HotDoc now works with Best Practice (BP) Oxford’s Assignment of Benefit (AOB) feature to collect bulk billing consent from your patients, and sync this into BP. 

When you mark an invoice’s AOB as ‘Managed externally’, HotDoc sends your patient a consent form. Their response updates automatically in Best Practice, and you can send off the claim to Medicare as expected.

This guide covers post-assignment and pre-assignment consent, as well as amended invoices for rejected claims where a patient needs to provide their consent again. 

There will be changes to the HotDoc Dashboard to show you more information about a consent request.

• How the HotDoc x Best Practice AOB Integration works
• 1. Post-consent
• 2. Pre-consent
• 3. If Medicare rejects a claim/service is adjusted for an unpaid claim and patient needs to provide consent again
• Changes in the HotDoc Dashboard
• FAQs
  • Where do I see all of our completed, outstanding and pending Assignment of Benefits in BP?
  • AOB Status (pending, approved, declined) not showing in BP
  • I amended an invoice, why didn't the status update in the appt book?
  • Will HotDoc send a consent form to a patient who already has enduring consent?
     

How the HotDoc x Best Practice Assignment of Benefit (AOB) Integration works

• Must be using Best Practice Oxford and have turned on AOB feature in Best Practice and in HotDoc (Medicare Hub > Settings)
   
• Make sure your patients contact details are up to date in Best Practice, so we can reach them
   
• When you turn this on, we'll send for any patients appointments/invoices that you've set to 'Managed externally' so the patient can provide their consent
   
• Post consent: We'll send a request when the invoice's AOB marked as 'Managed externally' and you click 'Generate and Store'
   
• Pre-consent: Once you send this in HotDoc, we'll sync this and update it in BP. If it doesn't match post appointment, we can send another request for the patient to consent again to the updated service
   
• Enduring consent: We do not send a AOB consent request when the assignment of benefit is marked as 'Enduring consent' in Best Practice
   
• To see AOB status in Best Practice next to the patients appointment: Go to Setup > Configuration > Appointments and tick the checkbox "Automatically show assignment of benefit from request status on appointment book", then press Save

1. Post-consent

Will send for any Telehealth or Face-to-face appointment where the assignment of benefit is set to 'Managed Externally'.

1. In Best Practice, the doctor will finalise the visit with the MBS items. Reception then creates the account and under Assignment of benefit, select Do not generate assignment of benefit > Managed externally, then click Generate and store. 
   • This tells HotDoc to send the consent request and the status changes to 'pending' for the patients appointment in Best Practice.
     
     
      
2. HotDoc sends the request: HotDoc sends your patient a consent request straight away. Telehealth visits get a push notification, email or SMS. Face-to-face visits get a push notification or email.
    
3. Patient approve or declines: they open the link, verify their details, then review and tap I agree to bulk bill this service to approve, or they can decline. 
    
4. We update Best Practice: the appointment shows Approved or Declined in your appointment book, and the signed form is saved as a PDF in the patient's Correspondence In. You can now send the claim to Medicare.

2. Pre-consent

Pre-consent lets your patients agree to bulk billing up to 7 days before their appointment. To send a pre

1. In HotDoc Dashboard: on the Bulk Billing Consent page, click Send a Pre-assignment Consent. We send it to your patient by push notification or email. See here for how to send these.
    
2. The patient approves or declines: the appointment shows Approved or Declined in Best Practice, and in your Dashboard.
   
    
3. The patient then has their appointment, the practitioner then adds the MBS items as usual.
    
4. On the invoice, select Do not generate assignment of benefit, then:
   • If the items match the pre-consent: choose Benefit assigned on [date], click Generate and store and claim as usual.
   • If the items have changed: choose Managed externally. We'll send your patient a new consent request for the updated items.

3. If Medicare rejects a claim/service is adjusted for an unpaid claim and patient needs to provide consent again

If a service is adjusted or there was changes to item numbers relating to a patients appointment, after a patient has already provided their consent, we can now send an updated request to the patient to ge them to provide their consent for the adjusted items. 

1. In Adjust billing, choose Change item number, set Assignment of benefit to 'Do not generate assignment of benefit' and select  'Managed externally' and click 'Generate and store'
   
2. We send a new request for the patient to approve: HotDoc sends your patient a new consent form for the updated items and lets them know it replaces the earlier one. Once they approve, we update the status in Best Practice, and you can resubmit the claim to Medicare.

   • Note: If you amend the service on a patients invoice, it won't change the AOB status on the appointment as it relates to an invoice, not the appointment. 

      

Changes in the HotDoc Dashboard

Under Medicare Hub > Bulk Billing Consent, We will be making changes to improve the visibility over a patient's consent history so you can see a timeline. These changes will be ready in the next few weeks.  

FAQ

• Where do I see all of our completed, outstanding and pending Assignment of Benefits in BP? 

  Management > Follow up Assignment of Benefit. When requests are completed/declined via HotDoc we will update this here. See BPs guide: https://kb.bestpracticesoftware.com/bppremier/oxford/MedicareDVA/AOBFollowUp.htm 
   

• AOB Status (pending, approved, declined) not showing in BP:

  Go to Setup > Configuration > Appointments and tick the checkbox "Automatically show assignment of benefit from request status on appointment book", then press save.

• I amended an invoice, why didn't the status update in the appt book?

  When you amend the invoice, the new AOB record is attached the the invoice and not the appointment, so the status will not appear/update the in the patients  appointment book.
   

• Will HotDoc send a consent form to a patient who already has enduring consent? 

  No. If you select ‘Enduring consent’ in the AOB section, HotDoc won’t send the patient a form. HotDoc only sends AOB consent forms when you select ‘Managed externally’. Previously, HotDoc created consent requests from invoice details, which meant some patients with enduring consent received forms. This no longer happens.