SILKIN MANAGEMENT GROUP: Potential Medicare Changes

Posted on December 15, 2011 by

I just read an article in the New York Times that discussed new legislation concerning the overhaul of Medicare. I was interested in it for several reasons: a) this change would be very relevant to Silkin Management Group clients, b) it is a truly bi-partisan initiative and c) it is co-authored by one of my state’s senators, Ron Wyden.

Readers of our Silkin Management Group blogs can read the full NY Times article by clicking on the link below. At the same time I thought I’d summarize the key points for a swift overview.

The Wyden-Ryan proposal does the following:

• Limits the federal government’s open-ended monetary commitment to the Medicare program.

• Private insurers would get premiums subsidized for beneficiaries that are under a Medicare contract. This is known as “premium support”.

• Insurance exchanges would be set up for beneficiaries of Medicare. This would allow private plans to compete with Medicare and hopefully drive down costs.

• Caps the growth of Medicare. A new formula is proposed by which Medicare could grow no more than 1% above the growth of the overall economy. I have no idea how they will figure this out, but it is supposed to result in a slower rate of growth than has been traditionally experienced.

Wyden, a staunch Democrat, is a strong supporter of Medicare, but also a fiscally responsible Senator. With his backing it is hoped that the usual objections of the Democrats to Medicare reform will be abated. Senator Ryan, a staunch Republican, has softened the usual Republican stance on more invasive Medicare reforms and it is hoped that, with his backing, the Republicans will get on board. If both parties proceed with this legislation we could have the first truly bi-partisan piece of major legislation in years and re-kindled hope that our government can start working again.

The full New York Times article can be accessed here: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/15/us/politics/lawmakers-offer-bipartisan-plan-to-overhaul-medicare.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha24

Jack Hennessy
Silkin Management Group Consultant

You can visit Silkin Management Group’s website at www.silkinmanagementgroup.com to find out more about the successes experienced by our clients.

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SILKIN MANAGEMENT GROUP: New Year Tax Issues – Part 5

Posted on December 13, 2011 by

Today we’ll present the last of a series of articles concerning financial and tax issues that Silkin Management Group clients and other readers of our various Silkin Management Group blog sites should be aware of.

So far we’ve covered the following items: a) the possible extension of the payroll tax reduction, b) how the IRS and state tax agencies are stepping up audit and collection activities on businesses, c) possible extension of some favorable business tax rules, d) the uncertainty over health care costs and the outcome of the “Obama-care” legislation that is now before the Supreme Court, e) revenue needs from city, states and federal governments, f) potential changes in unemployment taxes, g) upcoming changes in estate planning and h) on-line filing. Some of that information is on this blog site and the rest can be accessed at these two Silkin Management Group sites: http://bit.ly/snG27w
http://bit.ly/vTjsyZ

Here are two more issues that our readers should keep in mind:

Impact of lower interest rates:

Those of us who are savers don’t like the extremely low interest rates offered on savings accounts and similar accounts in which we park our money. Those who are borrowing like the historically low rates, especially regarding real estate loans. But have you thought about what the low interest rates mean for penalties for underpaying taxes? The IRS is only charging 3% right now on tax underpayments. That’s a much lower interest rate than a business owner could get for a business loan. It could make more sense for a business to underpay estimated taxes, use the money for cash flow, and pay the 3% interest come April 15th. Make very sure, though, that you check with your tax advisor before taking on any course of action like this when dealing with the IRS. You want to make sure you are doing the right thing and that whatever you are doing is strictly legal and on the “up and up”. You still have to pay any taxes due by April 15th or else you can bring about interest and penalties.

Additional complexities in the tax system:

Despite the various Republican candidate’s tax reform proposals (Cain’s 9-9-9, Perry’s flat tax, etc.) the odds are that the tax system will not only remain the same, but gain more and more complexity. Right now, according to a report from PWC, the U.S. tax system is the 69th most complex out of 189 countries looked at and has gotten worse by 23 places since 2009. With new rules being added every year there is more and more complexity rather than any attempts, other than political “hot air”, of simplification. Therefore readers of our Silkin Management Group blogs should stay on top of any new rules issued. The best way to do this is to hire a very competent tax advisor.

Eric Korb
Silkin Management Group Consultant

For more information about Silkin Management Group, call us at 800-695-0257 or visit our website at www.silkinmanagementgroup.com

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SILKIN MANAGEMENT GROUP: New Year Tax Issues – Part 2

Posted on December 8, 2011 by

In yesterday’s Silkin Management Group blog we began a series of articles discussing upcoming financial and tax related trends that we thought readers of our various blog sites, whether Silkin Management Group clients or not, should be aware of.

