Effective Ways to Improve Your Dental Practice’s Cash Flow
While hiring a bookkeeper to manage your dental clinic’s accounts can significantly enhance the practice’s financial situation, you must still wholly understand it.
Managing a dental practice by concentrating only on the bottom line is inadequate. Additionally, you need to know how money comes into and leaves your business. This ensures you always have enough money to cover your expenses and income.
Follow these recommendations to improve your dental office’s cash flow:
1. Reach Out to Delinquent Accounts
Most team members hate calling patients with past-due accounts, but they must do it. The team member in charge of these calls will feel more at ease speaking with these patients if you give them the necessary training, increasing business for your practice.
When talking about patient debts, remember to be patient and understanding. Always be kind to them and show that you’re willing to work with them to get past any barriers standing in the way of them making a payment. You should ask them why they have yet to pay rather than telling them their account is past due. Find out why something is happening and help find a solution.
2. Offer Third-Party Financing
Due to their limited financial resources, many patients cannot write a sizable check for pricey dental treatment. Treatment is significantly more affordable when payments can be made in manageable monthly installments through third-party financing. Giving patients this payment choice allows them to get the care they need while boosting the practice’s productivity.
What about a further advantage? Payment plans enable your business to set up the treatment’s necessary number of appointments rather than the number of meetings that patients can afford. As a result, there will be fewer missed appointments and related issues because patients will be less likely to cancel or attend appointments.
3. Regularly Review Expenses
Spending as little as possible is a great way to lessen the amount of money that leaves your clinic. Review your spending regularly and cut out anything unnecessary. Plans and subscriptions for phones may be canceled or scaled back.
You should review the contracts with current vendors to determine whether your practice is getting the best terms and prices. Never be afraid to haggle for a better deal or shop around to compare prices from different businesses.
4. Create a Forecast for Cash Flow
Cash flow projections are a valuable tool for predicting the future cash flow of your clinic using historical data. They enable you to foresee slower and busier months and can assist you in identifying when your company might encounter favorable or unfavorable cash flow conditions.
Based on the information in your forecast, you can take proactive steps to reduce spending or staffing if you anticipate a period of tighter cash flow in specific months. Delaying significant purchases, like the purchase of new equipment, is another option.
It is critical to remember that a cash flow projection cannot provide 100 percent assurance. You must keep comparing your forecast to actual data and make necessary adjustments to have a more accurate forecast in the future.
Conclusion
Improving the cash flow of your dental practice can be a crucial step in ensuring long-term success. By keeping track of monthly expenses, establishing timely payment policies, and offering flexible payment options, you can improve the financial health of your business.
Ultimately, the goal is to ensure you have enough cash to cover operational expenses and investments in future growth. You can successfully manage your dental practice’s cash flow with the right strategies and hard work.
If you’re having difficulty managing your dental practice’s cash flow and need dental accountants, Ash Dental CPA is here to help you! We communicate regularly with our clients throughout the year to ensure all their needs are met, keep a close eye on business development, and provide all necessary consultations. Contact us now!
