Getting Your Answering Service Right
Patients with urgent problems need easy access. Physicians on call need
isolation from unnecessary disturbances. That makes an answering service—live
or electronic—an
essential intermediary. Selecting a high-quality, cost-effective service for
your medical practice requires careful consideration.
Traditional Answering Service
A good operator can distinguish between calls that need to be passed on
immediately and those that are less urgent. But traditional services can be
high-cost choices. They bill based on the number and length of calls. Also,
some such services have reliability or courtesy issues. They may fail to
page the on-call physician promptly, may page unnecessarily at inconvenient
times, may page the wrong physician or may subject callers to long holds.
Make sure any service you select has an outstanding reputation, and consider
testing the service for efficiency and courtesy by having colleagues place
“phantom” or test calls.
Voicemail
Using voicemail or an answering machine can be a practical alternative
in some circumstances. You may simply direct patients to choose one option
for urgent matters and another for non-urgent calls. The urgent matters can
automatically ring through to the on-call physician’s cell phone. However,
on-call physicians may have to screen a large number of messages, and
answering devices are inherently impersonal. Elderly or agitated patients
may find coping with the menu choices and recording their responses
difficult. Make sure whatever arrangement you choose is as easy for patients
as it is for your practice.
Direct Access
Instead of a service, a practice with low call volume may want to
consider the simplest arrangement of all—a
cell phone that the on-call physician answers.
Health Care Commentaries is
provided by Somerset’s
Health Care Team
for our clients and other interested persons upon request. Since
technical information is presented in generalized fashion, no final
conclusion on these topics should be made without further review. For
additional information on the issues discussed, please contact a member
of our Health Care Team. This
document is not intended or written to be used, and cannot be used, for
the purpose of avoiding tax penalties that may be imposed on the
taxpayer.
Somerset CPAs,
P.C.
3925 River Crossing Parkway, Third Floor
Indianapolis, Indiana 46240
317.472.2200 • 800.469.7206 • FAX 317.208.1200
http://healthcare.somersetcpas.com
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