We have upgraded our MacPractice Payments offering to include a new feature allowing your office to provide a secure method for patients to pay their bill online. This article covers the basics of this feature.
You must be running MacPractice Build 15.18.4 or Build 16.3.1 or higher, and you must have MacPractice Payments on your license. You will also need the Patient Portal added to your license and set up. Setting Up The Patient Portal
If interested in MacPractice Payments, Please contact MacPractice Sales for further details. You can email sales@macpractice.com or call (646) 305-9008.
Set Up Steps
The first thing you'll need to do when you have finished installing the new MacPractice build is to access the MacPractice Admin Portal. You can do this via the MacPractice Menu > MacPractice Admin Portal, as shown in the image to the right.
This will bring up the Online Payment Terms of Service.
Terms of Service
The Terms of Service allows an office to set an agreement that a patient would have to accept before being able to make a payment via the Portal.
The drop down menu allows you to select a previously created Terms of Service, or to create a new one.
You can have multiple agreements, but only one may be Active at any given point. You can toggle which set of Terms of Service are Active by clicking the Active checkbox.
If no Terms of Service is activated and a patient attempts to access the Online Payment Portal, they will see this message:
MacPractice Support cannot assist with the creation or selection of appropriate Terms of Service for your office, as local and regional laws may differ, causing any template we could provide to be ineffective or inaccurate. The office will want to consult with a lawyer or other resources to address this need.
Default Payment Method for Online Payments
In the Admin Portal selection, you’ll also see there’s some options under “Card Processing.”
We strongly recommend creating a new Payment Type in References > Payment Types that can be specifically used for Online Patient Payments. This will help keep things organized in your reports. You can read more about Payment Types here.
Adding Portal User Access
Before a Portal User can make Online Patient Payments, we'll need to grant Account Access to that Portal User. You can set up your Portal Users and grant patient record access in addition to Account billing access in the References Ability under “Patient Portal Users”.
You can read more about Portal Users here. This linked article will guide you through the Portal Users node in References.
Update Portal User Online Billing Access Database Utility
This works for individual accounts, but what if you've got several Portal Users you want to grant Account Access to? The "Update Portal User Online Billing Access" utility can be used to grant or revoke access to all Portal Users with access to an Account. This utility is accessible from the Managers Ability, under “Database Utilities”, on the server computer.
As a reminder, we strongly recommend making a backup of your MacPractice database prior to using any Database Utility.
Managing Payments
When a Portal User makes a payment, the payment will automatically be posted to the Account's ledger, using the Default Payment Type set in the Card Processing Preference. These will be posted with the code "Online Payment".
Payments made on the Patient Portal cannot be voided or refunded on the Portal. A patient will need to reach out to the office to get these payments refunded or voided if necessary.
Online Payments can be voided if done on the same day as the payment was made by double clicking the payment and clicking the Void Transaction... button. Past this timeframe, you will be unable to Void a Transaction and must instead issue a refund.
Transaction Log and Report Changes
In the Transaction Log, we've made a few changes to accommodate Online Patient Payments. In the Entry Method column, we've added a new Online Payment type to better distinguish Online Payment transactions.
We've also adjusted the drop down filter to include an option to only display Online Payments.
In Reports that deal with payments, such as the Day Sheet reports, you can identify Online Payments as such for relevant transactions. These will also show as Online Payments.
Patient Payment Workflow
The patient can access the Patient Portal by following the URL to the domain. This URL is typically https://<OfficeDomain>.com/PatientPortal. For example, if we had a domain called "MacPracticeSupport", the URL would read https://macpracticesupport.com/PatientPortal.
Once they reach this URL, they'll be presented with a log in screen. This is where they will enter the Username and Password for their Portal User.
Once the Portal User has logged in, they’ll be presented with a few options at the top to review messages, specific patient information, or to schedule an appointment if that has been enabled. In this article, we’re focusing on Online Bill Pay. You can select Online Bill Pay in the top navigation bar.
If the Portal User does not have access to an account or patient, they'll see this screen:
At the top, you can select which Account to pay for with the Account drop down. This will contain any Accounts that the Patient Portal User has been granted access to. (See the previous section on setting up Patient Portal Users)
You’ll see the Patient and Insurance Balances that are currently on the account, in addition to the currently unapplied payments on the account. The “Account” Balance covers both Patient and Insurance.
The Payment Amount field will auto-populate with the Patient balance amount. To make a payment, the user will need to check the box indicating that they have read the Online Payment Terms of Service. These must be accepted every time a payment is made.
Once they've clicked Next, they'll be taken to the Card Selection page, where they can select any card that's currently on file for the Account in their Wallet.
They can also click the "Use a Different Card" button to enter the details of a new card. The Card Number, CVV, and expiration date are all required fields to process the payment. The patient can also set this new card as the Default option for the next time a payment is made, or uncheck the Save Card Information if they would prefer not have a card on file.
The last window to appear is a confirmation page where the payment amount, the selected card, and the Cardholder Information on the prior window. If everything looks okay, the patient can click Submit Payment.
This processing payment window will appear, indicating the payment is currently being processed.
Once the payment has been processed, they will receive a confirmation page, which they can then print or download at their leisure by clicking the indicated button.
