The amicable recovery of claims for healthcare professionals' fees
Debt can be defined as an active debt, a sum of money that one person owes another. This sum can come from a provision of service, a sale, etc., and is generally recorded by legal documents. Generally, it must be paid no later than a date which is called the due date and which is known to both parties. However, it happens that the debtor finds himself unable to honor his part of the contract with the creditor. It is from this moment that the concept of Debt recovery. This is a very common phenomenon in the field of health.
Unpaid healthcare bills
Unpaid bills in the health sector concern several professionals in this sector of activity. Whether surgeons, doctors, physiotherapists, dental surgeons, ambulance companies, etc., they may find themselves confronted with these less than rosy situations. To this effect, unpaid invoices can be due to many reasons. They concern both the third-party payer and the patients themselves. In any case, the amicable collection of debts should always be considered before any other procedure. Among the reasons for unpaid invoices, you have:
Complementary funds
At this level, you find mutual non-support, unopened rights, unknown beneficiaries, which can lead to unpaid bills. The same is true for a service that is not covered, a lack of agreements, etc.
social security funds
At the CSS level, you have invoice rejections, errors during remote transmission or unknown beneficiaries in the BDO. Added to this is the unknown prescriber, the ASSU-NAT-REGIME incompatibility, the ETM not found in the BDO and many others.
The patients
Patients can also be the source of unpaid bills. This may be due to an unpaid balance, forgetfulness, late payment or simply bad faith. Faced with these situations, several solutions are possible to take possession of your money.
Amicable debt collection procedures
Amicable collection is the first phase of debt collection. These are all actions taken by the creditor to obtain payment of his unpaid fees, without any coercion or legal threat. Indeed, as mentioned above, any unpaid claim is not necessarily a sign of dishonesty. Amicable collection therefore allows the debtor to repair his wrong. To this end, it is necessary:
The recovery letter
The follow-up letter serves as a call to order from the client. It is simply necessary to remind the latter that the invoice has expired and that he has still not paid. This, without rushing or offending him.
The telephone follow-up
If your follow-up letter remains unanswered, you can opt for a telephone follow-up, always, in a courteous manner. The goal is not to be hostile with the customer. It's more about listening to his explanations and negotiating to reach a solution that is fair to both of you. This is all the more true when the non-payment is due to a temporary cash flow problem.
The formal notice to pay
It amounts to inviting the customer to fulfill his payment obligation within a short time. It also makes it possible to warn him that in default of payment, legal proceedings will be initiated against him. This is the final warning. It is also recommended to write it in the presence of a lawyer to give it more credibility.
As you will have noticed, all these steps can seem long and restrictive. It would therefore be best to entrust the management of your unpaid invoices to a specialized company.
Outsource your bill collection
Collecting unpaid invoices is essential if you want to preserve your cash flow. Whatever the amount, it is important that you are paid the fees that are due to you. As a healthcare professional, your schedule is already overloaded with work obligations. These include, among others:
- Cares
- Consultations
- Office management
- Material constraints
For all these reasons, it is recommended that you hire healthcare collection specialists to manage your unpaid bills. Entrusting the painful management of these to experts will allow you to recover the sums due while preserving the relationship with your patients. You benefit from a dedicated and efficient service that will allow you to save time on receipts, through rapid intervention.
In short, unpaid bills are a nuisance for health professionals, who generally lack the time to deal with them properly. Faced with this situation, the best solution available to them is to entrust this task to a specialized company.
