Your dental team has a lot on its plate. From insurance claims to patient billing, to patient check-in and out, to scheduling, to keeping everything in the office running smoothly - it’s easy to forget to complete tasks. When your dental team is trying to juggle all of this, typically the first task to slip through the cracks is the insurance claims process.
We get it. The insurance claims process isn’t staring your team in the face the same way a patient problem or an organizational problem might. But when your team doesn’t have time for dental insurance claims, you’ll start to see your cash flow decline.
Dental Claim Support has been providing a streamlined claims process to dental teams for over 10 years. Through offering this service, we’ve seen how little time the team truly has to handle insurance claims. And we’ve seen what can happen when the insurance claims process is neglected.
In this article, you will learn 4 signs your dental team doesn’t have time for insurance claims. These signs will give you a good idea of where your dental practice’s overall health is. If any of these signs ring true for you, and you can see that your claims are on the back-burner, it might be time for some change.
Let’s get into the 4 signs your team doesn’t have time to handle your dental insurance claims.
1. There isn’t one person accountable for your insurance claims process
It’s common for dental teams with less time on their hands to divide up the insurance claims work. It’s even more common for the claims work to be handed off to whoever happens to have time that day to handle it.
When this happens, the claims process becomes a bottom priority for your team. Your insurance claims account for about 50% of your overall revenue - it should be a top priority!
Plus, whoever is forced to work on the insurance claims process could begin to resent this task as a whole. And when you hate doing a task, it’s tempting to rush through it just to be done with it.
Insurance claims need a lot of attention to detail and expert eyes. There are many rules and regulations to keep up with, which is why one person needs to be fully focused on it with zero distractions. If your team is treating the claims process as a checklist item that they hate, there might be more mistakes made on your claim form submissions. This will lead to claim denials, therefore delays in insurance payment.
If you see your team passing around the task of insurance billing, it’s a clear sign no one really has time for it.
2. No one is aware of the state of the insurance aging report
We don’t say this to point out that your team isn’t paying attention to important numbers. And we’re not here to get anyone in trouble!
However, IF you were to ask your team what the insurance aging report numbers look like and no one really knows - this is a sign it’s being neglected. Therefore, the insurance claims as a whole are likely being neglected.
The insurance aging report is a list of unpaid insurance claims. Ideally, the insurance aging report is worked a minimum of once a week. Possibly more, depending on how many unpaid claims are on it.
Look - it’s not a quick or fun task to work on the insurance aging report. We have billers who were previously office managers. And when it came to anything regarding the aging report or posting payments, they had to hyper-focus.
This meant they sometimes had to lock themselves in their office so that they could go through the software, claim by claim, to get each paid.
No one is aware of low collections
If your team isn’t aware of the state of the insurance aging report, they’re probably also not aware of what your insurance collections percentage is, or why it is low.
If you’re a dentist looking through your bank account and your practice management software and notice that cash flow was low this month, you’re probably going to bring it up to your employees who handle billing.
To learn what financial reports your dental team should be running for success, visit our Learning Center.
If they have no idea what you’re referring to when you bring up that your collections percentage is lower than 90%, they don’t have enough time in their day to give attention to claims. If they did, they’d (hopefully) already be taking steps to increase this percentage.
3. There is a tense work environment
If your team is feeling pressed to get all of their work done, and an 8-hour workday isn’t enough… they probably have too much on their plate.
And the tasks they are likely to prioritize over insurance claims are still important. Obviously, patient care and patient billing MUST be handled! But the insurance claims must be as well. When your team is struggling to make time for insurance claims, a tense work environment might begin cultivating.
Not sure about you, but when I’m stressed, I’m not very fun to be around! Like most people, if your team feels stressed about getting everything done, they’re exuding negative energy to the rest of the office. And this can affect everyone’s quality of work, and attitudes about their job.
As the dentist or business owner, you want everyone to be happy about their jobs! If you’re noticing your employees feeling tense, it could be due to the insurance claims they aren’t able to give attention to.
4. There have been patient drop-offs
Guess what else can be affected by a negative work environment? Your patients.
They notice more than you think. If you’ve been noticing a drop-off in your patient retention, ask yourself:
- How are my patient billing processes?
- Are my patients receiving inaccurate out-of-pocket estimates - therefore bills in the mail?
- Do my employees have time to be attentive to my patients?
These are just a few dead giveaways that your team doesn’t have time for insurance claims. If your claims are being handled inconsistently, your overall billing process is also likely unorganized.
If your patients are receiving surprise bills in the mail from you, it’s because someone doesn’t have the time or expertise to handle your insurance claims.
And if your patients are not receiving the attention or care they deserve, it might be because your employees don’t have the time to give to them. Or they might have a poor attitude towards patients because of the workload.
Ready to learn more about the solution to your neglected insurance claims?
When your team is scrambling to handle insurance claims, the state of your insurance aging report is unknown, everyone is stressed and you see a drop off in patients - you know it’s time for a change.
And when it comes to your insurance claims, they need to be a top priority. The cash you make from your claims is a huge portion of your overall revenue. It can’t take a backseat. And your team is already handling a lot in your office, tasks that also cannot be ignored.
Dental Claim Support is a valuable claims process service that can give your team time back in their day to put 100% into other tasks. Our billers take over the insurance claims so that you don’t have to worry about them. And your team will finally be able to enjoy their jobs again.
And you’ll have control over your claims revenue.
To learn more about outsourced dental billing and how it can give you back control over your claims revenue, schedule a consultation with one of our billing experts.
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