Medical Account Solutions » outsourcing

Outsourcing and the 44 million dollar question?

Webmaster — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 15:00:29 +0000

Have you heard this yet?

Bronx-Lebanon Hospital owes Alexis Rodriguez, and several hundred other patients, an apology. It was just “a simple mistake,” of course. But tell that to Alexis Rodriguez.

Basically, the billing firm handling invoicing for Bronx-Lebanon Hospital made a data entry error that placed the invoice number in the “Amount Owed” field. So several hundred patients received bills to the tune of eight digits!

Here’s a link to the full article: “You’re Better – and You Owe $44 Million.”

Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not faulting Bronx-Lebanon for outsourcing their billing. We think outsourcing is one of the smartest things a hospital can do.

But here’s the thing: The company they chose to trust with invoicing their patients fell short when it to came time to quality review.

And that, my friends, created a mess.

Outsourcing can be a risky business when you don’t hire the best. Here are some tips to keep in mind if you’re considering outsourcing:

Details, details, details: In this case, this little faux pas happened because the company Bronx-Lebanon chose to use didn’t pay attention to the details. It’s vital for a company to pay attention to little details that can make the difference between a job well done and an embarrassing mess. So when you’re considering outsourcing a job to a company, pay attention to little details like what kind of presence they have on social media or how they handle communications such as responses to your e-mails. These little clues can give you insight into how they may handle your job.
Pricing: Outsourcing can’t be a matter of finding the lowest bid and running with it. Who knows how much money Bronx-Lebanon has lost in cleaning up this snafu, but you can bet they’ve lost quite a bit in future earnings just based on a sullied reputation. And errors like this aren’t the only possibility when you go with the lowest bidder. Any time corners get cut or quality is sacrificed for price, you run the risk of looking bad, or possibly even running into legal trouble.
Reputation: You’ve got to be able to trust the company you’re working with to have the same quality standards as you and your facility. A solid firm you’re going to hire needs to have a strong reputation you can trust. A history of success you can research and rely on. I wasn’t able to find much about the company Bronx-Lebanon used for their invoicing. Maybe that says something.

I know from my own experience, outsourcing has its pros and cons. So if you’re going to enjoy the benefits and steer clear of the potential hazards, you need to be able to settle on a company with the history and reputation to stand behind their work and keep your name out of the headlines.

Tell me, what guidelines do you follow when hiring a vendor? Any best practices you look for when outsourcing? What do you do to pay attention to details? Let me know in the comments.

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Golfing, Networking and Support for Mitochondrial Disease

Bill Baylis — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 14:09:55 +0000

Zachary Foundation

Come join Michael Friedberg of HNLY, and other healthcare industry members in support of the Zachary Foundation on October 5, 2011 at the Barry L. Schiff Memorial Healthcare Classic golfing event.

The Zachary Foundation was founded by the parents and friends of Zachary Friedberg of Morganville, New Jersey who suffers from a rare form of Mitochondrial Disease.

Bring your golf game and come out.

MAS has been in many of The Zachary Foundation golf outings and they have always been a lot of fun. This year they are honoring three of the long time supporters Andrew Goold, VP of The Healthsearch Group, James Y. Lee, FACHE Executive VP and COO of Lawrence Hospital Center and Adam K. Weinstein, FACHE VP for Regulatory Affairs and Corporate Compliance New York Hospital Queens.

Michael Friedberg who has played an important role in healthcare through the years and deserves our industry’s full support, says “Throughout the years we have been privileged to have support from many people and organizations, it is the commitment of these three individuals that has been the driving force for our success. Their gift to Zachary and children like him who suffer from Mitochondrial Disease has been given not for recognition or personal gain but only due to each of their own selflessness. My family and the entire Mitochondrial Disease community are forever in their debt.”

Registration is still open! I look forward to seeing you there!

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Lets Hire America First.

Bill Baylis — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 14:00:18 +0000

About a year ago MAS wrote a blog post Forget Outsourcing, Try Rural Sourcing. MAS Agrees! about the value of “Rural Sourcing” and the need to keep jobs in the US instead of sending them overseas.

And today… jobs are still the big topic for all of us. In last week’s address to Congress and the country, President Obama laid out his plan for creating jobs. He stated the plan’s core goal: “The purpose of the American Jobs Act is simple: to put more people back to work and more money in the pockets of those who are working.”

