#972: How to Cut Your AR in Half!

Tiff and Kristy share not only how to cut down your accounts receivable, but also how to develop systems that will keep your AR low. They discuss time management, clear job descriptions, protocols, and more. Episode resources: Sign up for Dental A-Team's Virtual Summit 2025! Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: The Dental A Team (00:01.752) Hello, Dental A Team. I am so excited to be here with you. I have Kristy back here with me today, and we are excited to talk to you about a really fun subject today. It's not always the top of the fun list. think billing gets pushed down in the fun category, and a lot of people put a lot of stress on it, which I totally understand. But Kristy and I are here today. to bring some fun to the billing department and to bring some fun around how to make billing work within your practice. Kristy, thank you so much for being here with me today. How are you? Kristy (00:34.658) Good! It's a good Monday! The Dental A Team (00:37.955) Good, I know. Our Mondays get busy here at the Dental A Team. They are our meeting days and our project days and they just, they get chock full of so much stuff every single week and we absolutely love them. We get to spend a lot of time prepping for our client calls and our client visits. A lot of us have client visits coming up soon and just getting all the things together. So Mondays are always a little chaotic. Kristy, in your... In your experience, you've got a wealth of knowledge, a wealth of experience behind you. What was your favorite position or your favorite space to work when you were in practice? Kristy (01:16.704) interesting. Favorite Space was probably really helping getting patients the care they deserve, filling that patient advocate role. here's the thing, I know we're talking about AR today. If we If we aren't cognizant of a patient's budget, we're really not doing good by them. So being cognizant and finding a way to fit it, you know, the care they need within their timeline and their budget is, it's rewarding. The Dental A Team (01:50.047) I love it. I totally agree with you. think making sure that we're giving them the best experience all the way around, no matter what is the best space to live in within a dental practice. can get homes fulfilled us. It gives us a purpose and a reason to be there. And on those notes, I think you're absolutely correct. If we don't know what the patient wants, what their desires are, what they can do, and we end up down a path. that might not be the right fit for them and ends up not being the right fit for us because we end up in situations where we have high AR, outstanding claims, outstanding bills, all of those pieces. I also know one of the biggest reasons that people leave a dental practice or write a bad review, I have so many practices that are like, don't put me on swell, I want to have control over who gets reviews and who don't. And I just think everybody should get a link for review. So I love advocating for that company and for within our marketing. But I know that the biggest reason that we're afraid of something like that and that people that patients leave their practice is for billing inconsistencies or billing issues. So really having standards and protocols and just everything wrapped around the billing department is so imperative and so important because even down to that patient advocate space. When you're that patient advocate, which is also sometimes, you know, patient coordinator, front office check-in, like all of those are kind of wrapped around similar spaces within the practice. But when you're sitting in that space, Kristy, so many times you are walked into a really hard conversation because there was confusion over previous billing or you're the one that's responsible for collecting today's balance that's due or outstanding balances. And so you kind of walk into really uncomfortable situations because you're not sure what it is sometimes, the patient doesn't know what it is, and sometimes that patient comes in upset. So knowing how to diffuse those situations too, think Kristy is a really great space and just builds that relationship as well. I think I love your answer. Kristy (03:50.149) Thank The Dental A Team (03:51.193) That's my wrap up there. So today I've brought Kristy here to talk with me and chat with me for you guys today about really cutting your AR down and hopefully building systems that keep it so that your AR doesn't get high. And just so you guys know, doctors, your AR is your accounts receivable. So this is money that's supposed to be coming to you, but hasn't made its way through the door yet. And so we're trying to get that money through that door into your bank account to help your overhead ultimately. and by increasing your collection. So we really don't want a lot of money sitting out in that AR, in the accounts receivable, that ...