|
PO Box cost is about $ 60 per 6 months be sure to use a PO substation close to your office |
|||
|
Change of Address make a form letter then send to all takes 3 months for most changes to get finalized |
AMA, old office, hospitals, licensing, DEA, BNDD, magazines, professional societies, Postmaster all common insurance co along with your W-9 |
||
|
Lease |
Try for $1,000-$1,500 per month per doc | ||
|
Bank 50K loan use the same bank for your family account the loan takes 1-2 days to approve a promissory note at prime |
When you need startup money, just call the
bank and draw from your limit. No significant cash flow for 60 days, so live on your savings and the promissory note |
||
|
EIN you will need your Federal Employer's Identification Number (SS-4) prior to filling out most other forms; take minutes to get if you call or fax: |
Phone:
866-816-2065 or
800-TAX-FORM FAX: 215-516-3990 www.irs.gov/forms_pubs/forms.html |
||
|
W-9 Send to all insurance companies to inform of new EIN# |
Phone: 800-829-3676 www.irs.gov/forms_pubs/forms.html |
||
|
State Tax ID # Local offices are located in most major cities |
Check phone book for local listings for Mo. Dept. of Revenue, Business Tax Office; request Form 2643 | ||
| State Unemployment ID | A simple form to send in | ||
| Clia | A simple form to send in & requires renewal q1-3 years | ||
| Medicare | A long & tedious form | ||
| Medicare Railroad | About the same as the regular Medicare form,
but you must get it from them and mail to them in Atlanta |
||
| Medicaid | A long & tedious form you should sign up if you share call or have any MC/MD you can always control your new patient status |
||
| Cell Phone | Far better than a pager works in elevators & digital phones safe around high tech equipment DON'T PUT YOUR NUMBER ON YOUR BUSINESS CARD use your outgoing message to note who is covering & if you are out or will call back soon-- have a backup battery readily available |
||
|
Answering Service it's the way we doctors have done things for 30 years but the cell phone is quicker, cheaper, and only gives the wrong info if you forget to upgrade your message on the voice mail |
The answering service works well for the
hospital & group staff, but the service typically has a hold time when the
pt calls and occasionally isn't clear on who is on or out. If you use only a cell phone your office phone needs a reliable outgoing message when you are closed |
||
| Business Cards | Primarily your name, address, & phone fax strongly recommended office website if you have one consider your e-mail, picture, or cell/ans service- but generally these latter issues cause problems you don't want to change business card # very often |
||
| Staff | Run a newspaper ad & require applicants to complete your own application with key data you need have a list of benefits besides pay check |
||
| Provider Network | The form is standardized by the state & is
long complete one then file it and copy as needed each network wants all the same info from the doc |
||
| Office Forms | Use your word processor and make your own you'll save a lot on monthly expenses several generic versions we made & used in 2001 attached- -- feel free to use and adapt as you wish -- all from Word97 and generic format (RTF) |
||
| Office Checks | 1 or 3 per page & the cheaper the better expect your software to write the checks--eg Quicken |
||
| Office Brochure | It's easy-- just a front and back of normal sized paper for a tri-fold and a front and back of legal paper for a quad-fold after you add the verbiage a printer can make --generally 80 lb paper, glossy, 2 color ink about $200 for 2,000 brochures |
||
| Office Supplies | Your local discount store first then a medical paper supply like Colwell |
||
| Office Computer | At least P3 550 chip-- so you can manage numbers & voice-type 96 ram & 40G hard drive CD burner (CD-R) so you can do backups floppy drive to add your dictation that might return 56K modem so you can link to the WWW & get e-mail network card on each computer (eg. any new $900 system has all this and more) |
||
| Computer Network | 10/100 speed and at least 4 ports $20-40 for the switch box some network cable (looks like phone cord but 8 wires inside) cost is about $15 for 25 feet then just plug and play; Windows98 and up make all this very easy to start and only takes seconds eg. Best Buy staff can tell you how to do it when they sell you the equipment |
||
| Key Office Equipment | Fax--Hot Fax 5.0 ($50) for
incoming faxes is a real saver on ink & paper, but you still need a machine to send paper from chart copy machine-- need at least 8 pages per minute and top loader for multi-pages when copying records the new HP laser copiers are $400 for fantastic machines the cost of use is about 1/2 cent per page digital is superior to analog for cost and quality |
||
| Office Phones | At least 2 incoming lines & prefer 3 with
the same # need hold, forward, mute, an answering machine and an outgoing message when office is closed linking to a hospital PBX system is quickest & initially cheapest solution at least 1 line must be analog for fax and possible wireless phone |
||
| Software | Accounting--checks & payroll--
try Quicken or QuickBooks patient billing & producing HCFA claim forms-- ask local docs, generally they have a yearly renewal fee several like Medware are $600 to get started and work great use MS Office for word processing & database mgmt. |
||
| Payroll System | You can do it on your own if you have the
forms & understand book keeping QuickPay is easier but does have about $100 yearly renewal |
||
| Lab | Patients don't want to go to the hospital for
routine lab-- DRAW IT IN YOUR OFFICE, then let a referral lab like QUEST stop by late pm and pick it up. Quest can bill almost any insurance company & must bill the Medicare and the Medicaid, but you can bill the commercial accounts. Contact them via the # in the Yellow Pages. |
||
| Office Web Site | Easy with FrontPage see this article on how to
do this
 |
||
| Group Health Insurance | Nearly impossible for the small office generally better to have your own personal and portable policy and same for your staff, but offer a $ amount of monthly help that you can deduct via a cafeteria plan |
||
| Collection Activity | Your registration sheet needs to note late
charges. You can require pre-payment for future office services of those turned w/o the extra effort of formal dismissal. |
||
| OSHA | Mainly a written needle stick protocol & yearly update on B&B precautions and the Hep B vaccine for staff doing needle work |
||
| MSD | A simple notebook to file & forget the Managed care systems will inspect and want to see one sitting on the shelf --another link for this info-- |