Quick Reference — To add a payment plan for a patient (no credit card billing)

athenaCollector

  1. Display the Add Payment Plan page: On the Quickview, under the Insurances heading, click Add payment plan.

  2. Select medical group — Select the medical group where the balance was incurred.

  3. Plan name — Enter a name for the payment plan.

  4. Payment plan type — Select a payment plan type from the menu.
    Note: The list of payment plans is administered using the Payment Plan Types page.

  5. Payment method — Select Send patient statement.
  6. Frequency — The Monthly option is selected when the Payment method is set to Send patient statement. You cannot change the frequency. (The frequency is synchronized to the same monthly cycle as the patient statement.)
  7. Down payment amount — This field is disabled when the Payment method is set to Send patient statement.
  8. Per payment amount — Enter the minimum dollar amount due per payment cycle (the minimum amount must be at least $10.00). Any prior payments for charges on the plan, as well as overpayments, are applied against the total outstanding balance (instead of the amount due for that cycle), so that the amount due every statement cycle should stay constant until the outstanding balance is paid off.
  9. New charges — Select an action to specify how new patient charges are handled for this patient account.
    • If the patient already has a payment plan in place and you select Add new charges to plan, athenaOne automatically attaches new patient charges to that payment plan.
    • If you select Put claim into HOLD, athenaOne automatically places new patient charges into HOLD status for review.

    Note: Only one payment plan can have New charges set to Add new charges to plan.

     

  10. Deactivate — This option is selected by default. The payment plan is automatically deactivated when the patient responsibility for the claims covered by the payment plan is $0.
    Note: When the Frequency of the payment plan is One-time charge, athenaOne deactivates the plan automatically after the charge occurs, even if the balance on the plan is not paid down to $0 with the single payment. This ensures that the remaining patient responsibility balance is eligible for future payment plans.
  11. Notes — Enter any notes about this payment plan.
  12. Claims Covered by Payment Plan section — Select every line item to include in this payment plan.
    Note: Only charges for claims with a total outstanding amount greater than $0 appear in the list.
    The charges belonging to the selected claims are removed from the normal statements/collections cycle and are not considered overdue unless the patient is delinquent on the plan payments.
  13. Click Save.
    Note: A warning appears if you attempt to save a patient payment plan with a balance of $0 that does not have an open claim associated with it. You must associate at least one open claim with the payment plan.

After you create a payment plan, you are prompted to send the patient a new statement the next day. Click OK to send a new statement, or click Cancel to send a statement during the next statement cycle.