Based on the AMA’s findings, the health insurance business as a whole has about an 80 percent accuracy rate for processing and paying claims. Coventry Health Care Inc. ended up on top of the seven commercial health insurers assessed by the AMA along with a national accuracy rating of 88.41 percent. Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield completed the list with a national accuracy rating of 73.98 percent.

The AMA estimates that $777.6 million in unnecessary administrative fees could be saved if the health insurance industry boosted claims processing accuracy and reliability by one percent. At the moment, the health care system spends as much as $210 billion annually on claims processing. One new analysis estimated physicians pay out the equivalent of five weeks per year on health insurer red tape. To keep up with the administrative responsibilities required by health plans, physicians divert up to 14 percent of their earnings to guarantee accurate payments from insurers.

To promote a more economical and streamlined payment system, the AMA’s National Health Insurer Report Card delivers a handy overview of how each of the nation’s seven main commercial health insurers can improve their claims processing efficiency. The methods health insurers utilize to process and pay out claims were assessed according to:

• Accuracy. Along with measuring overall claims processing accuracy and reliability, the report card looked at how accurately insurers reported the proper contract fees to physicians. Commercial health insurance providers realized significant improvements over the past three years. Contracted fees were properly reported 78 to 94 percent of the time in 2010, in contrast to 62 to 87 percent of the time in 2008. UnitedHealth showed the biggest improvement in reporting correct contract fees, while Health Care Service Corporation scored the highest. The overall performance of insurers varied substantially by state, ranging from 58.6 to 96.9 percent.

• Denials. The inconsistency found among health insurers in 2008 continued to be shown in 2010. There is wide variation in the frequency of denials by insurers, ranging between .7 to 4.5 percent. Lack of eligibility remains the most frequent cause of claim denials, signaling the need for employers and insurers to help educate patients about the limits of their insurance coverage. Physicians can help reduce denials by making sure all claims are complete and accurate.

• Timeliness. The report determined that insurers’ response time to a claim ranged between five to 13 median days. With the exception of CIGNA, all of the insurers measured last year demonstrated slight increases in the number of days needed to respond to claims.

Every effort you can make to reduce denials, rejections and delays with your billing operations will mean more money to your bottom line. And for therapy practices, your best tool to achieve this is by using The Automated Medical Assistant, the online therapy billing solution created specifically to accommodate the intricacies of therapy practice billing.

“We’re excited about this new partnership, which brings powerful billing features to the Automated Medical Assistant and offers our clients the ability to shorten their revenue cycle and reduce patient bad debt,” said Advanced Billing Solution CEO and AMA creator Dr. Gary Traub.

In most practices today, some of the most inefficient and expensive challenges revolve around billing and collections. As more health plans shift the cost basis from the insurance company to the patient, out-of-pocket costs steadily rise, and providers continue to experience a significant and very costly increase in patient bad debt. In this economy, collecting a patient’s payment at the point-of-care and storing a payment method to assure collection in the future is more important than ever.

The credit card billing feature is offered to Automated Medical Assistant clients with no application or setup fees. Some additional features include:

• Allows for quick and seamless implementation
• Optimizes workflow when processing patient payments
• Accepts all major credit and debit cards
• Converts paper checks to ACH transactions to speed processing time
• Automatically posts payments directly into your patient accounts
• Frees up desk space – no separate credit card terminals or dedicated phone lines

Also featured is Patient Payment Assurance, or Card On File, which is a convenient and patient-friendly method for securing a form of payment from a patient — for processing at the time of service, after the adjudication of the insurance claim, or for repeat billings. Card on File reduces delinquent self pay and the need to send billing statements to your patients, increasing collections and saving you time and money.

Automated Medical Assistant™ (AMA) is the premier solution for online therapy billing software, therapy practice management software and medical scheduling software. The software is the flagship product of Advanced Billing Solutions, Inc., a health care technology company that provides affordable, user friendly medical billing/practice management software, as well as billing and practice management services for therapy practices.

At a time when therapy practices are being challenged to realize cost efficiencies to remain competitive, moving to electronic claims is an excellent financial decision. But how do you make this transition?

The Automated Medical Assistant™ is the premier online solution for therapy billing, practice management and scheduling. The system can automatically send your insurance claims to the insurance company. In fact, the system can even electronically handle your paper claims too. The built in clearinghouse knows which insurers accept electronic claims. For those that don’t, a paper claim is printed and mailed for you. The clearinghouse “scrubs” the claims and catches most errors that cause a denial.

The system is comprehensive and incredibly affordable. It makes it is extremely easy for your therapy practice to make the transition to electronic claims. The Automated Medical Assistant is the only tool you will need. Give us a call today (1-800-815-BILL), or sign up on our web site: www.automatedmedicalassistant.com. Get started today!

We’ve made sure that you can use AMA with your favorite handheld device, whether it’s a Blackberry, iPhone, iPad, Android or any other leading brand of smartphone. Check out some of the screenshots for yourself:

The therapy billing service from Advanced Billing Solutions, Inc. handles much of the difficult work associated with the billing process. We follow up on rejected claims, pursue and collect on unpaid accounts, and even send invoices directly to patients. The convenience of handing these headaches over to a resource who can give them their full attention is the main reason that providers choose to outsource.

