Billing for Unscheduled Appointment

[trishhaas]

Hi. I work for a Dermatologist Practice. We are in a small rural community and no other Dermatologist close by - we are scheduling 4-6 weeks out for appointments typically. Sometimes less, but that's getting to be average. Lately we are seeing an influx of patients that are just Walking In -- DEMANDING to be seen -- with no appointment. (I feel they've called and didn't want to wait that long for appt and have decided to just walk in). Our physician will go ahead and see them -- but its not fair to the other patients. This morning we had a patient show up at 8:10 waiting on the door to open at 8:30 to be seen. It was raining so the Dr went ahead and opened the door and let her in and saw her. My question is this: Is there a way to bill Medicare or the patient for a Walk-In appointment.... Need to know if there's a Medicare Fee Allowable for this or if we can bill the patients an additional fee if they have Medicare. Please, any help in this is appreciated.

 

[CatchTheWind]

There is nothing you can bill Medicare. I don't know whether or not you are allowed to bill the patient a convenience fee. Maybe someone else can answer that. (Perhaps you should post that question in the Medicare forum.)

If scheduled patients are having to wait longer because of the walk-ins, this really isn't fair. I would suggest telling the walk-in patients that you will be happy to see them, but because they don't have an appointment they will be seen after the scheduled appointments, at the end of the morning or afternoon. They could then choose to either sit and wait or to come back in a couple hours when it's closer to that time.