nTelagent Launches “Healthcare Cash Register,” Allows Patients to Tailor Payment Terms and Options

NASHVILLE, Tenn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--It’s not only the economy to blame. For a while now, individual healthcare consumers have had to take on more and more financial responsibility for their healthcare costs. No longer able to solely rely on post-service payments from third-party payors, hospitals and other healthcare service providers are struggling to efficiently manage collections from individual patients, a fact punctuated by those ever-rising bad debt numbers. To help providers adjust to the retail-oriented payment environment, nTelagent, Inc. has added a web-based “Healthcare Cash Register” to its point-of-service revenue cycle solution, called the Self-Pay Management System (SPMS).

“The healthcare industry has clearly moved in this direction, and both providers and patients must be prepared for this new payment environment where financial responsibilities are determined at the outset.”

nTelagent’s new online payment processing feature allows providers to accept patient payments in the form of cash, check, credit card and debit card. They can either post a one-time payment or negotiate and set up payment terms with the patient – resulting in recurring payments that are automatically posted to the patient’s account over a set number of months, using the Automatic Clearing House (ACH).

“Think about it. When consumers go to a retail store to purchase appliances or other high-cost items, they are always presented with the appropriate price and financing options at the point of sale, and they know how and when they need to pay,” said nTelagent chairman and CEO Earl T. Winter. “The healthcare industry has clearly moved in this direction, and both providers and patients must be prepared for this new payment environment where financial responsibilities are determined at the outset.”

From start to finish of the patient encounter, SPMS tells healthcare registrars and financial counselors exactly what to do and what to say to each patient at the point of service regarding financial responsibilities, just like in a retail environment. nTelagent’s payment processing feature closes the loop on this process. With nTelagent’s healthcare cash register, providers can:

Accept online payments via credit/debit card and e-Check securely and effectively
Post one-time or recurring payments to an account
Receive instant notification of transaction success or failure
Print receipts for successful postings or historical payments
Increase ongoing collections of accounts receivable
View real-time cash-collected report, showing actual payment-collected amounts

Winter concluded, “Most importantly, our system makes the collection process much easier on the patient by providing him or her with clear information at the outset. A financial counselor using SPMS is able to arrive at acceptable terms with the patient, all at the point of service. The staff member can accept different means of payment, so maybe the patient pays with cash at point of service, then future payments can come out of the patient’s checking account or are charged to a credit card. We let patients set up and tailor their own plans, according to each provider’s business policies and rules. In this economy, that can go a long way.”

About nTelagent, Inc.

nTelagent, Inc. has developed The Retail Application for the healthcare industry, called the Self-Pay Management System (SPMS). Similar to applications used in the retail industry at the point of sale, the company’s proprietary, automated system tells healthcare registrars and financial counselors exactly what to do and what to say to each patient at the point of service regarding financial responsibilities. Moving workflow to the front end of the revenue cycle, nTelagent helps providers ensure a better patient experience through clearer communication and better handling of patient accounts, while improving upfront and overall cash flow, receivables and profitability by reducing bad debt. Using non-credit scoring data, SPMS provides interactive scripts that integrate patient demographic information with each provider’s business policies and rules. The system allows for price transparency and automatically identifies discounting options, social services eligibility and charity care options when applicable, ensuring that patient financial accounting – for both insured and uninsured patients – is handled appropriately and consistently. Visit www.ntelagent.com for more information.