Yesterday we went over the “political football” going on in Congress right now concerning the extension of the payroll tax reduction and the head-butting between the Democrats and Republicans on how to pay for it. Republicans are holding out for no tax increases what-so-ever. We also went over how the IRS and state tax agencies are stepping up audit and collection activities on businesses. You can access this article on the following Silkin Management Group blog site: www.practicemanagementblog.com/?p=163

Today we’ll go over two more points for any business owner to be aware of.

Extension of some business tax rules:

There are numerous business favorable tax rules that are due to end this year. These were rules implemented by the Bush administration. Nothing definitive has been decided yet whether these rules will be extended, but the “rumor mill” in Congress is that the following rules will be extended:

• Ability to take 100% of depreciation on qualified equipment purchases up to $500,000.
• Ability to take 100% exclusion from the profits of selling qualified small business stocks held more than 5 years in certain C corps.

Legislation has been submitted for the extension of the rules that cover the points above, as well as other points. It may not be voted on until 2012.

Health Care Uncertainty:

With the “Obama-care” legislation now in front of the Supreme Court, there is a huge amount of uncertainty on whether mandated health care insurance will be implemented and how that affects individuals and businesses. We’ve written extensively about this in many previous Silkin Management Group blogs. For example, will the tax credit to small businesses for helping pay for employee health coverage still exist? Who knows? Although a much smaller percentage of small businesses took advantage of this credit than predicted by the Administration when Obama-care was passed, it is still an important issue for every business. The key issue the Supreme Court will rule on is the constitutionality of the mandate. This ruling will affect every individual and business in the country. We should have a ruling somewhere between June and October.

Future Silkin Management Group blogs will discuss additional tax related issues for every business owner to be aware of.

Dave McKevitt
Silkin Management Group Consultant

For more information about Silkin Management Group, give us a call at 800-695-0257. You can also visit our website at www.silkinmanagementgroup.com

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SILKIN MANAGEMENT GROUP: Year End Items to Look At

Posted on December 5, 2011 by

The end of the year is always a time for small businesses, including Silkin Management Group clients, to take a look at some important business related matters.

One of the first things that Silkin Management Group consultants look at with their clients is possible ways to reduce taxes. There are several avenues that can be considered including:

• Accelerating expenses. You can prepay expenses such as rent or mortgages that are due the following year, licenses, registration costs for upcoming continuing education conferences, etc. Pay every bill you have, if you have the money available.

• Delay income. One example of this is to send billing invoices after January 1st.

• Maximize retirement accounts. Get as much money as legally possible into any retirement account you have as this is “pre-tax” money. If you don’t have a retirement account set up, get one! If you do have one, consult with a good accountant to ensure you have the best plan available that allows you to invest the most possible money. This can be worth thousands of dollars in tax savings. Plans usually need to be set up by December 31st but often you don’t have to put the money into it until April 15th of the following year.

• Invest in your business. Part of the federal attempt to get the economy going included greater write-offs for investments in qualified business equipment, including vehicles. Check with your accountant on what you could possibly invest in that would qualify and that you need. Now is the time to do it as these tax breaks are reducing in the coming years.

These are just a few ideas of items to look at before the end of the year. As we always tell Silkin Management Group clients, consult with a good tax advisor before taking any action so you can ensure you are doing the right thing.

Eric Korb
Silkin Management Group Consultant

For more information about Silkin Management Group, visit our website at www.silkinmanagementgroup.com

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SILKIN MANAGEMENT GROUP: Take Precautions for Holiday Parties

Posted on November 22, 2011 by

Yesterday, we posted an article on one of our Silkin Management Group blog sites concerning whether or not to have a holiday party. You can access that article here: www.practicemanagementblog.com/?p=3

I recently read a good article concerning potential legal problems that can arise from these types of parties and thought I’d pass along a summary of that information here for any readers of our Silkin Management Group blog sites who are looking at having an office party this year. The full article can be accessed here:

www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iGbwjHnH2iM0us-RAOSbcYr6D_4g?docId=12f1d0943fbf45d6aeb5de8dc8ac7288

Most party problems start with alcohol. What problems can happen when one of your staff has too much to drink? Obnoxious communication that offends other staff; unwanted sexual advances; falling down and hurting themselves or others; a car accident, etc. I’m sure you can think of other things that could be added to this list.

Did you know that in some states you, as the business owner, can be held liable for these issues if you served alcohol at your office party? Prior to any party you hold you should check your state laws concerning this issue as well as determining if your business insurance will cover any potential problems. As covered in this article, it is unlikely that your insurance will cover any sexual harassment issues or a drunken assault by an employee, nor is it likely your workers comp insurance would cover an employee injured at such a party, although your liability insurance may.

