Category: Business Tips
Reduce Your Risk of Being Hacked
10 proven tech tips for every home healthcare DME Benjamin Franklin was addressing fire prevention, not healthcare, when he coined the famous axiom “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” But I can see his thinking clearly applying to our homecare industry today. In the case of being hacked, one could modify Ben’s saying to: “An ounce of prevention is worth many thousands and even millions of dollars of cures.” As the CEO and owner of Applied Home Healthcare Equipment, I have had the good fortune to visit many home healthcare businesses across the U.S. Virtually all them seem to share a passion for going the extra mile to serve their patients. But great service doesn’t defeat hackers from targeting your business. In my visits I have heard on more than a few occasions how lax email practices have caused anguish and regret. My son is a computer expert/ consultant who has worked for IBM and Google. He grew up with computers and has taught me a lot about the need for careful email handling. Here are ten rules I have learned from him, and from my own personal experience in serving the heathcare industry, about email safety. These precautions could save you much aggravation and many lost income dollars, if followed. Never put anything sensitive in an email that you wouldn’t want to see in your local newspaper. This is true even if you have been guaranteed the email is secure from national media, television, radio, bl
Introducing Patient Financing to Help Increase Cash Sales
A DME supplier can no longer survive while being dependent on Medicare for fee-for-service… with competitive bidding, stringent documentation requirements, lower reimbursement, post-payment audits, tightening Medicare purse strings—Medicare fee-for-service should only be a component of the supplier’s total income stream. There are 78 million baby boomers (people born between 1946 and 1964); they are retiring at a rate of 10,000 per day and are accustomed to paying for things out-of-pocket. The successful DME will be focused on selling upgrades and selling items for cash. To help providers in this changing market, and to allow patients access to the best POC in the market, OxyGo® is proud to introduce OxyCare Total Advantage. OxyCare Total Advantage is a revolutionary patient financing program for the Home Healthcare Market… Patients can own their equipment with monthly payments, and Providers can get the cash for the equipment almost immediately! OxyCare Total Advantage has partnered with a leading financing company to bring providers a consumer level financing experience for enhancing patient cash sales. Our surveys show that thousands of POC cash purchases are foregone due to lack of availability of patient payment plans, OxyCare Total Advantage projects that POC sales will increase by 20% for Providers offering the program. What is OxyCare Total Advantage? OxyCare Total Advantage is a fixed-term loan (closed-end finan
Innovative Financing to Help Your Patients Keep Going
The great early twentieth century sports and short story writer Damon Runyon wrote many memorable lines, perhaps none so famous as his observation that, “The race may not always be to the swift nor the victory to the strong, but that’s how you bet.” The swift and the strong in home healthcare sales should be asking themselves an important question: How many POC sales (and the high stacks of profit dollars associated with them) are they leaving on the table by not having an in-store finance program to help their customers keep going? The answer is probably plenty. Studies show that providers most likely would sell between 20% and 30% more POCs and other homecare products if they had a fast, reliable and fair finance program in place. Finance experts predict that homecare providers lose one out of every possible five POC sales simply because of customer affordability issues. That’s no longer necessary. OxyGo®, the top brand name for high quality and reliable portable oxygen concentrators, has partnered with a finance company to make it possible to provide customers with an OxyGo POC for as little as $63 a month, while providers can get paid in as little as 24 hours. The program is called “OxyCare Total Advantage™” because it gives OxyGo homecare providers a huge sales advantage. Many potential POC customers would like to purchase an OxyGo unit, but don’t have the resources to do so with a large payment. OxyCare Tota
Four Tech Predictions That Failed — And One That’s On-The-Money!
