Apply and Unapply Payments

ChiroSpring allows payments to be applied to claims or products from several areas within the patient record. Payments can also remain unapplied until you decide where they should be allocated.

This guide explains how to apply payments and how to remove them if adjustments are needed.

An unapplied payment is any payment that has been recorded on a patient account but has not yet been applied to a specific claim or product.

This commonly occurs when:

• A payment is collected before services are finalized
• A patient prepays for services
• Insurance payments are entered before claims are processed
• A payment was unapplied for correction or reallocation

Unapplied payments can be applied later from several areas of the patient record.

Before you look at How to Apply, let's look at Where to Find Patient's with Unapplied Payments

Reports - Patients - Unapplied Payments

Define Date Range and Click Search

This report will define patient's with Unapplied Payments on their account. From this report you can:

• See totals at the top
• Filter and/or Sort by clicking a Column Row
• Apply, Transfer, Print
• Navigate to Patient File
• Using your Action Button in bottom, right can Print to Excel or PDF

ChiroSpring provides several ways to apply payments to a patient’s account. To support different clinic workflows, Quick Links to payment tools are available throughout the system, including within dynamic reports and customizable user screens. These options allow staff to quickly apply payments from the area of the software where they are already working.

Applying Payments from the Unapplied Payments Report

• Click the APPLY (Index Finger Pointing) Icon

• The Apply Unapplied Payment Screen Pops up, from here you can:

• Choose if want to Apply to
  • Claim
  • Product
• Edit amount or leave as full amount due
• Enter Comments; Comments will appear
  • In your Claims or Product History Log, Patient Payment History and Activity Report

Applying Payments from the Patient's Checkout Screen (Front Desk)

• From the patient checkout on Front Desk
  • Check the Unapplied Payments under Payment Information
  • Select the Claims/Products you want to apply to
  • It will default to full owed amount, you can change the amount applied, if needed
  • Click Save & Apply

Applying Payments from the Billing Dashboard

The Billing Dashboard provides the fastest way to allocate unapplied payments.

Steps

• Navigate to
  • Patient Menu → Billing Dashboard
  • Under Account Summary, select
    • Unapplied Payments on Account

• A popup window will appear displaying any unapplied payments.
• Unapplied payments will be listed on the right side of the window.

• Choose one of the following tabs at the top:
  • Apply to Claim
  • Apply to Product
• Select the checkbox next to the claim or product you want to apply the payment to.
  • Enter the amount in the Amount column.
  • Note: If the amount is not changed, the system will automatically apply the full balance shown.
• Click Save.

Applying Payments from Payment History

Payments can also be applied directly from the Payment History section of Patient File.

Steps

• Navigate to
  • Patient Menu → Payment History
  • Select Claim # at the top of the page.
    • This will move unapplied payments to the top of the list.
  • Locate the unapplied payment you want to assign.

• Click the Assign icon (Index finger pointing up) next to the payment.

Icons:  

Print -> Payment Receipt

Assign -> Apply full or partial amount to Claim/Product

Transfer -> Transfer full or partial amount to a Claim or Product

• A popup window will appear.
  • Choose whether to apply the payment to a:

• Claim
• Product

• Select the claim from the dropdown menu.
  • Enter the amount to apply.
  • Click Save.

Applying Payments from Claim History

Payments can also be applied directly to a claim from the Claim History screen.

Steps

• Navigate to
  • Patient Menu → Claim History
  • Locate the claim you want to apply the payment to.
  • Click the Dollar Bill icon.

• In the payment window,
  • Toggle Manually Apply
  • Select Unapplied payments under Payment Information
  • Enter payment amounts (and/or write off amounts) in the ledger boxes
  • Click Save

• Enter the payment amount.
• Click Save.

Applying Payments from the Aging Report

When you are in the Aging Report, you will see a Dollar Bill Icon next to names of patients with Unapplied payments on their account

• Click the Icon to Open up the Add Payment Screen

• From here you can Click the Tabs at the top to
  • Apply to Claim or
  • Apply to Product

• Click Save.

Applying Payments from the Statements Queue

• When in your Statements Queue, patients with Unapplied Payments will have a Dollar Bill Icon next to their name in the report.
  • Click that icon to open up

• The Add Payment Screen will pop up, from here you can Click the Tabs at the top to
  • Apply to Claim or
  • Apply to Product

• Click Save

Once a payment is Applied, it will show in different areas of the system.

• Each Service and Product has an associated Log, you will see the action logged in product/claim history log the payment was applied to including any Payment Comments/Tags as shown below

• Patient Payment History will have a line item with the applied payment and associated comments/tags

• The action will also be reported in your Activity Report - Entry Date
  • Entry date filters payments by the date they were APPLIED/ALLOCATED
  • You can see in screenshot below, I ran the Activity Report - Entry Date for (today), the same day I applied an unapplied payment (ie credit) to a previous Date of Service, Claim
  • The action taken today logs in Entry Date report because it was applied today, you can see it listed to the left too, as Total Payments Reallocated

If a payment was applied incorrectly or needs to be reassigned, it can be unapplied from the claim.

Common reasons to unapply payments include:

• Payment applied to the wrong claim
• Insurance adjustments
• Deductible changes
• Billing corrections

Steps to Unapply a Payment

• Navigate to
  • Patient Menu → Payment History
  • Locate the payment that needs to be unapplied.
  • Click the yellow X icon.

• A confirmation popup will appear.

• Select:
  • Unapply to remove the payment
  • Cancel to keep the payment applied

What Happens After a Payment is Unapplied

When a payment is unapplied:

• The payment is removed from the claim
• The payment amount is returned to the patient’s Unapplied Payments balance
• The payment does not return to the original claim automatically

From there, the payment can be:

• Reapplied to another claim
• Applied to a product
• Left as an unapplied credit on the account