Statement Format

[sonyap]

Will the format of the statements ever change (or at least become customizable)?  The layout is beyond confusing for our patients (always has been), and the "due date" prints entirely too small - several font sizes smaller than anything else on the payment stub.  If anything should be easily visible (beyond the amount & where to send it), it should be the due date.

[kpratt]

Our patients find the statement difficult to read also. It would be nice to be able to customize the statement and to be able to write a message on the statements/treatment plans before printing.

[Anon]

Does anyone have an example of a statement format they would prefer? This could include taking an existing PW statement and marking it up with comments. Please email to me at jeremy.uriz@csdental.com 

Thanks!

[sonyap]

Any updates on this project?  We need to put a separate billing phone number on the statement, not our main office number.  Hoping that's not going to be an issue.

[nateinmaine]

We're hoping for an update as well - we have a similar requirement in our office where we have two separate A/R administrators with different phone numbers. We started a thread regarding phone numbers some time back: https://community.carestreamdental.com/t5/PRACTICEWORKS/Statement-Phone-Number/m-p/7216

Seems like a reasonable thing to be able to modify, and as mentioned in the other thread, Quickbooks has a good customization module for invoicing. It appears as though some other users want to change messaging and ad logos and so forth. This would be an awesome addition to the software where it's been lacking for a long time.

[jeremy_dempsey]

Sonya,

Have you investigated our Automated Statements service where you batch your statements and transmit them to Carestream Dental for printing and mailing? The statements do look a bit different than what is printed by PracticeWorks. You can view a sample here:

http://www.carestreamdental.com/ImagesFileShare/.sitecore.media_library.Files.Practice_Management.eS... 

[sonyap]

That is how we send our statements.  There was a brief period that we printed & mailed in-office, but outside of that, we've been transmitting electronically to PW for as long as we've been on the software (17 years).  And the fact that anything we can reproduce in office is different than what the patient received is part of the problem.

[Anon]

Thank you for the clarification.

And I agree with your assessment. The fact they don't match isn't good.

[Anon]

Good point jeremy.dempsey‌

Feedback I've gotten is the Automated Statements are much easier for patients to read.

That said, the practice has to weight out the current cost of sending statements (hours spent by staff printing and mailing) versus the Automated Statement service. Works out great for some offices depending on how many statements are sent each month. 

[Anon]

I hope so. This is a "passion project" I'd like to work on. When the statement is confusing to the patient it ends up being a call to the office with your time spent trying to explain the balance. Frustrating!

We're sizing up what we can accomplish for the release following 8.1. If it makes the cut for this (or the next) release I will follow up with you directly for input. In the meantime, if you have any ideas or mock ups of what we can change please email me at jeremy.uriz@csdental.com 

[nateinmaine]

I'd like to throw in an upvote for a reformat and customization - this is not an unimportant change. We need a way to add a logo, email address, website, and any other messaging on the statements. We do not get many complaints about them being confusing, but we do get a lot of complaints about the phone number being incorrect for one of our dentists.

Also, as referenced in this thread, our office requires a way to map the phone number to the A/R administrator, because they can have different phone numbers. We've tried adding a location with a different phone number, but there is not currently a way to sort statement runs by A/R administrator, which would be a very useful feature and solve our problem.

Quickbooks has a halfway decent invoice/statement design module built in. Practiceworks could benefit from something similar.

[dporter1]

We would love to see a change also.  We have had numerous comments on how confusing the statements are.