We charge just 5-8% of what is actually collected, depending on the particulars of your practice. And because all the work is done with the Automated Medical Assistant, you have 24/7 access to your data, reports, graphs, and all the features of AMA. You can use this service for as long as you want, or cancel when you are ready to take over. All your data will be in the system so you can seamlessly pick up where we left off.

Besides costs, there are other factors where a provider should consider outsourcing their billing.

• Inefficient billing process – Outsourcing to a third-party billing service will decrease the number of rejected claims and improve the time it takes to receive payments.
• High staff turnover – High turnover in a provider’s billing department is damaging and leads to a slowdown or even stoppage in the processing of claims. With an outsourced option, claims processing moves forward like clockwork.
• New providers – Outsourcing your billing from the start can give you relief from the day-to-day challenges of launching a new therapy practice, without the additional burden of hiring, training and managing employees (typically one of your biggest start-up costs).
• Different priorities – Many therapists are not strong on the business side of running a practice, and their motivation lies in helping patients rather than pushing paperwork.

In sum, our therapy billing service takes the stress out of having to deal with the constant changes and complexity of insurance regulations.  By allowing us to take over your billing, you eliminate the need to deal with difficult insurance carriers, and the many administrative headaches in managing the billing and collections process. We can increase your collections, decrease your costs, and improve your bottom line, while you focus on doing what you were trained to do: help patients get well.

Contact us today for a quote.

Cloud computing is generating a lot of buzz lately because many experts are predicting that most if not all software applications will eventually run online. Cloud computing lets you access applications and documents from anywhere you have an internet connection, freeing you from the confines of an office desktop and encouraging group collaboration across locations and time zones. Anyone who uses Google Docs, for example, is using a pioneering cloud computing product.

The Automated Medical Assistant is on the cutting edge of this major technology movement. Let’s take a look at some of the advantages of cloud computing:

• Lower PC costs – With cloud computing, your desktop computer can be a very basic model, with smaller hard disk, less memory, budget processor and in most cases no CD or DVD drive. Since the hardware burden is placed upon online computers running the applications, no software programs need to be loaded or maintained on your computer, and no documents need to be saved locally.
• Faster desktop performance – Fewer programs loaded on your desktop competing for memory mean better performance – faster booting, faster processing and an overall cleaner desktop running experience.
• Hardware freedom – Regardless of the device that you use to access your apps and docs on the cloud, from your home PC to work computer to iPhone or a device in a far off place, you won’t have to worry about configuring any of those devices or downloading anything special to get access and work immediately with your information.
• Data security – Losing your data because you neglected a critical backup on a local PC won’t happen when your data is on the cloud, and in most cases cloud data is stored, maintained and backed up in a manner much more compliant with data security laws than you could possibly do on your own (such as HIPAA in the healthcare industry).
  
• Anywhere document access – No worries about forgetting documents on your work PC when you are on the road or in another building. With cloud computing, you don’t have to take anything with you. As long as you have an internet connection, a computer or an iPhone or similar smartphone handset, you can always get access to your documents anytime, anywhere.
• Streamlined collaboration – Sharing documents means more easily collaborating on documents, and this is especially useful when you have large teams of people interacting with the same documents.
• Latest document version – When you edit a document in a cloud computing environment, you always have access to the latest version of that document.
• Instant and free automatic updates – When you log into a web-based cloud application, you get the latest software version available automatically, with no installations, troubleshooting or software conflicts with your other desktop applications or operating systems. You won’t need to pay for any downloads either.

Find out how you can jump onto the cloud computing wave now and free your therapy billing tasks from the confines of your office PC. Contact us today for a free demo.

The built-in clearinghouse “scrubs” the claims before they are sent. This means that the claims are checked for common errors that would lead to an insurance company denial. You get the feedback right within the software. You can then immediately fix any errors and resubmit right on the spot. It doesn’t get any easier!

“The new website is designed to give our product a more contemporary look and feel, and we are looking forward to utilizing it as the cornerstone of our new online marketing efforts for the Automated Medical Assistant” said Dr. Gary Traub, Director/CEO of Advanced Billing Solutions, Inc. and developer of the Automated Medical Assistant™.

The new site acts as a portal for new and existing customers, and features sections for detailed product feature descriptions, client testimonials, videos, and includes areas about the company’s service offerings, including online therapy billing software and therapy practice management software. iPhones and similar smartphones are served a streamlined, mobile-friendly version of the new design, Also included are Web 2.0 initiatives such as a therapy billing blog and links to the company’s profiles on the popular social networking sites Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

Future website additions in the coming months will showcase the many new product features that are continually being released.

About the Automated Medical Assistant™

Automated Medical Assistant™ (AMA) is the premier online solution for therapy billing software, therapy practice management software and medical scheduling software. The software is the flagship product of Advanced Billing Solutions, Inc., a health care technology company that provides affordable, user friendly medical billing/practice management software, as well as billing and practice management services for therapy practices.

For more information contact:

Dr. Gary Traub, Director/CEO
Advanced Billing Solutions, Inc.
1-800-815-BILL
info@automatedmedicalassistant.com