Your Patients, Your Reputation, Your Money
We typically purchase in two phases with most of our clients. The initial purchase may include accounts that have accumulated over a period of years, the “Archive”. These accounts may have been recalled, or more typically, are placed with a collection agency indefinitely where they are all but forgotten after the first few months of active collection efforts. Following the initial Archive purchase, most of our clients will engage in a Forward Flow arrangement whereby accounts are systematically recalled from the collection agency and sold to Senex on a monthly or quarterly basis.
Typically it makes sense for accounts to be recalled and sold once they have reached an age of 12 to 18 months from date of service, or 6 to 9 months from the date of placement with the collection agency. If the collection agency doesn’t have the account on a payment plan or marked for litigation by that time, the likelihood of recovery is very small over an extended period of time.
While it is up to the healthcare provider to determine the age of accounts in consideration for sale, we recommend selling accounts no older than five years from the date of service, or less in states with a shorter statute of limitations. Given the aggregate volume of many years of uncollected bad debt, the initial purchase can result in a significant cash payment.
Forward Flow placements provide a steady and predictable stream of cash flow to the healthcare provider, and typically provide an incentive for the collection agencies to improve their recoveries once they know they will not have the accounts forever.
Once established, the Forward Flow placements become a routine process no different than monthly placement with the collection agency. Our interaction with the healthcare provider will be similar that of the collection agencies, with the exception that the healthcare provider receives payment at the time of sale.
Senex Services Corp. was founded in 1998 upon the belief that there was an unmet need to assist healthcare providers by offering an alternative to the resolution of self-pay patient accounts.
Senex’s mission is to work with healthcare providers to maximize the value of their self-pay accounts. We understand that while each healthcare facility faces increasing fiscal pressure, like each of our clients, it is a mission-driven organization whose patients are its most important asset. We embrace that mission to provide quality and compassionate healthcare to the community.
We want to reaffirm that we will treat patients with integrity and decency. This is how we operate:
We do not attempt to collect debts from those who are unable to pay. We purchase no charity accounts; we have no intent to, anyway. As soon as we determine that a patient is unable to pay, we will close the account. If we identify an account that we believe should have been granted charity, we will return it to the healthcare provider; if the healthcare provider identifies such an account, it has the right to recall it.
Senex adheres to the Statement of Principles and Guidelines by the Board of Trustees of the American Hospital Association Regarding Hospital Billing and Collection Practices.
Our collectors are well trained and professional. Each of our collectors has completed four weeks of training in collection techniques and federal and state privacy and collection laws, including the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, Fair Credit Reporting Act and HIPAA. Our training is second to none. After initial training, our collectors are provided with ongoing training and constant monitoring.
We utilize none of the following collection practices:
- Requesting of body attachments or civil arrests
- Charging interest or fees without the express consent of the provider
- Seeking payment of a judgment by way of execution and sale of a primary residence
|
Valuing Healthcare Accounts
In order to evaluate a bad debt portfolio and make a firm offer, we will require the following four items:
Underwriting Questionnaire – The questionnaire requests information about the healthcare provider, the collection processes and collection agencies that have preceded the sale. Our representatives can generally gather most of this information in a 30 minute telephone interview, or it can be filled out by the provider and forwarded to us. One section of this document requires a signature authorizing us to perform a sample credit score.
Data file. The data file needs to include the following fields:
- Guarantor name
- Guarantor address
(street address, city, state, and zip code)
- Date of service
- Unpaid balance
- Guarantor Social Security Number
- Date of Birth
- Home Phone
- Place of Employment
Exclude Accounts that:
- Have been discharged in bankruptcy by guarantor(s);
- Are solely the responsibility of deceased guarantor(s);
- Are solely the responsibility of incarcerated guarantor(s);
- Include amounts adjusted for financial assistance;
- Include amounts subject to a contractual adjustment;
- Have been closed or recalled by healthcare provider for reasons other than contractual time limits;
- Are the subject of a complaint filed by healthcare provider or its agency in a court of law; or
- Are the subject of an agreed payment plan, and on which a payment has been made in the past 30 days.
Collection agency recovery reports (preferably in a static pool format) – While the questionnaire asks general information about the collection agency recoveries, accounts can be better valued after analyzing collection agency recovery reports.
A copy of the admission/consent form – The sale of accounts requires a blank copy of the form signed by patients / guarantors at the time of service to acknowledge financial responsibility.
As for data file transmission methods, there are a lot of options. Please contact us regarding the secure transfer of your data. The following is our mailing address for file transfer.
Senex Services Corporation
3500 DePauw Blvd.
Suite 3050, Pyramid 3
Indianapolis, IN 46268
Attn: Denise Purdie Andrews.
If you have any IT questions, please feel free to contact, Denise Purdie Andrews at (317)613-0120
Once we have all of the requested information, we will be in a position to deliver a formal cash offer within a few days, and complete the transaction quickly.
|
