“I have some clients who miss appointments without calling. It’s very frustrating. Should I be charging them a fee?”
This one has no clear answer. Ask around, and you’ll get different opinions. Compared with more mainstream medicine, my guess is CAM professionals are less likely to charge for no shows, simply because [...]
No-shows tend to get more attention in alternative medicine practices, likely because of the irritation factor. When you look at it from a business perspective, though, cancellations and reschedules can be just as detrimental. The only difference is that you get more advance notice, so you may have time to fill the slot.
Many [...]
A nice little PDF from Elizabeth Woodcock here on reducing no-show appointments. It’s written for MD’s, but equally applicable to any alternative medical business. A few other resources worth checking out there, too.
Here’s the dilemma, as submitted by a CAM doc:
“I had a new patient call looking for an appointment as soon as possible. My new patient visits are an hour long, and even though I wasn’t even close to fully booked that week, I couldn’t see the patient until the following week. My book was full [...]
A doctor once told me this great piece of wisdom: “Don’t set any office hours you don’t want to keep forever.”
It’s tempting when you start up to open weekends, nights, early mornings – anything that will get new patients in the door. Although offering this flexibility to your clients seems like a good [...]
It’s very common for alternative health care practitioners to work on a “cash or check” only basis. There are several compelling reasons to consider other options.
The usual resistance to accepting Visa, Mastercard and the like is the cost. You pay a monthly fee for the account, plus a percentage of the transaction. For the new [...]
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