We’re pleased to announce that the winner of our August “Medical Billing Tip of the Month” contest and recipient of a $250 American Express gift card is Diane Bell, CHBME.

We received many excellent tips on how to streamline the medical billing process and better use Kareo medical billing software, and we thank everyone for their submissions. Below you will find the winning tip, as selected by our judging committee, and the two runners up.

August Medical Billing Tip of the Month Winner:
Faster Address Updates

I have learned that even though Kareo has now added an address update feature, there is another way to check on CO24 denials and addresses for Medicare patients.

By using the eligibility feature in Kareo I have found that patients tend to update their address with Medicare. Also, by scrolling to the bottom of the eligibility check you are able to find any other insurance Medicare may have on file. With Medicare Managed care plans, patients often change plans. Using the eligibility check with commercial carriers has also helped. This Kareo feature has saved hours of time in follow-up and helped avoid timely filing issues.

Diane Bell, CHBME
Phone: 770-412-8451

Faster, Easier Way to Print Single Patient Encounter Payments from an ERA

1. If your clearinghouse is Capario* and you need a faster, easier way to print single patient encounter payments from an ERA for attachment to secondary claims: (When we first started with Kareo, we would print 2 pages of an ERA. If the payment for a specific patient overlapped, then we’d manually cut and tape the pages together and copy that to attach to the paper claim. What a pain! What a waste of time & paper! The tips below look like a lot of steps, but you’ll find that you can do it all in less than 30 seconds after very little practice).

2. Go to “Claims” & find the patient & encounter you want

3. Highlight a line item, then double-click or click “Open” to see “Claims Edit.”

4. Scroll down to the primary payment and click on one of the line items

5. Look to the right side for the check number of the ERA (Total Check amount can work too).

6. Highlight either of the above, then right click and select “Copy”

7. Then go to Clearinghouse Reports and click on the “Other Reports” option. (Hint) We never mark ERAs in our “Other Reports” as reviewed so we don’t have to remember to unclick the “unreviewed only” button.)

8. Right click in the long “Look for:” box at the top below “Other Reports” and click “Paste” so the check # or amount appears, then click “Find Now” on the right hand side.

9. When your ERA appears, double click on it or highlight and click “Open”.

10. You can then search for the specific payment details by patient name, encounter #, whatever. To do so, left click in a blank area anywhere in the body of the ERA, then type CTRL F, then type identifying info in the pop-up box that appears. We usually just type the first few letters of patient’s last name and the one we want is highlighted.

11. When found, hold your left mouse button down and drag from top left to bottom right of the specific EOB you want to print.

12. Right click, then left click “Copy”.

13. Now, left-click the Windows START button at the bottom left of your desktop.

14. Search for NOTEPAD. Left-click on it, then right-click anywhere in the blank space, then left-click “Paste”.

15. Now left-click FILE at the top left and select PRINT. When your ERA selection prints, click on “Don’t Save”.

For Windows Pros, all this stuff is probably second nature. But for us old-timers & computer illiterates, discovering this process was like finding gold. Now, if somebody tries to take away our OTHER REPORTS option, we’ll be sending Guido and Vito out to persuade them otherwise!

*Note: We are able to use the following tip for Capario ERAs, but not for Gateway because their ERAs do not format into the “Other Reports” category in “Clearinghouse Reports.”

Bob Pedersen
RLP Medical Billing, Inc.
Phone: 913-322-6675

Moving a Credit on a Line Item into “Unapplied” So You Can Apply the Credit Somewhere Else

When you are in the payment screen, down at the bottom right there is a button labeled “More.” If you click on that button, it gives you a drop-down where you can select a payment, adjustment, re-bill and several items. If you select “Payment”, then another box comes up and you would then enter a negative (-) amount in there for the credit amount. Next you would click “Post.” This then puts that amount up in the unapplied field next to the amount of the check. This then allows you to move to another line item, or choose a different date of service, or even choose another patient. Say, if you have more than one family member and one has a credit and the other a balance, you can move the money from one family member to the other in this fashion.

I hope this helps! I use it a lot when the patient pays a co-pay and the insurance company takes a different amount or doesn’t take the co-pay. I can move the money to a different line.

Nancy A. Berlad, CPC
Phone: 512-687-7203

Submit Your Entry for the September Medical Billing Tip of the Month Contest
If you would like the opportunity to win $250 and get your company name in front of thousands of potential customers, enter our Billing Tip of the Month contest for September. Just submit your best billing tip by August 31 via email to Marketing@Kareo.com. We’ll announce the winner by September 14 and will post the best tips on our website and in our monthly e-newsletter, giving you and your company credit. (Please be sure to list your company name in your entry!).

We look forward to hearing from you!