Some say that dark clouds have silver linings. A few weeks ago I
saw one.
Looking forward to getting home, I was disappointed when Delta
Flight 692 was late leaving Norfolk, Va. It arrived in Atlanta's
Concourse A at the same time my connecting flight was leaving
Concourse E. When I deplaned, I asked the gate agent if she could
rebook me for the next flight home.
Here is the silver lining: She told me that I had already been
rebooked. All I needed to do was go to the service counter and put
my old boarding pass under the scanner to get a new confirmation
printed.
With skepticism that the process could now be so simple, and
amazement that the system could be so proactive, I walked down the
concourse. Sure enough, when I put my boarding pass under the
scanner, it popped out a piece of paper confirming my new flight
home. As I walked toward the service counter, a uniformed agent
called out my name. When I answered, he said, “Here's your
boarding pass, Mr. Weeks. Have a good flight.” Wow! I thanked
him and then wondered, why don't we do so well with automation?
As a frequent flyer for many years, I had expected to stand in
line and wait to work with a service agent getting rebooked. Try to
calculate how many man-hours Delta must have stopped paying for
with this new system. And to top it off, they are making the
rebooking process easier for the customer, too. Again, why don't we
do so well with automation?
One process we do have automated pretty well is Medicare claims
submission, but beyond that, there are a lot of opportunities. Here
are a few to consider:
Counting Inventory — This process is the easiest to
automate. Today, providers small and large make weekly, physical
inventory counts. There is no need. Available software can support
perpetual inventory and reduce physical inventories to quarterly at
the most.
Receiving and Relieving Inventory — The way to
automate this process is by adding bar code readers to the
perpetual inventory system. When an order arrives or leaves, it
only needs to be scanned to be counted in or out.
Purchasing — Another addition to the perpetual
inventory system is setting reorder points so that the inventory
software can prompt the placement of the order.
Intake — Some companies have developed software to
automate intake rather than taking a telephone call or deciphering
a fax. There is at least one commercial application available if
you don't have software development capability.
Electronic Claims Submission — Submissions to
insurance companies are where the opportunity exists here. There
are companies that facilitate the electronic claim submission
process, which works about the same as sending a batch to
Medicare.
Accounts Payable — Setting up an electronic funds
transfer service (EFT) with the bank will eliminate printing
checks, getting them signed, separating stubs, stuffing checks and
invoices in envelopes and metering the envelopes.
Claim Status Checks — It is not too difficult to
develop custom software to automate the retrieval of online claims
status.
Payroll Processing — The automation can start at
timekeeping and be fed to the payroll system of the accounting
software. This usually only requires a change in the process.
Management Reports — Most HME companies that do
what is considered a good job with the preparation and distribution
of management reports have an employee who takes data from the
reports of multiple software applications, such as billing and
accounting, then transcribes the numbers from those reports into a
spreadsheet application. Custom software can automate the data
retrieval, perform the calculations and distribute the reports.
And this is only the easy list. For providers more intent on
improving productivity and reducing costs through automation, the
list can be extended.
Wallace Weeks is founder and president of The Weeks Group
Inc., a Melbourne, Fla.-based strategy consulting firm. He can be
reached at 321/752-4514 or by e-mail at wweeks@weeksgroup.com.
