If your practice uses another billing software package but is converting to Bp Premier, you must perform a series of steps to reconcile accounts and Medicare claims in the old software, and configure Bp Premier to start recording billing information and submit claims to Medicare.
Billing data cannot be converted from your existing billing package. You must manually recreate in Bp Premier all billing components such as accounts, fees and fee schedules, and appointment book configuration. This guide assumes that your practice will use the Medicare Online Bulk Billing and Patient Claiming features of Bp Premier.
1. Transfer Medicare Online Claiming
Inform Medicare that you intend to change from the existing billing package to Bp Premier . Medicare requires a new Minor ID to be registered against the practice and providers for new claims to be transmitted and received correctly from Bp Premier.
You will need to complete and submit two forms:
You can also search for these and other forms at https://www.humanservices.gov.au/health-professionals/forms/.
Contact Medicare after the forms are completed for further information, and to advise them on the date on which the practice will start using Bp Premier Medicare Online. Medicare often takes up to two weeks to process this request for transfer. Step 3 provides advice on how to set a workable transfer date for your practice.
See Set up Online Claiming for single Minor ID for more information.
2. Update Tyro
If your practice uses a Tyro integrated EFTPOS solution with Bp Premier, you will need to provide Tyro with some updated details. Contact either:
- Tyro Customer Support Team on 1300 966 639
- Account Manager on (02) 8907 1717.
See Configure Tyro for more information.
3. Set a handover date
Due to limitations with Medicare software, it not possible to use two billing packages simultaneously for Medicare Online. All Medicare and DVA claims need to be reconciled in the old billing package before Medicare Online can be configured in Bp Premier. There is usually a period of 1 week where no claims can be transmitted.
The practice should decide on a date when the practice will transfer to Bp Premier. Best Practice Software suggest choosing a Friday or Saturday as the last date for using the old billing package. On that date, all outstanding Medicare or DVA accounts are created and transmitted to Medicare and DVA.
After outstanding Medicare and DVA accounts have been transmitted from the old software, initial configuration of Bp Premier can start. Existing appointments can be manually transferred over from the old billing software, and staff can begin using Bp Premier to create new appointments. However, NO CLAIMS can be transmitted in Bp Premier until ALL CLAIMS are reconciled in the old billing package.
Some configuration items are listed in the following steps.
4. Update software licence
If your practice has been using Bp Premier with a third-party billing package, you may need to obtain a new licence for Bp Premier to activate billing and claiming functionality. If you have recently subscribed to Bp Premier or updated to the latest version, this functionality may already be active. Contact sales@bpsoftware.net or call General Products Support on 1300 40 1111 to confirm and obtain a new invoice and updated licence.
After you receive your practice's updated license key, enter the key into Setup > Practice Details in Bp Premier. If you are using an older version of Bp Premier, a new Management menu will become visible at the top of the main screen, and extra icons will appear in the toolbar, such as the Appointment Book and Waiting Room.
If you were using Bp Premier Lava or later, these menu items will already be visible. You can access billing functionality after turning off the link to the old package in 7. Deactivate billing link.
5. Configure Bp Premier for billing
Sessions and Appointments
All doctor's sessions will need to be set up within Bp Premier, and appointments transferred one by one from the old billing package.
Fees, Items, and Account Holders
All practice fees and custom practice items (for example, vitamins or books you may sell in the practice) will also need to be set up within Bp Premier. See Create non-MBS fees and schedules for more information.
If your practice bills hospitals or other third party account holders, you will need to create each of these organisations as account holders in Bp Premier. Select View > Account Holders and click Add new to add a new account holder.
Set user permissions
You must update permissions for users who will be using the new functionality.
Select Setup > Users from the main Bp Premier screen. Select a user and click Set Permissions. Scroll to the bottom of the list and update each accounting-related permission to the appropriate setting for the user. See Add, update, or deactivate a user for more information.
Click Set Reports to set the reports available to the user.
6. Reconcile legacy Medicare claims
Any Medicare or DVA accounts outstanding in the old billing package must be updated and successfully reconciled before submitting any online claims from Bp Premier. Medicare software does not allow multiple billing products to claim and receive payments from the online Medicare server. If you fail to reconcile all claims in the old billing package and begin using Bp Premier for online claiming, you will be unable to retrieve payments or process batch rejections.
On the date decided in Step 3, create all outstanding Medicare or DVA accounts in the old billing package and transmit to Medicare.
A minimum timeframe to reconcile any accounts would be at about 1 week, to allow any rejections and resubmissions of online claims that may still be outstanding to be dealt with.
Outstanding private, work cover, or other accounts can either be finalised in the old billing package, or manually recreated and sent from Bp Premier. The most suitable option depends upon the number of such accounts and whether the old billing package will be available for use in the future.
7. Deactivate billing link
On the Bp Premier server, select Setup > Configuration > Links and untick Activate the link to another package. Repeat this step on each Bp Premier workstation.
The practice can now begin to use Bp Premier for billing.
If you do not deactivate the link, Bp Premier will not allow certain functions to be carried out, such as creating new patient records.
8. Cease use of old software
After Bp Premier has been set up and is in use for billing and claiming, log out of all old billing workstations and the billing software server. You can no longer use the old software for Medicare and DVA online claiming.
IMPORTANT Do not create any accounts in the old billing package once the cut off date has been reached.
Staff can start billing patients and creating accounts from Bp Premier. Even though the practice may not have the ability to submit claims online to Medicare or DVA for a few days, practice staff can still create accounts. The accounts will remain in Bp Premier as 'Unsent', and can be sent to Medicare after Online Claiming has been set up in Bp Premier.
9. Set up Medicare Online in Bp Premier
Once the reconciliation is complete within the old billing software, configure Bp Premier to use online claiming. It is assumed at this point that the practice has verified with Medicare that their details are registered against the new practice Minor ID number.
See Set up Online Claiming for single Minor ID for more information.
10. Begin claiming with Bp Premier
Once all the outstanding Medicare and DVA accounts have been transmitted, the practice can begin to use Bp Premier for billing and online claiming.
IMPORTANT It is not possible to transmit any Bulk Bill Medicare, DVA, and patient claims to Medicare from Bp Premier until all claims have been reconciled in the old billing package.
11. Clear AIR Register in Bp Premier
In Bp Premier, immunisations that need to be transmitted to the Australian Immunisation Register (AIR) are written to the AIR register. When you are using a third-party billing package, this information is written to an interface file to be imported into the billing package and transmitted to Medicare.
You need to clear all the existing immunisations from the register:
- Select Utilities > AIR from the main screen of Bp Premier.
- To select multiple immunisations, use CTRL + click. To remove multiple pages of records, use SHIFT + Page Down on the keyboard.
- If you have selected all the records you wish to remove, select File > Exclude Current Record or press Delete.
After the list has been cleared, any new immunisations that appear in this list can be sent to AIR by clicking Send to AIR. Immunisation records are not batched in Bp Premier, unlike other billing packages.
NOTE The Send to AIR button is only enabled if Medicare Online has been configured.
See Send immunisation records to AIR for more information.
12. Review outstanding accounts and claims in old billing package
Once are you using Bp Premier for all billing, consider tidying up accounts in the old billing package.
For non-Medicare / DVA accounts, you can either continue to use the old billing package until the accounts are paid, or you can enter a new account in Bp Premier to be processed in Bp Premier.
If any outstanding Medicare or DVA accounts exist, first call Medicare/DVA to check on the status of the claims, because the status may not be up to date. If vouchers are unpaid and you want to resubmit them, recreate the account in Bp Premier and transmit to Medicare in a new batch.