The crystal ball business can be tricky. This is especially true when it comes to predicting the degree to which new commercial technology will be accepted by the general public. Sometimes even the smartest of the smart miss the boat badly in their predictions. Consider, for example, these four famous pronouncements: 1 — “TV will never be a serious competitor for radio because people must sit and keep their eyes glued on a screen; the average American family hasn’t time for it.” ~ The New York Times 2 — “There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home.” ~ Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp. (DEC), maker of big business mainframe computers, arguing against the PC in 1977. 3 — “There is practically no chance communications space satellites will be used to provide better telephone, telegraph, television, or radio service inside the United States.” ~ T. Craven, FCC Commissioner, in 1961 (the first commercial communications satellite went into service in 1965). 4 — “Everyone’s always asking me when Apple will come out with a cell phone. My answer is, ‘Probably never.’” ~ Tech columnist David Pogue (2006) As we look back at these and other wildly off-the-mark predictions, it’s easy to laugh. Hindsight is always 20/20. Predicting the future is risky. But of one trend in healthcare I am certain. The battle fo
Home HealthCare TODAY's Sweet 17
17 positive changes you can implement now — for a successful 2017! With the start of a new year, it’s time to follow through on resolutions that every DME-focused business should seriously consider. Here’s a list of our top picks. There is a new sheriff in town in Washington, D.C. It’s time to review your business plan in the light of possible politically based changes that could impact your business from the new administration. Is there anything you should add or delete to the plan that can be leveraged to your benefit? Collect the money you are owed. Redouble your efforts to collect delinquent accounts. Nothing good follows by hanging on to an unproductive employee. The beginning of the year is a good time to do employee pruning you may have been putting off. Your productive employees will thank you. Give yourself a break. Plan a real vacation this year without a computer by your side. Go back to school and learn something new. Make an effort to catch employees in the act of doing something right. Let them know how much you appreciate their efforts. Automate, automate, automate. Leveraging technology to handle repetitive workplace tasks is smart business. Include a stuffer in your monthly invoicing that promotes a product or service that needs extra attention. Teach yourself a new marketing skill and use it. Weed out marketing and sales efforts to people who don’t have the money to buy from you. Consider canceling the next expensive Christ
Blog - Business Tips
Category: Business Tips
Reduce Your Risk of Being Hacked
10 proven tech tips for every home healthcare DME Benjamin Franklin was addressing fire prevention, not healthcare, when he coined the famous axiom “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” But I can see his thinking clearly applying to our homecare industry today. In the case of being hacked, one could modify Ben’s saying to: “An ounce of prevention is worth many thousands and even millions of dollars of cures.” As the CEO and owner of Applied Home Healthcare Equipment, I have had the good fortune to visit many home healthcare businesses across the U.S. Virtually all them seem to share a passion for going the extra mile to serve their patients. But great service doesn’t defeat hackers from targeting your business. In my visits I have heard on more than a few occasions how lax email practices have caused anguish and regret. My son is a computer expert/ consultant who has worked for IBM and Google. He grew up with computers and has taught me a lot about the need for careful email handling. Here are ten rules I have learned from him, and from my own personal experience in serving the heathcare industry, about email safety. These precautions could save you much aggravation and many lost income dollars, if followed. Never put anything sensitive in an email that you wouldn’t want to see in your local newspaper. This is true even if you have been guaranteed the email is secure from national media, television, radio, bl
Introducing Patient Financing to Help Increase Cash Sales
A DME supplier can no longer survive while being dependent on Medicare for fee-for-service… with competitive bidding, stringent documentation requirements, lower reimbursement, post-payment audits, tightening Medicare purse strings—Medicare fee-for-service should only be a component of the supplier’s total income stream. There are 78 million baby boomers (people born between 1946 and 1964); they are retiring at a rate of 10,000 per day and are accustomed to paying for things out-of-pocket. The successful DME will be focused on selling upgrades and selling items for cash. To help providers in this changing market, and to allow patients access to the best POC in the market, OxyGo® is proud to introduce OxyCare Total Advantage. OxyCare Total Advantage is a revolutionary patient financing program for the Home Healthcare Market… Patients can own their equipment with monthly payments, and Providers can get the cash for the equipment almost immediately! OxyCare Total Advantage has partnered with a leading financing company to bring providers a consumer level financing experience for enhancing patient cash sales. Our surveys show that thousands of POC cash purchases are foregone due to lack of availability of patient payment plans, OxyCare Total Advantage projects that POC sales will increase by 20% for Providers offering the program. What is OxyCare Total Advantage? OxyCare Total Advantage is a fixed-term loan (closed-end finan
