Many months back a medical secretary friend of mine suggested the MHM approach of writing the address on an envelope to a self-funder or for an excess/shortfall looked unprofessional. The address should be typed in her view, presentation being everything.
My reply was that an envelope with a typed address could easily be mistaken for some kind of circular or indeed as junk mail. She was having none of that argument and insisted her view was correct.
Skip forward several months and we met up again. She asked how MHM were finding self-funders and excess charges and specifically were we getting them paid? In answering we stated we, like her, had seen an increase. Nonetheless we were having them paid. She apparently was seeing the same increase in numbers but significantly was seriously struggling to get them paid. Many times she called a patient to be told the invoice hadn’t arrived.
When I mentioned writing the address again, she stopped and thought about it again.
She called me this afternoon. Since she stopped typing the address and writing it instead, she’s seen an increase in the number of paid self-funders. She is also seeing an increase in the number of paid excess / shortfalls too.
Learning to write did come in useful after all!