How to Become a Medical Billing Specialist

Whether you want to work in a hospital or office setting as a medical billing specialist, there are several basic skills you must master to accomplish this goal successfully. Possessing solid organizational skills will enable you to generate positive results no matter which setting you choose. The following steps will help you learn how to become a Medical Billing Specialist.

Instructions

• 1

  Obtain a certification or a degree in the medical billing field. There are several schools that offer extensive training. This is not a requirement when recruiters are hiring for this position, but having this certification will help you stand out in the candidate pool. Most employers expect you to have a basic knowledge of the medical billing process, which can be obtained by various means.

• 2

  Work in any secretarial role within a medical office to help get your foot in the door and help you gain the working experience you to need to work in the field of medical billing specialist. Ask your peers questions and be willing to learn and acquire new skills outside of your job duties.

• 3

  Study the claims submission process from beginning to end. Determine the rejection reasons by reviewing a code provided by the insurance carrier explaining the reasons more specifically. Make any adjustments accordingly. Look for simple reasons first as this will save you from losing valuable time doing unnecessary research. Check for correct spelling of the patient's name, date of birth's, sex and social security number. Do the same for the insured individual as well.

• 4

  Contact the patient if the information is not available in the file. Make the corrections and resubmit all related charges.

• 5

  Post all payments received making any provider contracted adjustments as required by law. Sometimes insurance companies make hours when inputting the allowed amounts, so you must check these as you are posting to ensure they are accurate. All errors must be appealed to the insurance company for corrections. Follow the guidelines the company has in place to accomplish this.

• 6

  Report all denied charges due to coding errors to the coding specialist in your department .The law requires that only certified coders make any changes to a patient's medical codes once it is determined a mistake has been made.

• 7

  Maintain an accurate detailed log of all your conversations to either the patient or insurance company. This will aid anyone who needs to look into the account to have a up-to-date report of the status of this account. Most company's software programs have features that allow you to do this.