Sally McKenzie's Monday Morning Management Memorandum #2 Print this Memorandum, distribute to your team, discuss at your morning meetings!   March 11, 2002   WEB: | http://www.mckenziemgmt.com     This issue is sponsored in part by: McKenzie Management and Associates - A full service, in-office dental management consulting company specializing in the business, clinical, and hygiene areas of practices nationwide. Their clients include thousands of dental practices in over 40 states throughout the U.S. Sally McKenzie, President founded the company in 1980. You can find McKenzie Management at http://www.mckenziemgmt.com CareCredit: More than 30,000 healthcare practices nationwide use CareCredit as an alternative means of helping their patients finance treatment. You can find CareCredit at http://www.carecredit.com Dental Town: Never practice solo again! DentalTown.com is a free community, hosting dentistry's MOST ACTIVE message boards, classified ads and a dental event calendar. The site is open to dental professionals throughout the world, 24-hours a day, 7 days a week. Once you visit, you'll wonder how you ever practiced without it! Log onto http://www.dentaltown.com TODAY! Burbank Dental Lab: is a full service lab providing fixed restorations that combine science, precision and artistry. Clients can expect the best laboratory work possible, delivered in a timely manner. Call David French at (800) 336-3053 or visit their web site at http://www.burbdental.com   Is your practice operating at peak performance? Take this test to find out.     Dr. Smith's 0% Financing Are you feeling like your office is operating more like a lending institution than a dental practice?Your patients expect quality dentistry. You expect prompt payment for services. It's pretty straightforward, yet establishing even a basic financial policy is a struggle for some dental practices. According to Sally McKenzie, founder of mckenziemgmt.com, the policy should be standard for all patients and exceptions should be rare. McKenzie Management and Associates recommends the following tips when establishing a financial policy. Create a policy you are comfortable with. Staff input is valuable, but as the owner and CEO of your business, you decide what's in the best interest of the practice. If allowing a credit option for patients, determine how long you are willing to wait for payment. A policy that is too lenient is a liability for your practice. A policy that is too strict is a deterrent to patients. In lieu of extending credit to patients, partner with a patient financing company, such as CareCredit. Offering payment options for patients not only allows you to collect what you produce, but production also will go up if patients have a means to pay for procedures that can be quite costly to most people. Consider offering a slight adjustment in the fees for more costly procedures paid in full. Refer to this as a bookkeeping adjustment not a discount. Require insured patients to pay a portion of their payment responsibility when services are rendered. Do not allow post-dated checks. These amount to lots of money in a drawer and not in the bank. Avoid providing a menu of payment plans for patients to choose from. Give patients the opportunity to pay in full within 30 days before assessing a financing charge on the account. Shoring up your financial policy will help ensure that both collections and production improve, and you can keep the practice shingle in tact.       Copyright © 2002 http://www.mckenziemgmt.com - All Rights Reserved. To Subscribe: http://www.mckenziemgmt.com To Unsubscribe: simply reply from this email. Please address all other inquires to: webmaster@mckenziemgmt.com