At Fusion Anesthesia Solutions, we frequently talk to anesthesia providers who are dissatisfied with their current billing situation but reluctant to make a switch. They feel as if they are contractually obligated to continue in a bad anesthesia billing situation.

When we encounter these conversations, the complaints typically fall into one of the following categories:

• Lagging Collections – Anesthesia Providers feel like their billing company is not collecting as much revenue as they should be but can’t quite put their finger on the cause.
• Deficient Reporting – When Anesthesia Providers are unable to pinpoint reasons for lagging collections or experience delays in obtaining needed financial reports, this should be an indication that something is amiss.
• Patient complaints – When there are complaints regarding delayed wait times to speak to a representative regarding their bill, or an inability for the patient representative to accurately answer questions regarding their bill (for example, differences between MD/CRNA charges), this reflects poorly on your practice.

If you’re experiencing any of the aforementioned issues, chances are you are in a sub-par and challenging anesthesia billing situation. These red flags are signs that something is going on behind the scenes with your anesthesia billing company and the end result is likely affecting your bottom line.

Example: If your billing company can’t provide near real-time reports and analytics on revenue, volumes and the net collection ratio then they either don’t have them and, more importantly – aren’t analyzing these reports that give insight as to the financial health of your practice. Reports are critical for obtaining actionable data and ensuring your practice is profitable.  

Example: If you call for an explanation as to why days over 120 is growing,  then you’ve likely just alerted your anesthesia billing provider as to an issue instead of vice versa. This lack of service and attention to detail will ultimately be detrimental to your practice.

The Group Feels Stuck with Their Current Anesthesia Billing Solution

In our 47 years of anesthesia specific billing, we’ve had many conversations with providers who realize there is an issue but feel stuck in their current billing situation. The reasons vary from being contractually obligated to remain with the vendor or believing that the vendor will turn a corner and they’ll begin to see improvement. Another common excuse we hear is the fear that switching will result in lost revenue during the transition to a new company. And, finally, there are just those anesthesia providers that are simply too busy with their day-to-day responsibilities to take on a practice management change.

The reality is every day that you stay with an underperforming anesthesia billing company is another day that you are losing revenue; revenue you are unlikely to recover.

We’ve outlined a few of the most common scenarios we’ve heard below and Fusion’s response:

error icon“I am locked into a long contract” – Many sub-par anesthesia billing companies often force new clients to sign lengthy contracts (most are a minimum of 3 or 5 years!). Why? Because they know that when their contract expires, the unhappy client will leave. The longer the contract, the more years of revenue they are guaranteeing for themselves.

At Fusion Anesthesia, most of our contracts are for 1 year. In 47+ years of anesthesia billing, we’ve never had a client not renew their contract due to dissatisfaction, ever. A one-year contract – that’s how confident we are.

error icon“I should give my current anesthesia billing company another chance” – Why? You’ve given them access to the most important part of your business – your revenue. Why would you let them continue to manage your revenue with poor performance? You work hard, why would you settle for a company who isn’t working just as hard to maximize the revenue that you have worked for!?

When a client switches from a competitor to Fusion Anesthesia, we typically increase their revenue by up to 15%. What would a 10-15% bump in revenue mean to you and your partners?

error icon“If I terminate my contract, I’ll never see that lost revenue” – This is the most perplexing. If you’ve seen a continual decline in collections over the course of your contract, every day that you stay in that arrangement you are losing money that you will not recoup.

On average, clients that switch to Fusion see a bump in cash flow during ramp-up as well as increased collections (often upwards of 10%), which will help to offset revenue your old billing vendor wasn’t going to collect anyway.

error icon“Now’s not a good time to make a change, we need to wait until the end of the quarter or the end of the year to make a practice management change” – Again – every day that you stay in that situation is another day that you are losing revenue. There is no time like the present then to make a change for the better.

Your billing partner should be your biggest advocate. Fusion Anesthesia Solutions stays abreast coding changes, billing mandates, compliance adherence and so on. We take care of your anesthesia practice so you can practice medicine

error icon“I am worried about losing even more revenue if we switch” – Maybe you’ve had this experience in the past, which is simply unacceptable. No anesthesia practice should feel trapped with a vendor for fear of losing additional revenue.

At Fusion Anesthesia Solutions, we have a solid transition/implementation plan and have put processes and protocols in place to ensure that revenue will continue to flow and, typically even increase.

If you are stuck in a bad billing situation, contact the team at Fusion Anesthesia today.