Dental

Kinum debt collections utility for Eaglesoft dental software

Kinum has introduced a utility that can quickly transfer accounts from your Eaglesoft Dental Practice Management software to Kinum for debt collections without the need to manually re-enter accounts on Kinum’s client portal. This saves a lot of time for the practice.

For about $15 per patient, Kinum will

1. Send 5 collection letters to your patient (or debtor).

2. Kinum will check if the debtor has moved to a new house and send letters there.

3. If your patient has filed for bankruptcy or not

4. Check if the patient is litigious or not, to protect your practice from costly lawsuits.

5. Update status in case there is a Mail Return.

6. Ability to forward this account for intensive collections ( Contingency based Collector calls) if the debtor still refuses to pay.

All this for only $15 per account. You can free up our staff time and focus on your dental practice. Performing collection tasks in house is a costly affair and may result in a full time position if the number of late paying/delinquent patients increase.

Additional features of Eaglesoft and Kinum utility ( Collections Extract Manager) include

1. Ability to transfer accounts to any step ( 1st party demands, 3rd party demands and 3rd party Collector calls)

2. You decide what should be the minimum outstanding balance eligible for collections.

3. Only send accounts if a payment hasn’t been made in ___ number of days and have been ____ days past due

4. Transfer accounts one by one or in bulk.

5. If you make a payment in your Eaglesoft software, our utility will pick that up and reflect on Kinum’s client portal.

Screenshots from the Kinum-Eaglesoft utility

Kinum’s cost effective collections for AthenaHealth users

Athena Health and Kinum have been working together to provide medical practices a cost effective, tactful and a streamlined process for debt collections on past due accounts. [Kinum-Athena partnership information on Athenahealth’s Website]

https://youtu.be/Fp4PvihJ9_0

Collection Agency for practices using AthenaHealth (https://youtu.be/Fp4PvihJ9_0)

Transfer of Past Due Accounts:
You will be able to directly transfer past due accounts from Athenahealth to Kinum without the need to re-enter them on Kinum’s client portal. Since Kinum reports all payments collected back to Athenahealth, you will be able to track the collections progress both inside the Athenahealth’s platform or by logging on Kinum’s client portal.

Account transfer rules:
Transfer rules can be set up based on your choice, which includes whether you want to transfer all past due accounts automatically after certain number of days, or manually transfer accounts one by one as needed. You can further setup rules if you want accounts to be transferred for Kinum’s Collection Letters service or to go for more intensive Collection Calls.

How to setup
First step is a signed agreement between Kinum and Practice. You will provide consent for transfer of accounts from Athenahealth to Kinum for collections. Then a Kinum representative will setup an online interactive meeting with you and complete the setup process which takes about 15 minutes.

Benefits and Pricing

Reduction in days in receivables
Ability to maintain the patient relationship
A low cost solution
No setup fees, no long term contracts, no hidden fees.

Collection Letters Service (also called the Connect – Step 1 or/and Step 2)

Best used on accounts 30-180 days past due (You control the process).
Customized setup of up to 5 Collection Demands.
Letters and/or phone calls.
Flat-fee of no more than $9.75 per account.
Best utilized after the third statement.
All money paid directly to you or in your Athena PO box account.
Written demands are sent in colored print for maximum impact.
Spanish and English contacts.
Scrubs performed: Litigious Patient, Bankruptcy, USPS Change of Address.
Unlike other agencies, accounts purchased from Kinum never expire. But majority of AthenaHealth clients are setup on a “Pay-as-you-go” basis so you won’t have to setup anything in advance.

Collections Calls by a debt collector (also called the Collect – Step 3)

No upfront cost, Kinum charges only if it collects.
40% contingency fees.
Best used on accounts over 180 days past due.
Process controlled by Kinum.
Kinum accepts payments and puts them into a trust account and will send you the contracted percentage the following month.
Credit Reporting, if requested

Legal (Step 4):
Accounts may be forwarded for legal intervention if all other reasonable strategies have been exhausted.

Image: Kinum’s typical collection process

Already using another collection agency?
Try Kinum and we sincerely believe that you will be delighted to see the difference.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d48N-RL5C6A

Kinum Connect & Collect Explained – Debt Recovery That keeps your customers (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d48N-RL5C6A)

Collection Agency for Dental Debt

Dental collections requires a deep understanding of how a dentist and patient relationship works. Even with no fault of the dentist himself, a single cranky patient can possibly attempt to spoil the reputation of a dental practitioner in many ways, he may post negative reviews on Twitter and Google or even spread negative publicity with word of mouth. Dentists face ever increasing challenges including increased competition, changing regulatory environment, business complications, further more doctors have to buy the Malpractice Insurance, which can be quite costly. Amid all these challenges, the pressure of reduced cash flow due to their past due accounts can not just be frustrating but also become a roadblock to expand their practice.

Dental collections made simple:
After a very careful evaluation we have partnered with Kinum collection agency which has enormous experience and success with dental collections. These are the main steps involved in dental collections.

Here are the main parameters for our recommendation.

a) Number of accounts purchased for collections never expire. This is an astronomical advantage.

