Setting Up and Using Discounts

Overview

You can add a standard discount into your system, which can be assigned to charges as needed. Discounts can be percent discounts, dollar amount discounts, or some combination of both. If a combination, the dollar amount discount will apply first, with the percent discount applied to the new, lower total.

Custom or Free Text Discount Tip: Normally, defined discounts will automatically apply a fixed percentage and/or dollar value discount to a charge. However, if you want to create a "flexible" discount, which allows you to specify a variable value at the time it's applied, simply create the discount definition as normal but leave both the Discount % and the Discount dollar-value fields as "0" and "0.00" respectively). When applied, this discount will prompt you to enter the dollar value of the discount.

Related Articles

• Practice Charge List - Add to or Edit Master List of Charges
• Add a Charge to Patient Account

Table of Contents

• How to Set Up Discounts
• How to Apply Discounts
• Auto-Apply Rules
• Apply Discount to Multiple Charges
• Discount Reporting

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Details

How to Set Up Discounts

To add a new discount, go to the Admin > Manage > Discounts. This will bring up the Manage Discounts pop up. To add a new discount level, select the green +Add New Discount button.

Discount Name (text) - Name shown in the Discount drop-down on the +Add a New Charge pop-up.

% Discount total charge by this Percent (number) - Percentage discount applied. Enter zero if using a dollar value discount.

Discount total charge by this dollar value (currency) - Dollar amount discounted. Enter zero if using a percentage discount.

Note: If both percentage and dollar value are set, the dollar discount applies first, then the percentage.

Based on retail or wholesale price - Discounts can be based on wholesale prices, which add the discount to wholesale prices to reach retail price, or on retail prices, which reduce the retail price by the discount.

Description of this discount - Internal/admin description.

To edit a standard discount, go to Admin → Manage... → Discounts, select the discount, update details, and click the green Edit This Discount button.

Note - Discounting Charge Groups

You can create charge groups (e.g., packages) with discounts applied to each charge individually. Percentage discounts work well here.

Dollar value discounts on groups apply to each charge individually, so a $100 discount on 5 charges should be set as $20 per charge. If charges vary or the discount doesn't split evenly, use a percentage discount instead.

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How to Apply Discounts

Once the discounts are created under Admin > Manage > Discounts, you will be able to access them when adding a charge to the patient's account. Click the Discount button to access your list of discounts.

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Auto-Apply Rules

This feature allows you to set rules for your system discounts to be automatically applied to patient charges based on the patient's tags and the charge type.

Under the Admin > Manage > Discounts. In the Manage Discounts window you can either click on an existing discount item to edit it and auto apply discount rules or click the green button to "+ Create New Discount."

Under Auto-Apply Discount Rules click +Add Rule. From here select from the dropdown options to apply discount automatically based on charge type and for patients with a particular tag(s). 

Click +Add Rule to apply multiple parameters for auto applying discount.

Example of an Auto-Apply Rule

In the example below, this discount will auto apply to all patients tagged as "Friend" whenever adding a "Services" charge type.

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Apply Discount to Multiple Charges

Not only can you add discounts on a per-charge and per-charge-group basis, but you can also bulk-apply a discount to a group of charges after they have already been added to a patient's account.

There are two ways you can add a discount to a group of charges on a Patient's Account:

1. From within an encounter note, hover over the Charges/Payments block and click on the "Apply Discount" option:
   
    
2. From the patient's expanded billing block, check one or more charges and use the Manage Checked > Apply Discount option. This will bring up the bulk-apply discount window, which gives you the option to select a discount and shows the new total(s) that brings your charge to:
   

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Discount Reporting

To view a summary of all discounts applied across your practice, navigate to Reports in the main menu. Use the billing reports to filter by discount transactions and review the total discount amounts applied over a given date range.