Bob Stevens Associates
Real Time Practice Management - One Dose At A Time

P.O. Box 14 Phone
Mt. Morris, NY 14510

 
Phone (800) 269-3387
Fax (800) 217-1989
E-mail DrProfits@aol.com

Practice Management Tips

I have worked with over a 1,000 practices in the last 20 years, 13 with PSI and 7 as a Veterinary Consultant. I know that utilizing the tips provided below, in almost every practice, will have significant financial results.

In the last 7 years, I have built a client base that relies on my recommendations for the future of their practice, profits and the owner's retirement. Where is the PROFIT? - Many practice owners ask this question at the end of the year. There can be many reasons and there are some simple things you can do to increase number of visits and the average client charge. Both of which will add to increased profits.

SERVICE PRICING
Your service fees are made up of two basic types: those that are price shopped and those that are not. Shopped fees, such as vaccinations, spay, neuters, declaws, boarding, grooming, etc. represent only a small number of your total service fees. Typically not wanting to raise shopped fees causes the practice to not raise their fees at all. Often times only a select few fees will be raised. All fees performed should be contributing to the bottom line of the practice.

Exercise - Use the mass markup feature of your software and mark up all service items either 6% annually or 3% semi-annually. Then go back to the shopped fees and bring them back down. This exercise will mean thousands of dollars for you.

Example - How to realize $18,000.

What is the affect of a 6% price increase on non-shopped services?
If the ACT (Average Client Transaction) is $100?
 
  Average Client Transaction
Approximately 30% will be Inventory or Medicine
Service component of ACT
Conservative estimate of shopped services
Non shopped component of ACT
6% increase in non-shopped services
New ACT with 6% increase in non-shopped services
$100
( 30)
$70
(20)
$50
$ 3
$103
 
  Three dollars will be insignificant to your clients, but for a typical 2-doctor practice, with 6000 transactions, per year it will mean $18,000.
 
REMINDERS
I have found, on average, Twenty Two Percent of new clients to a practice pets have NO reminders.

Exercise - have your staff research the last 50-100 new clients and look for pets that are lacking all reminders or that are deficient on reminders.

Reminder Statistics - Many practices do not keep reminder charts and, therefore, are not able to determine the effectiveness of their reminder program. I recommend practices send out 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th reminders. Financially, it is worthwhile to send 4 reminders. The reminder response rate percentage will fall off for the 3rd and 4th reminders, but you cannot spend percentages.


ADDITIONAL REMINDERS
CDC (Center for Disease Control) and the AAVP (American Association of Veterinary Parasitologists) are recommending Strategic Deworming Guidelines for Dogs. They are recommending more frequent fecal checks for Dogs. The back cover of the VETERINARY PRACTICE NEWS, June 2002 issue, references the CDC recommendations.

Exercise - Do a mailing to those Canine owners that have not had a fecal check in the last 6-12 months. Suggested wording:

The Center for Disease Control (CDC) has urged all pet owners to have their Dog's stool checked for parasites at least twice a year. Our records show that your pet is overdue for this test. Please drop a fecal sample by the office or call with questions.


I hope these suggestions are useful to you and that they increase the profits of your practice. If you would like to participate in our Semi-Annual Price Comparison, would like copies of our Reminder Chart or have any questions please call 800-269-3387.

Thank you for your time,
Bob Stevens?