Innovative Financing to Help Your Patients Keep Going
The great early twentieth century sports and short story writer Damon Runyon wrote many memorable lines, perhaps none so famous as his observation that, “The race may not always be to the swift nor the victory to the strong, but that’s how you bet.” The swift and the strong in home healthcare sales should be asking themselves an important question: How many POC sales (and the high stacks of profit dollars associated with them) are they leaving on the table by not having an in-store finance program to help their customers keep going? The answer is probably plenty. Studies show that providers most likely would sell between 20% and 30% more POCs and other homecare products if they had a fast, reliable and fair finance program in place. Finance experts predict that homecare providers lose one out of every possible five POC sales simply because of customer affordability issues. That’s no longer necessary. OxyGo®, the top brand name for high quality and reliable portable oxygen concentrators, has partnered with a finance company to make it possible to provide customers with an OxyGo POC for as little as $63 a month, while providers can get paid in as little as 24 hours. The program is called “OxyCare Total Advantage™” because it gives OxyGo homecare providers a huge sales advantage. Many potential POC customers would like to purchase an OxyGo unit, but don’t have the resources to do so with a large payment. OxyCare Tota
Four Tech Predictions That Failed — And One That’s On-The-Money!
The crystal ball business can be tricky. This is especially true when it comes to predicting the degree to which new commercial technology will be accepted by the general public. Sometimes even the smartest of the smart miss the boat badly in their predictions. Consider, for example, these four famous pronouncements: 1 — “TV will never be a serious competitor for radio because people must sit and keep their eyes glued on a screen; the average American family hasn’t time for it.” ~ The New York Times 2 — “There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home.” ~ Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp. (DEC), maker of big business mainframe computers, arguing against the PC in 1977. 3 — “There is practically no chance communications space satellites will be used to provide better telephone, telegraph, television, or radio service inside the United States.” ~ T. Craven, FCC Commissioner, in 1961 (the first commercial communications satellite went into service in 1965). 4 — “Everyone’s always asking me when Apple will come out with a cell phone. My answer is, ‘Probably never.’” ~ Tech columnist David Pogue (2006) As we look back at these and other wildly off-the-mark predictions, it’s easy to laugh. Hindsight is always 20/20. Predicting the future is risky. But of one trend in healthcare I am certain. The battle fo
Home HealthCare TODAY's Sweet 17
17 positive changes you can implement now — for a successful 2017! With the start of a new year, it’s time to follow through on resolutions that every DME-focused business should seriously consider. Here’s a list of our top picks. There is a new sheriff in town in Washington, D.C. It’s time to review your business plan in the light of possible politically based changes that could impact your business from the new administration. Is there anything you should add or delete to the plan that can be leveraged to your benefit? Collect the money you are owed. Redouble your efforts to collect delinquent accounts. Nothing good follows by hanging on to an unproductive employee. The beginning of the year is a good time to do employee pruning you may have been putting off. Your productive employees will thank you. Give yourself a break. Plan a real vacation this year without a computer by your side. Go back to school and learn something new. Make an effort to catch employees in the act of doing something right. Let them know how much you appreciate their efforts. Automate, automate, automate. Leveraging technology to handle repetitive workplace tasks is smart business. Include a stuffer in your monthly invoicing that promotes a product or service that needs extra attention. Teach yourself a new marketing skill and use it. Weed out marketing and sales efforts to people who don’t have the money to buy from you. Consider canceling the next expensive Christ
Home HealthCare TODAY is a news and regulatory magazine for the home healthcare industry.
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