Customer Stories: Crimson Physical Therapy
Speech therapy clinic makes it easier for patients to pay for services with QuickBooks® Merchant Services
Communicating using the spoken word is a skill that begins the moment an infant is aware of his or her surroundings. Failure to develop this skill properly at the earliest age can have devastating impact on a person's life. From stuttering to non-communication, the Crimson Center for Speech & Language Pathology provides individualized treatment to maximize functional communication skills of children, adolescents, and adults.
The clinic, based in San Diego, California, uses QuickBooks Merchant Services to make it easier for its many clients to pay their monthly statements.
"Because patients may come in for multiple weekly sessions, they don't pay at each visit," said Katy Cottingham, office manager for the busy clinic. "That would put our bookkeeping activities out of control. Instead, we bill them monthly. What we wanted was an easy method by which our clients could settle their accounts without adding extra paperwork to our workload. Accepting credit cards seemed the best way to go."
Together with the clinic's founder, Katy looked at several credit card processing services, but they didn't seem convenient. Since QuickBooks Pro software was already being used in the practice, they decided to integrate QuickBooks Merchant Services into their business. "It was really easy," Katy said. "The QuickBooks people sent us the initiation paperwork, which was simple to fill out. They took care of all the legwork. We got the card swipe machine to plug into our PC and we were ready to go." The clinic's accountant helped Katy get started. "We did a test and it worked perfectly the first time," she said.
Katy really likes the way QuickBooks Merchant Services works smoothly with QuickBooks software, which she's been using for more than two years. "It's so easy to put in the client's name, swipe their card, and then print out an invoice already marked paid," Katy pointed out. "It's great. When I'm entering checks [into QuickBooks software] and I have to write out the receipts, I need to enter those checks in multiple places. With QuickBooks Merchant Services, I just swipe the card and it enters the information for me. I don't have to do all that manual labor. And the file keeping is incredible. I can look up a client's name if they have a question about a payment. QuickBooks also gives me a full report of what service they received, which clients are paying privately, what their co-pays are, what their balances are, and more—all without having to trace that information back from a third party service."
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It's so much easier for our patients to know that they can come in and swipe their card and be assured that the balance has been paid. With QuickBooks Merchant Services, people pay their balances in full every time.
And how did QuickBooks Merchant Services discount fees compare with other credit card processing service providers? "When we were looking at a service to process our transactions, we definitely found that the [QuickBooks Merchant Services] rates were great. That has saved us a lot," Katy said. "But what we really like is the turnover and rapid receipt of our fees. When a client receives an invoice and pays with a check, that can take time. With QuickBooks Merchant Services, a patient comes in, swipes their card and it's done. It's nice to know that the amount is in our account within a few days, plus, I'm not running to the bank as often to make deposits."
Katy also likes the fact that she can tell clients that she can accept their credit cards when they ask. "We know that, even for people who don't have the funds right now, they can pay us with their credit card and then pay their credit card bill later. Prior to QuickBooks Merchant Services, we had people sitting on our invoices until they got the money to pay us. Meanwhile, they had additional charges building on their account. Being able to accept credit cards has shortened our billing cycles dramatically from what was typically 90 days down to 30 days, and that really helps our cash flow."
