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Redmond Accounting Inc

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Brushing Up On Your Business: 5 Ways To Get Back To Your Patients

Are you tired of facing an endless array of choices and making decisions without having all the proper business information? As a business owner, are you stressed out and is this “doing it all yourself” getting old? Are you frustrated because you would like to be able to spend more time on dentistry and with your patients instead of worrying about where you might be financially? Here are some ways you can get back to doing what you love:

  1. Know your profitability by designing a service plan to maximize patient focus and provide excellent customer service increasing patient retention and referrals. Do you know what your average cost per patient is? How much should you charge for chair-time (break-even point)? Knowing your current financial position allows you to know how much to charge patients, thus giving you the ability to create financial options for patients, which results in proactive decisions regarding your practice.
  2. Create office policies and procedures to maximize and streamline your back office responsibilities allowing for more time with patients. Mapping out workflows help to determine office inefficiencies and highlight the opportunities for optimization. Multi-layered systems allow for the delegation of tasks associated with paying bills, receiving payments for the practice, etc. to staff members, while maintaining a high level of accountability.
  3. Organize and establish accounting controls with benchmarks so business and year-end reporting is simple and easy. Financial information must be organized in order to prepare and file quarterly and year-end tax returns. Defining key performance indicators and determining benchmarks provides a way to measure the progress of the business by going beyond the balance in the bank account to show more about what’s going on in the practice.  
  4. Invest in new technology to become more efficient and productive. In order to make technology purchases you need to know the current financial position of your practice. Do you know what your return on investment (ROI) is if you purchase this particular piece of equipment? Is there enough cash flow in the business or do funds need to be borrowed in order to purchase the equipment? Knowing the practice profitability is vital, especially for large purchases.
  5. Hire a competent outside accounting firm to help you from “Doing It All Yourself”. Do you know the financial health of your practice? Wearing too many hats and not having enough expertise can be a detriment to any business. The true financial picture of your practice is obtained by examining all of your practice financial statements and aggregating the information so that it is presented in context.

By taking the guesswork out of knowing where your business is, you can attain work-life balance and get back to practicing dentistry leaving you more time for your patients.