around for a while may have neglected to update their software. We know it’s a pain to make these kinds of changes, but a more updated software can help your practice work more efficiently. Not to mention, as softwares age, if security updates are not kept up with then compliance with HIPAA could come into question. Dental ClaimSupport also requires up-to-date software. 

When we work together within your dental software, we are accessing your account remotely. If your dental software is not up to date and logging us out every five minutes, we can’t do our job which means you’re not collecting money from insurance companies.

You can outsource your dental billing from anywhere in the United States

While our company has grown tremendously in the past few years, we’re not global quite yet! We love meeting new people and want to help everyone we can, but if your office isn’t located in the United States, we’re not able to work with you. You’d be surprised how many calls we get from offices in Canada! 

We do, however, have clients all over the U.S. of all shapes and sizes. We love working with all different kinds of dental practices and learning your different ticks and needs. I guess that “qualification” is pretty simple, eh? Unfortunately, it’s not a technical or logistical factor that we can help you fix. If you ever move or open a location in the States, though, give us a call! 

What changes does your practice need to make to work with an outsourced dental billing company?

Many of the mentioned above requirements are achievable if you are willing to improve your internet connection somehow, then we are happy to work with you. Since we are a remote dental billing company, working in your dental software from afar, connecting with you via Zoom and always communicating through email with you, it’s important for us to be able to remain connected. 

If your dental office is in a rural area and you are unable to afford a large internet router that can ensure a consistent connection, we may not be a good match for one another. Perhaps another outsourced dental billing company is the better fit for you.  

When it comes to dental softwares, we recommend dental softwares to potential clients all the time. We’re experts in working in the best billing softwares, so we have a lot to say about it! We even have an entire blog article dedicated to helping you find which dental billing software is best for you and your practice. 

While we don’t set up the software for you, many of our current clients have come to us originally with older, less user friendly softwares, followed our recommendations and converted to a preferred practice management software, then signed on with us. We’re more than happy to help you make adjustments to prepare you better to work with an outsourced dental billing company. 

IT department is here to help

We’re not in the business of turning people away for no good reason. Let’s be honest, that wouldn’t be a very good way for us to make money… Typically when we get a call from an office that might not have the “right” answer to any of these questions, we put them in touch with our amazing IT department. They can help you see if there is a solution such as updating your technology or purchasing a new dental software in order for us to work efficiently together. 

We want to work with you to help you increase your collections and improve your outstanding insurance aging report to bring your practice more revenue. But we can’t if there are logistical issues that cannot be resolved. 

We don’t want to waste anyone’s time, especially yours. We’re here to improve your practice and help you bring in more money. We consider all of these changes and outsourcing your dental billing an investment with an invaluable return on investment. To keep learning about how making some of these changes could be worth the money in order to outsource your dental billing, check out our blog.