EZclaim partner, Alpha II, to Present COVID-19 Billing Changes

EZclaim partner, Alpha II, to Present COVID-19 Billing Changes

Apr 13, 2020 | Alpha II, Medical Billing Software Blog, Partner

One of our partners, Alpha II, is presenting a special webinar on COVID-19 billing changes on April 16, 2020, “COVID-19: Critical Coding and Regulatory Updates,” to provide the most up-to-date information on the coming changes to new procedures, diagnosis codes, telehealth updates, and changes to regulatory policies.

As guidelines for coding and billing of COVID-19 services are revised almost daily, rest assured Alpha II is working to implement these critical changes to regulations and coding guidance as quickly as possible by conducting near-daily promotions.

Here is a very brief summary of some of the updates we’ve implemented:

    • Clarification of correct telehealth rendering POS and use of modifier -95
    • Modification of diagnosis code edits for billing of COVID-19 symptoms from February 20 – March 31, 2020, and use of new diagnosis U07.1 for dates of service on or after April 1, 2020
    • Addition of the new AMA CPT code 87635 effective March 13, 2020
    • Addition of the new CMS CPT codes U0001 and U0002 retroactively effective February 4, 2020
    • Modification for waiver of DME replacement requirements prior to March 1, 2020
    • Modification for waiver of occurrence code 70 on SNF three-consecutive day stay validation prior to March 1, 2020
    • Modification to LCD/NCD edits to relax rules related to respiratory-related devices and services
    • Modification to Medicaid for the temporary suspension to prior authorization rules in PHE areas effective March 1, 2020

You can get all the latest COVID-19 specific updates here:  https://www.alphaii.com/landing/covid19

Alpha II is an EZclaim partner that provides “Claim Scrubbing” for our medical billing software system. View our website for more details on this: https://ezclaim.com/partners/

Why Do I Have A Balance? – Patient Payments

Why Do I Have A Balance? – Patient Payments

Jan 13, 2020 | collections, Electronic Billing, Medical Billing Software Blog, Revenue

Patient Payments – Written by Stephanie Cremeans of EZClaim

Why do I have a balance? The golden question regarding patient payments every physician’s office staff member dreads beginning January 1st. Unfortunately, your patients are not usually savvy when it comes to the nuts and bolts of their contract, and they are frustrated. They thought their plan was good, but now they have a bill.

68% of patients failed to fully pay off medical bill balances in 2016, up from 53 percent in 2015, and 49 percent in 2014. This number is expected to climb to 95% by 2020

Source: Patients May be the New Payers, But Two in Three Do Not Pay Their Hospital Bills in Full, TransUnion Healthcare, June 26, 2017

So here we are, in 2020. Let’s make sure your office is equipped and able to collect patient payments for services rendered rather than becoming a part of this scary statistic.

Begin with the basics. Make sure that your staff understands these key terms and is comfortable explaining them to your patients.

Deductible – The deductible is the amount the patient has to pay for covered services before the insurance plan pays. Some insurance plans will apply an office visit to the deductible, others will not. Family plans typically have an individual and family deductible.

Copay & Coinsurance – These are both the portion the patient will be responsible for after their deductible has been met. Copays are a set, flat fee. Coinsurance is a set percentage that the patient will pay.

Max Out of Pocket – This is the limit of what a patient will pay for covered services within a plan year. Again, on family plans, there may be an individual max and a family max.

Keep in mind your staff will not know the details of your patients’ plans, nor should they be expected to! In the ever-changing world of health insurance, our patients need to become better consumers. So just being able to explain these key terms and why they create a patient balance will help them become better insurance plan shoppers!

Use your tools. Look into using Integrated Eligibility (available through your billing software and your clearinghouse). This will allow your staff to check remaining deductible balances, copay, and coinsurance amounts with the click of a button. These results allow practices to confidently collect at the time of service rather than spending time and money on sending statements and working collections after the visit.

Create a plan and stick to it. Use this time to review the efficiency of your patient collections plan. Are you using an outdated plan or policy? Have you considered offering payment plans to patients with an HSA card kept on file? Make sure that your employees understand how important patient collections are to the practice, educate them on the plan, and support them when they hold patients accountable to the patient collections policy.