Nearly all other collection agencies keep an expiration duration on accounts purchased which varies from 6 months to 2 years. Due to this expiration clause, either the dentists land up buying fewer than needed accounts at a higher price, or buying a larger number of accounts just to realize that a large chunk of them went unused and finally expired. This is a win-win strategy for collection agency but not the doctor/dentist. If accounts do not expire, dentists can purchase large number of accounts in one go and avail the benefit of lower pricing.

b) Adherence to federal and state laws. Agency follows additional guidelines specific to the medical and dental industry including HIPAA*, TCPA, and FDCPA.

c) Going an extra step by implementing direct integration with billing software products like ‎EagleSoft, ‎Dentrix and many more. These technical integrations allow transfer of accounts from these billing softwares to the collection agency using a simple interface. It’s a great time saver and convenience to any dentist.

d) Unlike almost all other collection agencies, Kinum’s collection letters are sent in colored print instead of plain black and white. This extra investment from Kinum ensures that these demands are taken a lot more seriously by your patients.

e) Guarantee of collections: A promise to minimally collect 2 times the purchase price if all accounts purchased are submitted through the Step 1 and/or Step 2 as per the contract else the refund clause can be invoked.

f) Provides a 24/7 online portal to submit accounts and monitor the progress of accounts already in collections.

g) The agency is experienced in dental collections, keeps up to date with the changing regulatory environment of the industry.

h) Performs additional checks on debtors if their address has changed or if the patient is protected due to bankruptcy. Furthermore, the agency attempts to check if the patient has a history of being litigious.

i) Offer contingency services for more difficult to collect accounts or those which are over 5-6 months old.

j) There are no hidden fees and the process is kept completely transparent.

k) Accounts purchased under Step 1 and Step 2 are fixed fees services and are an extremely cost effective way to recover on past due accounts. Furthermore, it gives you more than 30% discount if Step 1 and Step 2 services are purchased under the combo package scheme.

l) Offers to report the debt to credit bureaus like Experian, Equifax and Transunion if you want.

*HIPAA is the federal law that governs how “Covered Entities” and “Business Associates” handle the privacy and security of patients’ protected health information (PHI).

Medical Debt Collections – Recover money quickly

When it comes to recovering past due amount from debtors in health care industry, early intervention is extremely important compared to other industries. Let us share some interesting reasons behind it.

Kinum Collection Agency is a leader in medical debt collections serving hundreds of practices all across USA. Diplomatic collection practices followed by our debt collectors helps to protect the valuable reputation of your healthcare practice.

Regardless of the size of your healthcare practice Kinum delivers superior recovery rates from your accounts receivable. Kinum maintains a BBB rating of A+ and is affiliated to ACA International. Kinum is 100% HIPAA-compliant and a knowledgeable staff which does not indulge in unethical techniques.

Kinum offers both “Flat fees” and “Contingency only” options. Some debts are collected within days while others take longer. Every account assigned to Kinum if taken very seriously and maintains a high reputation in medical debt collections.

1. Why is there such an urgency to submit accounts early?
Here is a graph showing the probability of collecting money depending upon how old the debt is.

If a demand is raised within 30 days, the probability of recovering money is nearly 90%. If you wait for 6 months, the chances fall to about 50% and keeps falling there after. Flat fees services charged by a medical collection agency is extremely cheaper than engaging your own staff to handle these account receivables.

2. Keep your patients:
Pre-collections (or Step 1) and Soft collections (Step 2) play a vital role in Medical accounts receivables. These two steps attempt to put enough pressure on the patient to pay without annoying him. Lets look at this chart before we discuss further.

In Step 1, a total of five “reminder” calls/letters go out in your own name, in Step 2 about five more “collection” letters go out under collection agency’s name. Our recommendation is that, after 30 days of non-payment of the account, it should be forwarded to a collection agency for Step 1. For the next 90 days, the collection agency will tactfully send a total of 10 contacts and there is a 90% chance that you will recover your money. The verbiage of these contacts change from soft to intensive. If a patient pays you the amount-due during these 10 contacts, there is a high probability that you will not lose this patient and he/she will likely not spread a bad word about you since the collection was done in an amicable manner.

3. No one likes to pay for services.

Accept the fact, people pay straight up in cash for groceries, diapers, cigarettes, alcohol, restaurant bills etc. because they are getting a physical product in exchange for money. After getting a medical or dental treatment, a patient walks away with pretty much nothing. Willingness to pay for services goes down as the time passes by. It further becomes a lower priority if other kind of bills like auto-loan are also outstanding for your patient. With collection agency in the middle, it creates a sense of responsibility and fear in your patient’s mind, increasing your chances to get paid.

How to shortlist a medical collections agency:

Select an agency which does not charge extra for Address Scrub, Bankruptcy Scrub and Litigious Defaulter Scrub in its Step 1 and Step 2, these costs quickly add up. The price per account ( with 5 contacts) varies between $28 to $9. More accounts you buy in one go, lower the pricing is.
Most agencies charge separately for Step 1 and Step 2 services. Only a few companies offer a combo package of Step 1 and Step 2, resulting in cost savings for the doctor in the range of 30% – 40% vs when you buy separately.
Select a medical collection agency which does both English and Spanish demands.
Most agencies will expire your unused Step 1 and Step 2 accounts after 1 or 2 years. Only a handful of agencies have these accounts with no expiration date. Isn’t this awesome. You can buy larger chunk of accounts initially at a lower price and keep using them over the years.
Many agencies will try to sell you contingency collection services directly (Step 3) even if your debt is less than 180 days old, which means they do not charge anything initially, but they keep about 40% to 50% of amount collected. This is a great deal for the collection agency but not for you. I repeat, Step 1 and Step 2 have a smaller up front cost, but they are drastically cost effective. Only, if a patient does not pay after Step 1 and Step 2, or you have put in enough efforts to collect money, only then assign it to Step 3. Another time this should be directly done is if the account is more than 5 or 6 months old.
Will the agency report your defaulters to the Credit Bureaus after all collection efforts have exhausted, and you get to set that preference.

This article is equally applicable to all Medical, Dental, Vision, and Veterinary practices.