Patient Services Associate - ED

Responsibilities

• Strives to understand and anticipate patient needs, manages service recovery efforts when needed, enlists management assistance as appropriate, identifies opportunities to improve the patient experience.
• Answer phones in a timely manner, manage/handle patient requests and route appropriately, retrieve voicemails in a timely manner, take accurate and thorough messages and route appropriately through EMR.
• Schedule patient appointments (on phone or in person) by determining reason for visit, following established schedules and protocols, using appropriate billing area/appointment location, communicating changes and confirming appointments, and, as needed, offering alternative and canceling/rescheduling appointments.
• Responsible for arriving/departing activities of patient at any Patient Access location or department and performs point of service activities: collects copays and records accurately, obtains necessary signatures/forms, obtains insurance cards and referrals/authorizations, updates appointment status in EMR, and finalizes all check-out procedures.
• Communicates with patients regarding patient flow and wait times – keeps manager aware of potential issues as they arise.
• Issues referrals and obtains pre-authorizations for patients as required and as per protocol.
• Maintains up to date knowledge of insurance requirements pertinent to patient service and billing procedures: including basic knowledge of all managed care plans and which insurers require a copayment (including how to collect a copay) or referral.
• Validates patient demographic/insurance information and/or registers new patients into EMR using established protocols.
• Records receipts accurately to ensure end of day reconciliation participates in cash reconciliation delineations.
• Resolves work queues and/or issues from front-end reports proactively prioritizes recovery of missing charges.
• Ensures compliance with all applicable federal, state, and local regulatory standards (ex TJC, DOH, FDA, HIPAA, HCFA, DPW, LCGME, SCGME, etc.).
• Stays current with communications from the Patient Access Management Team while remaining flexible and readily adopts new processes and engages in practice operation changes.
• Coordinates clinical and administrative aspects of the new patient scheduling encounter.
• Performs within the expected outcome of the Automated Call Distribution (ACD) environment. Solves telephone issues and timely reports problems related to volume to manager.
• Follow established downtime procedures for registration.
• Performs duties in accordance with Penn Medicine and entity values, policies, and procedures.

Qualifications

• H.S. Diploma/GED
• 2+ years Medical office experience.
• Or 2 years of customer service experience.
• Advanced degree may be considered in lieu of experience.
• Associate of Arts or Science (Preferred)