Medical Billing Blog

3 Steps a CEO Can Take to Improve Accounts Receivables

  

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Medical practices, hospitals and physician groups know that medical billing changes at the speed of sound. If a medical business doesn’t keep on top of these changes it runs the risk of lost revenue and increased liability. Accordingly, the Accounts Receivable department is one of the most important departments in a healthcare-related business.

The success of your business rests, in large part, in the hands of this crucial department. But, what can you do from the top to ensure that the accounts receivable (AR) process is humming along smoothly?

While you can’t (and don’t want to) micromanage your AR staff, there are steps that, as CEO, you can take to improve the functionality of the department:

1. Set the right tone. One of the most important responsibilities you have as CEO is to ensure effective communication with employees.  It’s up to you not only to steer the ship, but to make sure the crew knows where you’re going and they are doing their best to get there.  To help educate staff, this can be as simple as drafting an internal pointing out the risks of faulty or inefficient AR practices in contrast to the concrete benefits of improved practices. It might also mean making regular visits to the department, not to check up on folks, but to establish a genuine rapport with them and to keep abreast of potential issues affecting morale and motivation.
2. Choose the right leaders. Each person in the reporting chain between you and your AR department, from the CFO to the AR Manager, is a potential weak link. As CEO, you need to have leaders in place who are capable of making good hiring decisions.  You don’t want to have to make an end-run around your CFO in order to get a good departmental manager in AR. You’re much better off providing direction and advice to a reliable CFO and letting her make those personnel decisions.
3. Implement effective auditing processes.  Running an accounts receivable aging report, evaluating the results and identifying weak areas is a key process to increasing your AR department’s effectiveness. Creating built-in peer audits, internal audits and even periodic external audits can provide you and your leadership team with information to ensure you are collecting every dollar.

While it isn’t practical for a CEO to be down in the details, these three steps can provide you with a higher level of confidence in the effectiveness of your AR Department.

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