General Category > General Questions
Can you make a profit by charging 4%?
tallmanusa:
It is quite simple, the larger companies outsource to India, where billers get paid 50 cents an hour.
You can't pay $15 per hour and compete with someone who pays 50 cents per hour. There is no evidence that what the companies get for 50 cents per hour is any worse than $15 per hour.
With regards to suits, do you have some link that larger companies get sued more often? The large companies have tough contracts which makes suing them nearly impossible.
Athena Health is a public company, and on their records I don't see any pending suit.
Richard I don't doubt that small billers could help a lot of doctors; but the doctors are not convinced. E Clinical Works has 220,000 providers, that is 15% of the total market in USA, that is just one company. Doctors are flocking to these companies.
RichardP:
One can make money by starting a business - if they can attract investment money for start-up, and then later issue stock. One can pay themselves a handsome salary out of the investor's start-up money, and also pay themselves in stock. When the stock goes public, the entrepreneur can sell part or all of their stock and make even more money. And then, six months after the Initial Public Offering, the company can go bankrupt because its business plan was unworkable, and it is no bother to the entrepreneur who has already gotten their money out of the start-up. So yes tallmanusa, you can make yourself very wealthy by starting a billing company - even if you have no clue what billing is actually about.
Making money by starting a business is not the same thing as making money by doing medical billing properly. This forum is here to answer questions from those who wish to make money from doing medical billing properly. This is not a website designed to answer questions from those who want to learn how to start a business of the sort you wish to start.
I have posted some serious information about the actual billing part of medical billing, and you have responded to none of it other than to ignore what I said and ask why I wasn't using more sophisticated technology - even though I had already stated that we considered doing that (researched the issue) and decided it would not help us bring in any more money for the doctor than we do with our dinosaur setup. I'm left thinking that you are not a real person; rather, your posts are being written by a computer algorithm riffing off of key words in others' posts. Case in point:
You said above: "There is no evidence that what the companies get for 50 cents per hour is any worse than $15 per hour."
I can't imagine a real person would write such an uninformed statement. Particularly when I have written several times in this thread about the 50-doctor medical group that is leaving on the table about 30% of the money they should be collecting. There was no evidence to these folks that they were leaving that money on the table - until someone who knew what they were doing took a look at what they were doing. Their current off-site billing company, who ships the work offshore, has said nothing about this issue to them. They just bill what they are sent, and write off whatever gets rejected by the Insurance Carriers. We still monitor their work occassionally. And in spite of our comments, they are still leaving about 30% on the table (that fact won't show up in anybody's statistics, so how can you research it?). We won't take on their billing until their income exceeds their expenses - so they have no one who gives a damn to get in their faces and insist that they bill properly (since we get paid a percent, we tend to insist that our clients bill properly, because that means more money for us).
No evidence ... ??? There is, to people who know what they are looking at.
But, per my previous comment above - doctors who do simple medicine can get by with simple billling. So for those folks, there would be no benefit to them to overpay for their billing. For those folks, there would be no evidence that "what the companies get for 50 cents per hour is any worse than $15 per hour.
That makes the point that has been made throughout this discussion, but your comments are not informed by it: there are many different types of medical billing, from the simple to the extremely complex. The blanket statements you make don't account for these differences. Medical billing never has been, and never will be, a one-size-fits-all enterprise.
That distinction extends to the type of medicine practiced also - private practice vs. institutional medicine. In institutional medicine, the doctors use whatever technology the business office insists on. And institutional medicine uses the large billing companies. Those doctors are included in the numbers touted for how many doctors are using the large billing companies. But it can hardly be said that these same doctors actually chose the large billing companies. They didn't. The business office did. The choices made by doctors in private practice are quite different. They actually make the choice personally. When you look at statistics, it helps to break them out based on private practice versus institutional medicine.
He who knows not, and knows not that he knows not, is a fool; avoid him.
He who knows not, and knows that he knows not, is a student; teach him.
He who knows, and knows not that he knows, is asleep; wake him.
He who knows, and knows that he knows, is a wise man; follow him.
Attributions: Persian apothegm, Sanskrit Saying
PMRNC:
Nicely Said Richard. Can't think of anything I would add :)
tallmanusa:
Richard the stanza you stated is perfectly suitable to yourself. I could not have said any better also.
You are a person who peddles junk like office ally and practice mate; you must know a lot about these systems. The fact that they are free may have something to do with that? Nah. Must be stroke of genius.
Whatever I do, I would never use that free stuff to do any billing; it is disservice to the doctor.
Now you say that the doctors are " leaving money on the table "; I never responded to this before, because it is your opinion, that the doctors are idiots and hiring big companies; another stroke of genius from someone who uses free stuff.
Let me be more specific. When you take money from the doctor, it is for something and it is not for your elaborate speaking ability. To point out, every claim that is submitted mus be electronically "scrubbed". Practice Mate does not do it. Automation is used everywhere in the society and our business is better for it.
Second thing you must provide the doctors with reports, Practice Mate does not have any.
Then the system must call to confirm the appointments, Practice Mate does not.
I can go on and on. My website would have 40 pages of what we do and how we do it.
My point is that you are taking good money from the doctor, give him the best money can buy otherwise you are cheating the doctors.
tallmanusa:
A word about outsourcing.
I will be happy to hire American workers, but my competition hires them at 50 cents an hour, I can't pay them $15 per hour and make money.
My job is to get the doctor the best money can buy.
The person I hire in India does a better job at 50 cents an hour.
Have you ever worked with East Asians? They have better work ethics, and better education. Those are not my words, it was said time and time again during the recent elections.
Just because they look different, is no reason to consider them " inferior ".
Prejudices like always are based upon utter ignorance. They have children to feed, just like us at 50 cents per hour.
They do have problems with English, the big companies have a solution, they use a local buffer between them and the clients.
The solution is NOT denigrating the East Asians; the solution is for the US Congress to make laws that prohibit outsourcing, but such will never pass the Republican House. So that is the reality and deal with it.
So all big companies outsource, that is the way it is, accept it or find another business.
A word to Newbies, and all those attending " schools " to learn billing and coding; market is very tough, do your due diligence before you give out your money. Sadly those people preying on uniformed newbies are preying mostly on women with their last dimes, hoping to make a few dollars in this troubled economy, many with small children.
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