For more information on how EZClaim can help you with this journey, schedule time with our sales team. Ready to get started? Download your free 30-day demo today!

Happy Holidays from EZClaim!

Happy Holidays from EZClaim!

Dec 19, 2019 | Medical Billing Software Blog

Happy Holidays!

Written by Dan Loch of EZClaim – As with most people at this time of the year, I like to reflect a short time on the year gone by before I make plans for the next year. Each year is filled with experiences that shape who we are and where we are going next.

This was a very exciting year for EZClaim and for me in my first year as the VP of Sales, Marketing, and BD. I used this year to truly understand who EZClaim was, is today, and help to guide EZClaim into the future. EZClaim, as many of you know, has been around for over 22 years. We are a firm that values our customers and the support we give them over everything else. We are a support firm that sells software as we like to say.

This year we decided to announce that support would be ending at the end of 2020 for one of our most popular products, EZClaim Advanced. This does not mean people have to stop using a product they love. We want to make sure we can continue to offer great products on the latest technology so it is time for us to move on.

This year we hosted our very first User Group Meeting in our home town of Rochester, Michigan. It was an excellent opportunity to meet face to face with the people we support on a regular basis while making some new friends that are considering our solution. During this meeting, we interviewed some current customers along with many of the EZClaim staff. Please take a couple of minutes and watch some excerpts that talk about EZClaim’s history, support focus, and family focus that forms who we are from our interview with the EZClaim Founder and President, Al Nagy.

We started a Blog this year and for the first time added a Facebook page to go along with our LinkedIn profile. Our plan is to communicate about industry topics on the blog and these social channels to assist our vast customer and prospect network. We have a lot of knowledge built up over the long history of EZClaim and it is time we share it. The blog will feature topics from our partners as well. Please be sure to watch for posts every few days in 2020 and beyond. Please let us know if there are any specific topics you want us to hit as well. We are always looking for feedback.

We added some new partners in 2019 that nicely complement our solution and have the same drive for customer support we do. Live Compliance for all your HIPAA compliance needs, Elation Health EMR for “The Quarterbacks of Healthcare” as they like to say, and Alpha II for claim scrubbing. All the vendors we work with are listed on our partners page.

As we go into 2020, EZClaim will focus on EZClaim Online, another Premier platform product due out in quarter four. This expansion of our Premier platform offers additional flexibility in how our clients interact with our billing and scheduling platform. In addition to Online, we will continue to enhance Premier by introducing new features such as Claim Status Inquiry (CSI) and more.

Thank you for being part of the EZClaim family and taking the time to reflect on 2019 with me and think about an exciting 2020. Please take a moment of your time and watch the message from Al Nagy.

Please have a safe and joyful holiday with your friends and family.

Welcome to the EZClaim Medical Billing Software Blog!

Welcome to the EZClaim Medical Billing Software Blog!

Oct 30, 2019 | Medical Billing Software Blog

Welcome to the latest addition to our website, the EZClaim Medical Billing Software blog. As we begin posting blog articles we hope you will continue to come back to learn more about EZClaim software solutions, our U.S.-based white-glove support, features that make your job easier, expert training, and the latest trends in the medical billing software industry. Be sure to join our user community on LinkedIn as well as our new Facebook page. These channels will allow you to keep up with us and learn from and share information with other EZClaim users.

In addition to giving you the latest news, updates, features, and appearances related to EZClaim and our great people, this Medical Billing Software blog will be host to the latest trends in the field. We have tons of great content lined up to share with you from our internal experts as well as our partners to make this a repository of useful information that you can count on again and again.

EZClaim has been at the forefront of medical billing software since 1997 and is currently in use in all 50 of the United States, including the territories of Guam and Puerto Rico. Every practice works differently and has different needs, that’s why EZClaim is power-packed with features that give you the options to streamline workflow to suit your needs.

If you’re interested in learning more about how EZClaim can streamline your practice’s billing and scheduling needs, sign up for a free demo today! Want to learn more about the features that make EZClaim so simple and powerful? Take a moment to review our upcoming or pre-recorded webinars.

Do you have an idea for a topic or a tip to share with other EZClaim users? We’d love to hear from you! Please send your topics and tips via email to sales@ezclaim.com.