Preventing employee theft.Owners of medical practices must be alert to employee theft. It is important to investigate all employment references, and it is necessary to establish some in-house In-house In the context of general equities, keeping an activity within the firm. For example, rather than go to the marketplace and sell a security for a client to anyone, an attempt is made to find a buyer to complete the transaction with the firm. policies to reduce the opportunities for theft: * Be sure that the same person who deposits money does not have the authority to write off balances or instruct in·struct v. in·struct·ed, in·struct·ing, in·structs v.tr. 1. To provide with knowledge, especially in a methodical way. See Synonyms at teach. 2. To give orders to; direct. v. the payment poster to do so. * Do not let the same person who posts payments deposit money. * Establish a write-off Write-Off A reduction in the value of an asset or earnings by the amount of an expense or loss. Companies are able to write off certain expenses that are required to run the business, or have been incurred in the operation of the business and detract from retained revenues. policy and establish a maximum amount that an employee can write off. For any amount greater than that maximum, you must write it off yourself. * Be sure that no one but you sees and initially reviews cancelled checks, and review each check. * Have your accountant reconcile all accounts. * Every patient visit should generate either paper or electronic evidence of the encounter. * Do not allow delayed posting of payments; doing so creates a theft opportunity. * Do not use outdated out·dat·ed adj. Out-of-date; old-fashioned. outdated Adjective old-fashioned or obsolete Adj. 1. and unreliable technology; it also provides a theft opportunity. * Account for items sold in your practice, e.g., hearing aid batteries, sinus washes, etc. Every sale needs to be tracked with paper or electronically. This is not a complete list of steps you can take to prevent theft opportunities, but it covers most of the ground. Make sure that employee duties are segregated. Always monitor your accounts, adjust your policies, and trust but verify (1) To prove the correctness of data. (2) In data entry operations, to compare the keystrokes of a second operator with the data entered by the first operator to ensure that the data were typed in accurately. See validate. . Dr. Isenberg is an otolaryngologist in private practice in Indianapolis; sisenberg@good4docs Short for documents or documentation. .com |
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