Open Dental Forum

As we have overhauled the main Account grid (see related thread), it has become obvious that now is the time to overhaul the way that payment plans show in the accounts. Here is what I propose:

A separate grid at the top for the payment plan. A payment plan would have it's own balance rather than being rolled into the main account balance like it is now. Payments which were attached to the payment plan would show in that grid rather than in the main grid. Straightforward enough, but...

Here's my question to everyone. How should the main account balance for the patient/family change when a payment plan is added? Let's say Johnny Smith just got braces and has a $4800 balance. You set up a payment plan for $4800 spread over 2 years at $200/month. The way it works right now, Johnny's balance would be reduced by $4800 to bring it to zero, and the guarantor, whether in the same family or not would be increased to $4800. Actually, we make it unnecessarily complex by only increasing the guarantor account by the amount currently due. Let's say we're at two months due with nothing paid yet. Under the current scheme, Johnny would have a balance of $0, and John Sr would have a balance of $400.

Using the example above, I propose handling it like this instead:
1. Johnny's account would get reduced by $4800. This is so that when they get their regular bill, it doesn't say, "please pay $4800".
2. John Sr's regular account wouldn't get touched.
3. John Sr would get a payment plan grid showing on his account.
4. The payment plan would have it's own total amount, amount due, etc. Separate from John Sr's regular balance, which is probably still zero.
5. Since the payment plan would show $4800 owed, the aging report for the family would not change when the payment plan was created.

Incidentally, I've done a bit of research, and this is the way that SoftDent does it (budget plan). The Dentrix manual does does not indicate how a payment agreement would affect the main account balance, leading me to believe that it would not.

We still have Dentrix 11.5 on a few computers, so I brought it up and it does not effect the balance at all. It is just a completely separate section that shows the agreement terms.

I think the simplest way is to just leave the main balance untouched and then have a separate section with "amt due with payment agreement"

So on pmt agreement pt's, the statement would print differently. Instead of "please pay $4800", it would show Account Balance $4800, Currently Due: $200 w/ payment agreement. And then show the payment plan grid as mentioned. The aging report would then still show $4800 and there should be another column with just an "FA" (Financial Agreement) or X or something to indicate there is an agreement.

Then you wouldn't have to mess with adjustments on any accounts. Instead I would just have a line that states the FA terms.

Would this work?

It's not quite as clean as that. It's common for a patient to have braces that go onto a payment plan, and regular fillings that need to be paid as done. So offices have indicated that they don't want that $4800 hanging around on Johnny's account where it will start to get intermingled with the charges and payments for routine dental work.

Also, let's say the parents are divorced and each parent is responsible for half. So now there are two payment plans, one for a guarantor in the same family, and one for a guarantor in a different family. Instead of $4800 showing on Johnny, it would be better if $2400 showed on John Sr, and $2400 showed on Mom.

Furthermore, if you don't remove that $4800 upfront, then when *will* it get removed? Will it just stay there forever? Remember that the payments coming in will be applied to the payment plan(s) rather than to Johnny's account. So that $4800 will never get paid down.

There's not really room at the top of the regular Account screen for a an entire amortization schedule like I had imagined. The payments associated with a payment plan aren't visible until the payment plan itself is opened. However, when statements go out, I think we do need the entire amortization schedule on the top. So I'm still trying to decide how the office flow should work here. We could either print payment plan statements as a separate batch and with a different look, or we could just put an amortization grid at the top of ordinary statements. I'm leaning towards the second option.

if there isn't room for the whole thing on the screen, I request at least a very visible indication that there is a payment plan with balance due/total.

I vote for your second option. Print the payment plans at the top or ordinary statements.

Well yes, of course there will be all the summary info of the payment plan(s) at the top of the regular screen. One row per plan, with about 8 columns of data, all in a dedicated grid.

Well since you are working on this I asked my business manager what problems she has with payment plans and what could be improved. Here is what I got keep in mind we have an ortho office and have hundreds of payment plans going:

1. Patients want to know what the remaining balance to be paid is. (Maybe add a line under "Principal Paid").

2. On some patients, and I can't define which ones, their unpaid balance on their payment plan show up as 90 days past due when they are only 30 days past due.

3. Past due amounts on insurance payment plans shows up as past due on patient statement causing confusion (even though technically they are still responsible for this it triggers an unpleasant phone call from the patient).