By Vanessa Hirschl , Senior Product Manager, TELUS Health
A study conducted by the Fraser Institute shows that approximately 80% of Canadian adults have turned to alternative and complementary medicines at least once in their life1. Complementary health professionals are consequently becoming allies of choice for Canadians.
Demand for direct billing to insurers is steadily increasing2. Healthcare professionals who submit their clients’ claims, in real time, at the point of service, now have a significant competitive advantage over those who don’t. Half of Canadians would consider changing healthcare professionals to benefit from direct billing3. This service is also available to you.
Some of the many benefits of direct billing:
Reduce clients’ out-of-pocket expenses and your operating costs.
When a healthcare professional offers direct billing, their clients have the opportunity to pay only the portion not covered by their insurance. They can therefore better plan their expenses and avoid having to pay large sums when they receive a treatment.
Direct billing will not only benefit your clients, but your practice too. Do you accept credit card payments? Do you pay transaction fees on every dollar charged to a credit card? By offering direct billing to your clients, only the portion not covered by their insurance will be invoiced, which can reduce the fees your practice must pay to credit card companies. The following is an example of how much you could save in credit card fees by using eClaims, a direct billing service4.
Improving customer experience with a free service.
More and more people are asking for direct billing. Determined to offer their clients a quality experience, nearly 7 out of 10 Canadian allied health professionals are registered for eClaims2
A study by IPSOS Marketing and TELUS Health3 found that:
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Nearly 70% of Canadians select a healthcare professional according to the portion of the fees they must pay;
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80% believe eClaims would improve their customer experience at healthcare professionals’ clinics;
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And half revealed that they would consider changing healthcare professionals in order to benefit from direct billing.
In short, direct billing can help improve the experience at your clinic and build patient loyalty, as well as reduce your credit card fees and your patients’ out-of-pocket expenses.
1 Fraser Institute, 2017, Complementary and Alternative Medicine.
2 TELUS Health data, 2019
3 IPSOS Marketing, 2018
4 The results from this image should only be used as an estimate and might differ from the actual savings. It only serves as an estimate and is not an accurate calculation of how much a healthcare professional will save.
5 TELUS Health, 2019