Issue: #13

September 2014

In This Issue

Partnering With You for Success!

Reduce Your Workload

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Dear SMB Client,

We hope you had a wonderful and relaxing summer. Here at SMB, we have been busy fine tuning our efforts to reduce your workload. In this newsletter we will articulate how SMB helps your practice grow while reducing your stress and workload. In addition, we highlight our CEO, Glen Sands.

We hope you enjoy reading our newsletter.

Sincerely,

SMB

Employee Spotlight: Glen Sands

Glen Sands, CEO & President

ABOUT ME AND MY FAMILY

My lovely wife Susan and I have been happily married for 24 years. We have two sons (ages 16 and 13) who keep me extremely busy with their activities which include basketball, baseball, soccer and fishing. I love every minute of cheering for them and watching them excel in their respective interests. In addition, we love to travel and take every opportunity we can to get away and just have fun. The boys have become obsessed with deep sea fishing and I must say they have "reeled" me in as well.

FUN(NY) FACTS

My wife used to be in the Kansas City Ballet. I have seen the Nutcracker multiple times and really enjoy the arts.
When I was younger I played in a rock band. (It's true, I can actually sing!) And I love all the retro music and can name any song and artist of the 70s and 80s.
My dog "Sandy" is my constant companion.

MY GOALS TO HELP YOUR PRACTICE

I want SMB Medical Billing to meet and exceed all of your expectations. We are here to partner with you to ensure that you get maximum reimbursements for your hard work.
We also want to be a resource to help you in the ever-changing world of the medical field. Let us take the pressure off of you, so that you can concentrate on growing your Practice.

Partnering With You for Success!

By: Cheryl Sands

Cheryl Sands, Executive Vice President

"Up front", Copay and Deductible collection are more important than ever now. We are seeing more and more plans in place with higher deductibles and copay requirements. Due to these factors, it is very important to be diligent to check patients' insurance benefits prior to seeing them.

Waiting for an insurance company to process a claim when the entire allowable (or a large portion thereof) has been applied to their deductible puts negative financial burden on your practice. It may take patients over 90 days and beyond to pay their bills in full. You can be proactive by asking your staff to collect copays at the time of service (this is a must) and to call for precerts, authorizations, while checking on the patients' deductible amounts that remain unmet. You have every right to collect the deductible amount upfront. A refund can always be issued later if the anticipated amount you collected was too much.

Some insurance companies require a pre-authorization or referral. Make sure your staff knows the rules/requirements for each individual plan. They must be diligent in getting these referrals/authorizations or your work may be for naught. We know how incredibly hard you work and we intend for you to get your full reimbursement.

Another way to help us is to make sure we get every piece of information up front that we need to transmit the claim. Here are items that are routinely left off the information that we get:

� No DX or cpt code listed

� Not referencing RT or LT when needed

� Leaving off a toe digit (11750-example)

� No insurance given

� No patient demo page - we need all information to include Date of birth, address etc.

� Nursing home face sheets omitted

� Failure to list the Date last seen and primary care physician when necessary

All of these items slow down your reimbursements. I have laid out things we need from you, now we need to hear from you! What can we be doing better to serve you? After all, you are our top priority and we want to exceed your expectations. We are here to help, assist and to listen and take action on every concern you may have. We look forward to hearing from you. Send us your thoughts at suggestions@smbmedicalbilling.com.

Reduce Your Workload

By: Chad Bixler

Chad Bixler, Business Development

We, at SMB's marketing, are seeing that the workload on Podiatrists is dramatically increasing. We hear the higher levels of stress in the voices of the Podiatrists we talk to. We feel the tension that the Podiatrists are experiencing. SMB provides release from this burden. SMB's clients are offloading their workload to SMB while maximizing reimbursements and reducing outstanding receivables.

How does SMB do this?

SMB deals with the payors (insurance companies, Medicare, Medicaid) for you. We resolve reimbursement issues for you. We out-last payors' delaying tactics such as being placed on hold for long periods of time. SMB people are experts at podiatry medical billing that daily deal with all CMS regions, all states and 98% of the insurance companies. Thus, SMB reduces the time and energy it takes to deal with payors.

SMB deals with the patients for you. SMB does your patient billing. We handle your patients' billing questions. Our people have been specifically trained to work with older Medicare and Medicaid patients. We are saving our clients many hours.

SMB's system and procedures are designed to reduce your workload. SMB handles everything for you from the time you generate your super-bill to when you receive your reimbursements. SMB provides the electronic platform for claim submittal. SMB provides you with a web-based practice management system that gives you complete transparency about your claims and what is being done. SMB provides the information quickly and conveniently so you may get to more important things.

Perhaps you have a Podiatrist friend or colleague who needs to reduce their workload. Please allow us to tell them about SMB, show them SMB's advantages and feel confident that SMB can help them. You may have them visit ReduceWorkload.com. Better yet, have them email me, Chad, at contactsmb@podiatry-billing-service.com or call him at 888-874-5503.

From all of us at SMB, we hope you have a wonderful fall. Thank you for reading our quarterly newsletter.

Sincerely,

SMB