The speech made me think of Linda McMahon’s quote on how jobs are created, “It’s very simple how you create jobs. An entrepreneur takes risk. He or she believes that they create a good or service that is sold for more than it costs to create it. If an entrepreneur thinks he can do that he creates a job.”

The heart and soul of the economy is small business. If you want to put Americans to work, it seems like a no brainer to begin with small businesses and entrepreneurs of America! We are standing ready to do whatever it takes to get the job done and start pumping some confidence back into the economy. Confident business owners hire.

Some companies may still have a need to send jobs overseas, but with the amount of people looking for work, MAS thinks it makes sense to hire people right here at home.

Small businesses can be creative in their hiring by focusing on their core expertise and outsourcing other job functions to entrepreneurs and consultants.

We use outsourcing to simplify things and be leaner and it’s been very effective for us. We hire out in key fields like IT, Accounting/CFO and other services for pennies on the dollar–with better results. This lets us focus on what we’re good at–is medical billing and collections.Trusting our expert consultants has paid off for us.

The biggest win of all is that it’s freed us up to hire people to build our core business and create more local jobs for Americans.

So how can outsourcing to experts help you streamline your business and help boost the economy at the same time?

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Would YOU Take a Pay 4 Performance Job?

Webmaster — Mon, 23 May 2011 14:31:21 +0000

People in sales understand the concept of being paid for their performance. Most sales positions are commission or bonus based positions. The sales person gets paid when they meet preset sales goals. If a sales person doesn’t perform well they don’t get paid.

If you’ve never worked a sales position, then you pretty much got paid just for showing up to work, even if you don’t perform your best. Imagine if the amount of money you earned was directly tied into your level of performance on the job? Most people avoid sales positions because they need the guarantee of steady income and don’t want to be judged on the job.

Lately, a lot of industries are using a pay for performance strategy, including healthcare. Pay for performance can impact the state of the industry by affecting the cost and quality of healthcare. We like to see the healthcare industry is taking a page out of the business handbook.

At MAS, we love the concept and practice it with our Pay 4 Performance guarantee. Our medical billing clients don’t pay us until they get paid. We love accepting the challenge of hitting account receivables and collections goals for our clients.

We see “pay 4 performance” as an incentive produce. We know when we work hard we’ll get paid for the results. Here’s a question for you. Would you “work for performance”? Let us know what you think about the pay for performance concept.

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MAS Wonders if ACOs are Already in Jeopardy?

Webmaster — Mon, 16 May 2011 14:24:37 +0000

In the world of healthcare, ACOs or Accountable Care Organization have only recently been creating a huge buzz. Are they already in jeopardy?

ACO’s may already be at risk, due to recent budget cutting measures passed by the House of Representatives that would restructure Medicare and Medicaid. If the Ryan budget is fully passed, it will likely start the countdown to the end of Accountable Care Organizations, which were created under the Obamacare law.

Currently Medicare is a “fee for service system” where healthcare providers are paid for each service rendered. At it’s current rate of reimbursement government spending on Medicare increases 7.2 percent each year and is projected to consume every dollar produced in the United States in only a few years. To try and prevent this, the Ryan budget begins a slow transition away from the current fee for service system to a voucher program that would allow seniors to buy private insurance free of charge.

This move is expected to save billions of dollars in Medicare spending and will guarantee coverage for seniors who otherwise will find themselves exposed when the program runs out of money, while still leaving coverage for those currently on Medicare or nearing retirement unchanged.

As ACOs are currently structured, providers in ACOs receive a portion of every dollar they are able to save Medicare in the form of a bonus. Under the proposed plan however Medicare would only be buying insurance for people not paying doctors directly, removing the main draw of an ACO for doctors and hospitals ultimately rendering ACOs a thing of the past.

So are ACOs almost a thing of the past before they even become reality? Chime in and let us know what think–post a comment below or on our Facebook page.

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MAS takes a closer look at ACOs-Accountable Care Organizations

Webmaster — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 14:45:20 +0000

Recently, Bill Baylis of Medical Account Solutions attended a local event at the Long Island Business News Power Breakfast that focused on the topic “Healthcare on Long Island-Can We Afford It?”

In his blog following the event LIBN breakfast was Powerful but left LI Heathcare Powerless Bill shared his thoughts and disappointment on the lack of knowledge from local “experts” about ACOs. What was surprising was that all the industry experts were unable to say how things are going to turn out since the new lay has been passed.

