How therapists can manage difficult billing conversations with clients?

Guide to Mental Health Billing

It isn’t easy to discuss with patients concerning counseling fees and therapy costs, especially knowing that they’re coming to you during a tough time. It can certainly be awkward to bring up money after a patient may have talked through distressing content with you. After all, you’ve entered the mental health industry to care for the needs of people, and to help and see them through their difficult situations; so, bringing money into it can feel disconcerting. 

But, therapy billing doesn’t have to be difficult. In a mental health practice, at the end of the day, you are needing to make a profit, and you must cover any incurring costs. Using healthcare billing software is a great way to do so, and in a non-invasive way that can make things more comfortable for you and your clients. Medical billing errors account for 24% of healthcare issues, and so it’s important to get this right. With software and implemented practices, you can ensure that your patients can openly communicate with you and supply the right amount of money, as well as that your medical billing processes are the most efficient they can be. 

Tips to manage difficult billing therapy conversations with your clients

To make those therapy billing conversations easier, we have collated some top tips to ensure you are providing the highest quality of care for your client and ensuring that you are also making a profit.  

1. Policy clarification - One of the easiest ways to navigate billing conversations is to outline your policies and fee structures right from the beginning. It can be helpful to create a document that highlights your payment policies and to go over this with clients to ensure they understand what is required of them if they choose to continue. Once they’ve had a read-through, it can be beneficial for them to sign this to ensure that there are no misunderstandings. 
2. Be specific - Even though your payments may be made on a case-by-case basis, try to avoid being vague. Clients in difficult financial situations will want to know how many sessions they can afford, and whether you offer reduced fees; essentially, they want a transparent fee process. When patients come to you with questions, being able to openly communicate and provide clear answers boosts the quality of your service, and prevents missed payments, and session terminations. 
3. Define your sliding scale and no-fee policies - Whether you have a sliding scale to accommodate those with different income streams or no-fee policies for select clients who need help but can’t contribute anything, you must make this clear. You may not want to turn away patients for those who have difficult financial situations by having blanket policies, but at the same time, if you have different ones, you need to clarify them for patients. Being honest avoids misconstrued information, and will prevent you from feeling guilty or like you have let someone down. 
4. Prepare a list of colleagues - It’s not realistic to say that you’re able to treat everyone. For those who you aren’t able to offer treatment to, it can be helpful to refer the client to a colleague or offer a sliding scale or reduced fees, so the patient can be seen and treated. In business terms, you won’t gain any profits, but as a professional who entered the industry to help people, it’s important to prioritize their needs. 
   

If this overwhelms you, there are also billing services for therapists who can offer ways to provide transparent therapy invoices. This way, a lot of the process is done for you, and you can easily address any financial billing concerns. 

How to Handle Mental Health Billing Denials, Rejections, and Appeals?

Mental health billing denials, rejections, and appeals are the most difficult steps in the billing process. They require a lot of reevaluation, assessment, and review, and can be very time-consuming for practices to keep up with. Ensuring you have the right processes in place will mean that you can avoid any further stresses, and handle therapy invoices effectively and efficiently. 

Denial and rejection can happen at the clearinghouse or insurance level, and accessing your electronic health records (EHRs) can determine where this occurred. Doing so enables you to pinpoint whether this was due to missing enrollments, bad subscriber IDs, or simply incorrect information. If not due to these reasons, then it will likely not be on part of the clearinghouse, but rather, denied by the insurance company, who you then need to call. 

The insurance company, with your claim on file, may have denied it due to unauthorised sessions, needing updated provider information, lack of timely filing, terminated coverage, or multiple benefit issues. For example, the insurance company may have updated policies that need addressing. Going through any denied or rejected claims on a case-by-case basis is the best way to resolve this issue, filtering through the dates of services and refiling with correct information. 

In the case of appeals, speaking to the right representatives and filling out the correct forms to fight your case for eligibility will prove beneficial. 

Identifying the most suitable billing platform for your mental health business

Medical billing software is one of the best ways to manage difficulties surrounding billing conversations and processes, as most software for healthcare teams is designed with you and your client's needs in mind. They provide immense benefits, including:

Minimizing errors - With online software, the need for paperwork is eliminated. Software designed specifically for medical billing purposes reduces the likelihood of making mistakes and reduces human errors that go hand-in-hand with filling out physical forms. 

Accessible information - It is far easier to access patient billing data in a way that is private and secure. For example, patients can access and amend their information if needed, such as their previous appointments if auditing their bills, meaning that using a billing platform allows for a highly transparent billing process. 

Enhances claim tracking - When you process and track claims, medical billing software can help with identifying coding errors, and alerting you if there are any denied or rejected claims. By doing so, it increases the overall data accuracy and efficiency of the claims process. 

Improving financial reports - You can use medical billing data to monitor financial performance aspects for your clinic. This allows for in-depth analysis into where you can improve your practice, to continue providing the best care for your patients. 

Ace coding - Medical billing software also elevates the quality of the coding process, by using AI to automate and streamline coding and charting. It pulls out the essential details while identifying any errors to prevent delays on claim processing.

Ensures patient care - Overall improvements in the payment experience allow for patients to receive the highest level of care. 

Final thoughts

We acknowledge that it isn’t easy to discuss and manage billing conversations and processes with clients. It’s a bit of an ugly side to the mental health discipline, as we want to help our patients, but at the same time, we need to ensure we are making a profit with the right processes in place. While we hope this has developed and consolidated your understanding of how to navigate such conversations, sometimes having medical billing software in place is the easiest way to manage these situations. When it comes to your therapy bills, Carepatron serves as a great option, as they have integrated medical billing software to help you track claims, identify areas of improvement, as well as ensure you are being transparent with clients.

Whether you consider this or not, we hope our tips have improved your understanding of the importance of productive dialogue with patients concerning billing. With the right systems in place, you can make sure you never have another uncomfortable conversation about billing. 

One therapy app for practitioners and their clients: Try Carepatron for free today!

Further reading:

• The Practice of Therapy – Resources, tips and advice for success private practice
• How practitioners can avoid frequent ethical pitfalls?