Dental  EFT & ERA Technology!

Connecting the Dots with EFT & ERA Technology

Written by Chris Haines

To help Dental industry providers recognize and realize the benefits of automation using the healthcare EFT standard and ERA, this technology proved that practices of all sizes can achieve cost savings and benefits from converting their claims reimbursements payments from paper checks to the EFT standard transaction and automating the reconciliation and posting process using the ERA.

Practices no longer need to wait for your Explanation of Benefits (EOB) to arrive in the mail. Once you enroll in ERA, you can access the information you need to reconcile your patient accounts as soon as it is available to you. Each ERA will have a trace number (TRN) attached and name of insurance company to give you the ability to automatically re-associate the claim remittance information you receive from the clearinghouse. The TRN is designed to help providers confidently match EFT deposit with corresponding ERA's that are deposited in the bank account. The benefit of this is huge, being it is available electronically and gives you access to the information it contains sooner than with a mailed paper EOB. Administrative savings are realized as a result of the paperwork reduction and the ERA can be scanned into the patient file.

Benefits achieved across practices included:

• Faster patient billing, as EFT payments are received faster allowing for quicker secondary billing and billing of patient responsibility
• Reduced posting errors through automation of EFT and ERA
• Reduced processing costs.
• Improved payment cycle within 2-7 days
• Threat of lost and stolen checks is eliminated
• Drastically cut down on the possibility of embezzlement in the practice

A new era in Dentistry has begun, if dentists want to increase the cash flow coming out of their practice he/she needs to learn how to manage their businesses, or hire the right experienced professional with the help of their management team to help them do so.