The definition of an ACO might differ slightly depending on who you talk to. In another MAS blog, the end results and benefits were identified as an ACO being”… technology-dependent, requiring good healthcare data to identify the patients and communities most in need, as well as electronic patient records immediately accessible to all doctors and hospitals treating a patient.”

To help educate all of us, Bill is launching an MAS blog series focusing on ACOs, presenting the pros, cons and some food for thought. We’d love to hear what you think in the process, so be sure to post your comments, ask questions and share with others!

Stay tuned for the first installment “ACOs-Accountable Care Organization’s Part 1- The Pros for Them”

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Bill Baylis is a Basso on Business Guest Blogger: Do You Outsource? Here’s 3 Core Reasons Why You Should Consider It

Webmaster — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 19:02:16 +0000

Bill Baylis is a guest blogger for Rob Basso of Basso on Business. Below is an introduction to the post. Please click through to read the full post and to add your comments and thoughts.

As a decision maker in today’s business climate, it’s more important than ever to know your options for success. One such option is outsourcing. Whether it’s outsourcing a single specific task, such as collecting on an overdue account, or outsourcing your entire accounts receivable function, the possibilities are endless!

To help you determine whether or not outsourcing may be for you, here are 3 core reasons for consideration:

Click here to visit the Basso on Business site and read the full article.

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Bill Baylis talks about the state of Medical Billing and Outsourcing

Webmaster — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 15:38:35 +0000

In a short video, Medical Account Solutions President, Bill Baylis talks about the state of medical billing on Friday , January 7th at the Health and Business Alliance. The HBA meets at The Holliswood Hospital 87-37 Palermo Street Holliswood, Queens, NY. For more information, call Bill Baylis at 516-348-7282 or visit the HBA website at http://www.hbametro.org/

Bill recommends that hospitals focus on doing what they do best, and let others—experts—take care of the rest! Click here now to watch the video on the front page of the MAS website!

A special thanks to the HBA for all of their support!!

About MAS: Is there a certain area in your medical billing process which is slowing you down or eating into profits? You no longer have to let an unmet billing need undermine your strength and efficiency. With its team of talented medical billing experts, Medical Account Solutions (MAS) can help your healthcare organization identify and focus on your unique problem and fill the void to keep your billing processes running smoothly.

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Get the MAS Profitability Calculator

Bill Baylis — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 15:37:50 +0000

We’ve had some discussion and outright debate about value of outsourcing and making the decision to keep your billing staff in-house or sending your accounts receivable out.

Now MAS makes it easier to know how profitable your medical billing practice is!

We know that a lot of hospitals have reversed the trend of outsourcing all of their in-patient billing so they can put a concentrated effort on receivables by putting their best and brightest to streamline and maximize that part of the A/R.

At MAS we understand that many doctors and hospitals are on the fence and that the truth is that they are not sure if outsourcing will actually result in increased profits.

To help answer that question, MAS has developed a complimentary Profitability Calculator so you can have concrete proof that using MAS to manage your medical billing will have a positive and profitable impact on your bottom line.

All you have to do is sign up now to get your copy of the MAS Profitability Calculator so you don’t have to keep tackling cash flow alone. Click here to sign up for your copy now.

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Letting Go to Grow

Bill Baylis — Mon, 08 Nov 2010 15:00:57 +0000

Recently I heard someone say that when you’re building a team, in order to grow you have to learn to let go.

Many of us when we start our businesses are used to doing everything by ourselves. We get scared of letting go and delegating to others. Because we’re afraid that things won’t be done right and that our customers are gonna be the ones to suffer.

Doctor’s are no different. Some doctors run their medical offices this way. They are almost too involved in the administrative things and aspects of running their practice and it gets in the way of patient. They are concerned about outsourcing their medical billing or other administrative tasks.

Other doctors, especially those in multi doctor practices hire staff in house to manage the administrative things, but it’s still hard for them to let go and their staff to get overwhelmed with things like following up with patient billing, the back and forth with insurance companies. These time consuming activities–especially those for medical billing–can make it harder to focus on the core functions of their practice–patient care.

But the truth is if we don’t learn to delegate and get the support we need it’s going to be hard for us to grow. So learn to let go and outsource the things that are taking up too much time for your practice.

Outsourcing to me Bill Baylis and my company MAS to manage your accounts and receivables and medical billing will make it easier for you and your staff to focus on the more important aspects of your practice—your patients.

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