A positive patient billing experience isn’t just something that’s nice to have, it’s essential for a healthy revenue cycle. By making financial conversations precise, predictable, and patient-friendly, ambulatory surgery centers can build trust while strengthening long-term financial stability and ensuring more successful payment cycles.
Healthy RCM solutions require clear, timely, and compassionate billing, ensuring that the only surprises your facility delivers to your patients are positive ones.
Why Patient Account Reconciliation Matters
ASCs deliver exceptional patient care and convenience, but few things can undermine a good clinical experience like a confusing bill. An estimated 65% of healthcare consumers expect a more convenient billing process1; when their expectations aren’t met, it directly impacts patient perception. The billing experience is the last impression patients carry, and how positive or negative it is directly impacts your bottom line.
Since the procedures performed at ASCs often involve multiple departments and higher patient out-of-pocket costs, providers have particularly tricky billing and reconciliation challenges. Elective procedures can also present issues with co-pays, deductibles, or co-insurance, making cash flow gaps commonplace.
With higher deductibles and greater out-of-pocket expenses, patient pay has become a significant part of ASC revenue. Consequently, account reconciliation is a lot more than just mere bookkeeping—it’s the bedrock of an ASC’s financial wellbeing.
Poor account reconciliation practices result in delayed payments, rising negative debt, and strained patient relationships. Late or missed payments drag down the entire revenue cycle; multiple unreconciled payments can put ASCs in the red. But when providers are very easy to work with, patients are 84% more likely to stay with them than ones who are difficult to work with.2
Self-pay, a major source of ASC revenue, is the leading source of write-offs; providers only collected about $500.5M for services rendered in 2022 and 2023—less than half of what was owed.3 Smooth reconciliation processes, empowered by smart tools and technology, ensure that ASCs can achieve and maintain long-term financial stability.
No Alarms and No Surprises
There are several key steps ASCs can take to ensure that billing is always comfortable and clear.
- Set expectations early: Eliminate the dreaded “sticker shock” by discussing cost and insurance estimates, deductibles, and patient out-of-pocket responsibility up front so your patients always know what’s ahead.
- Make payments easy: Meet patients where they are with online portals, text-to-pay options, and flexible payment plans, and use their preferred communication channels (calls, texts, or emails).
- Keep it simple: Explanations of Benefits from insurance carriers don’t need to be complicated. Translating EOBs into easy, actionable terms keeps patients from feeling blindsided.
- Trust an expert: Bringing in an expert RCM provider to do the heavy lifting makes the process effortless—especially when you partner with a provider who specializes in ASCs.
Keeping billing clear and compassionate shows patients that they’re more than just a name on an itemized billing statement. Making payment and communication options easy means faster payments and fewer account reconciliations for a healthy bottom line and happier patients.
Finding a Proper Partner
Not all RCM providers are created equal, nor do they all focus on the same kinds of clients. in2itive specializes in ASCs, with over a decade of experience serving them nationwide.
As a full-service RCM provider, we combine expert account reconciliation, transparent patient communications, and modern payment platforms and tools that put patients first, like our Patient Access Suite that streamlines front-end optimization, patient verification, eligibility checks, and financial clearance. From automation to proactive patient education, in2itive removes the guesswork out of patient pay with solutions that protect both your relationships and your revenue.
We’re experienced with a wide variety of billing software platforms, so whether it’s working with your existing system or setting up a whole new tech-enabled solution, we set you up for success. With in2itive as your RCM partner, you’ll experience seamless integrations and transparency into every aspect of the process to maximize revenue and your facility’s reimbursements.
Get in touch to learn how in2itive can make patient pay comfortable, clear, and revenue-positive for your ASC today!
Sources
- Bain & Company. “It’s Time to Elevate the Patient Experience in Healthcare”. Bain & Company Insights, June, 26, 2023. https://www.bain.com/insights/its-time-to-elevate-the-patient-experience-in-healthcare/
- Accenture. The Difference Between Loyalty and Leaving: Healthcare Experience (Provider Edition). Dublin: Accenture, 2022. https://www.accenture.com/content/dam/accenture/final/accenture-com/document-2/Health-Provider-Loyalty-Accenture.pdf
- Taylor, Mariah. “Patient Collections Fall to 48%.” Becker’s Hospital Review, February 29, 2024.
https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/patient-collections-fall-to-48