It is imperative to undertake Daily/Weekly/Monthly procedures for consistency, efficiency, and to ensure finalising of the practice’s figures for the period. These tasks provide debtor transaction movement, revenue, reconciling, reporting, etc. providing your practice with an awareness of its financial position. The goal is to compile accurate financial data to maintain the integrity of the business and for Management to use when making business decisions. These tasks are not time-restricted; they can to be actioned when convenient to your practice’s procedures.
Daily/Weekly Tasks
Daily tasks are undertaken at the end of each day to ensure that all practice transactions from the current day have been correctly processed. The following tasks can be actioned weekly, however it is highly recommended as daily tasks:
1. Ensure that daily tasks for all staff members have been actioned;
o Issue invoices, ensuring all billing for consults, appointment lists, theatre lists, hospital sheets, and operation reports for surgical/assistants.
o Issue receipts, ensuring all payments are made for consults (cash, cheque, EFTPOS), mailing cheques, and if you have access to the bank statement(s) processing patients, Medicare, and Health Fund direct debits.
o Ensure corrections are made; adjustments, refunds, and write-offs.
2. Print a Day Sheet - a snapshot and tracking of the day’s entries into the system (Transactions, Allocations, Appointments made or cancelled, and Bank Deposit Slips). This will aid in troubleshooting errors, and provide an opportunity to resolve them.
3. Ensure that transactions/payments/unallocated accounts are allocated. Allocation involved matching-up transactions (debits and credits) which affect reporting and patient records.
E.g. Patient File – Fully invoiced and receipted, but displays as an unfinished file.
The Credit Reports (Reports > Credit Detail Report) indicate accounts with unallocated credit transactions.
To manually allocate;
o Access the patient’s record, and select the appropriate Account and then Account Credits tab.
o Click the Allocate/Refund Credit Payment button. The receipts (top) and invoices (bottom) that require allocation are displayed. Receipts will be selected automatically.
o Click the appropriate invoice(s) to allocate. The Payment Amount and the Total Allocated Amount should match, and then click OK. This cleans-up the patient’s record (all balances $0.00) and no longer displays these anomalies on the report.
4. Banking: Ensure to finalise/settle the Bank Deposit;
o Cash and Cheques are finalised when physically taken to the bank.
o Credit Cards are finalised with the EFTPOS machine batch.
o Direct Deposits are finalised with Bank Statement for the patient, Medicare, Health Fund and Tyro deposits. Access via the Practice Explorer (select Banking from the margin menu). Ensure to settle for each Practitioner separately.
Note: If reports are required to ensure banking transactions are correct, use the Unbanked Receipts Report or/and the Day Sheet.
5. Medicare Claiming (BB and DVA): Ensure BB, DVA and Patient Claims are transmitted to Medicare and processed in Bluechip depending on the status. Claims are processed via the Practice Explorer (select Medicare from the Margin Menu). Paid claims appear on the Medicare Australia Claim (Detailed) Report.
6. Eclipse Claiming to Medicare: Ensure IMC-submitted ECLIPSE claims are transmitted to Medicare and processed in Bluechip depending on the status. Claims are processed via the Practice Explorer (select Medicare from the Margin Menu). Paid claims appear on the Inpatient Medical Claim Payment Report.
Note: Additional Medicare Reports on individual claim types are also available.
7. Print the next day’s Appointment List (with/without comments). This indicates which patients are expected to attend the Practice on the following day. Alternatively, this can be printed every morning. This report is accessed via Reports > General Non-financial Reports > Appointment List (with/without comments).
8. Backup is a strict daily task which can be automated, or run manually. If back-up is not completed, the Practice runs the risk of losing data; files could be lost to virus, computer crash, theft or disaster. All users must be logged-out of MedicalDirector Bluechip to perform a backup.
End-of-Month Tasks
End-of-Month processes are crucial to the Practice. If the daily tasks are actioned and up-to-date, then end-of-month tasks are few. If not, it is imperative to complete your daily tasks first. Completing monthly tasks ensures data is correct, finalising processes and financials, and once processes are complete, locking down a month with Monthly Close-off. These tasks consist of the following:
o Tasks
o Reports
o Comparison Reports
o Monthly Close-off
1. Ensure that all the daily tasks are completed.
2. Ensure that invoices and receipts that may not be issued as a daily task are processed now:
o Issue Invoices, ensuring billing is processed for VMO (Visiting Medical Officer), Leasing/Rent of Rooms, Retail Products if required.
o Issue Receipts, ensuring all payments made have been processed that have been missed in the daily task (cheques, direct debits)
3. Make any payments that are required if traced in Bluechip; for locums, assistants, etc.
End-of-Month Reports
A number of reports have been referred to, above. Furthermore, there is a large range of financial reports that provide transaction history, revenue, GST, etc. that can be accessed if your Practice requires. All are date-range specific. The following reports are an indication of what is available for end-of-month to assist you with finalising your system.
o Debtors Reconciliation Report: This report provides a summary reconciliation on the movement of debtor balances over a given period which is affected by invoices, receipts, credit allocations and write-offs. This can assist with outstanding accounts. A Debtor Detailed Report is also available.
o Income Summary Report: This report provides a summary of revenue (net earnings) from both accrual and cash. The report also takes into account write-offs, discounts, and refunds of allocated payments. An Income Analysis Report is also available.
o Statements: Account Statements are intended for distribution to account holders that have outstanding amounts, and require payments. Statements are A4-formatted, and each outstanding account holder receives at least a one page statement. Be advised that printing such statements may take some time dependent on the number of statements and the speed of your system. Individual Account Statements can be printed via the Patient’s record > Accounts > Account Transaction Listing button. Two options are available; Account Statement and Audit Trail. Further information about Bluechip’s full range of reports is available in the Bluechip Financial Reports Guide.
Reports List Comparison
Below is a list of reports that have related financials in each report that can be used to compare and validate the totals/transactions for the same date range.
Monthly Close-off
Monthly Close-off allows a month to be locked down once Management is satisfied that the month is finalised, financially. The month is physically closed off in the system, preventing future transactions from being recorded inadvertently in a period that has been reported on. It prevents the backdating of transactions, and the altering of reports. Where adjustments are required, a new transaction is issued, reflecting the true month. This functionality ensures that the integrity of financial management and tax reporting on closed months is not compromised or violated.
Important Note: Closing-off a month is not a strict end-of-month process. The month is only closed-off when everything is finalised. It is also highly recommended to complete monthly close-off 2-3 month in arrears. This provides leniency and flexibility you may require for any delay in claiming, adjustments, payments, and so on.
When ready to close off a month, access via Setup > Practice > Monthly Close-off. Select the next month to be closed-off and click OK. That month is now locked down.