Here are some suggestions to avoid problems:

• Put out a memo to all staff prior to the party that that all attendees are expected to behave and not drink in excess. Let them know what is expected of them and their guests and that any untoward behavior can affect their standing as an employee.

• Limit the amount of alcohol served or consider an alcohol free party. Or limit the alcohol to wine and beer.

• Don’t hold the party in a bar. Consider a sit down lunch or dinner in a restaurant.

I suggest to Silkin Management Group clients and anyone else looking at holding a holiday party to read the full article for a more detailed understanding of how to prevent the potential problems that an uncontrolled holiday party could cause. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

Silkin Management Group has many other successful public relations and marketing ideas that are proven winners in any health care office or small business.  Contact us through our website, www.silkinmanagementgroup.com, or call Silkin’s office at 800-695-0257 for more information.

Dave McKevitt
Silkin Management Group Consultant

 

 

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SILKIN MANAGEMENT GROUP: Reactivating Patients

Posted on November 17, 2011 by

Clients new to Silkin Management Group are taught that one of the quickest ways to increase production is by reactivating former patients/clients. It is a valuable and often lost source of income for any practice.

It is possible for patients to fall through the cracks for one reason or another. Perhaps they were waiting for new insurance to start, or they had vacation plans made for the time of year that their regular exam came due and forgot to call in when they returned. There could be numerous reasons, but whatever the reason, there is often a “goldmine” there waiting to be successfully mined.

Silkin Management Group clients are taught that one way to reactivate a patient that has not been in for at least a year is to send them a reactivation letter. This letter can be one that is kept as a template in your computer and then personalized before sending it. Here are some steps that Silkin Management Group consultants recommend to their clients:

1. Make a list of every patient who hasn’t been in for at least one year.

2. Generate a reactivation letter for each.

3. Have the doctor sign each letter.

4. Once signed, mail them out.

5. Place a follow-up call to the patient/client several days later. Be sure to give the letter enough time to reach the patient/client. Five to seven days should do the trick.

6. Develop a script/dialogue for the person doing the calls so that they can easily get in communication with the person they are calling. Silkin Management Group’s Job Description and Office policy manual contains such scripts as well as sample reactivation letters.

If you would like more information about Silkin Management Group’s 400 page Job Description and Office Policy Manual, visit our website at www.silkinmanagementgroup.com or give us a call at 800-695-0257.

Eric Korb
Silkin Management Group Consultant

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SILKIN MANAGEMENT GROUP: Look Out for Increasing Bank Fees

Posted on November 14, 2011 by

We’ve all probably recently read about the furor over banks wanting to charge customers for using their debit cards. This potential charge would have affected almost every consumer including the patients and clients of Silkin Management Group clients. Fortunately there was enough outrage about this attempted new fee that the major (“too big to fail”) banks backed away from implementing it for fear of losing too many customers.

But many of these banks are still desperate for increased income and are looking for other, less obvious ways to increase fees. Readers of our various Silkin Management Group blog sites should be aware of some of these potential new or increased charges and see if their bank is implementing any of them. Here are some of the potential new or increased charges we ran across:

• Charging for replacing a lost credit or debit card. (Bank of America is now charging $5 for this, $20 if it is a rush delivery).

• Bank wires. These are often charged for, but many banks are greatly increasing the per-wire charge. I’ve noticed as much of an increase as 3 times the previous amount.

• Increased charges for ATM cash withdrawals.

• Charging for sending paper statements.

• Overdraft charges.

• Raising minimum account balances to qualify for some fee waivers.

• Higher monthly fees on many checking accounts.

Banks have recently lost about $12 billion a year in income due to recent rules reducing fees for credit card swipes and overdraft charges. They are also making less money on loans due to lower interest rates being charged. Losses are estimated on this at $8 billion. That’s a lot of money to make up for. It looks like they are going to try to get this money back one way or the other through the types of charges noted above. I’m sure they will be looking for additional “less obvious” charges as well to sneak by us. That’s why many people are changing to smaller banks that aren’t “too big to fail” and credit unions. As Alan Greenspan once said, “if they’re too big to fail, they’re too big”.

Silkin Management Group clients and other readers of our Silkin Management Group blog sites should keep an eye out for what their bank may or may not be doing that could cost them and their patients and clients more money.

Jack Hennessy
Silkin Management Group Consultant

For more information about Silkin Management Group, visit www.silkinmanagementgroup.com

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SILKIN MANAGEMENT GROUP: Tax the Rich?

Posted on November 9, 2011 by

Most Silkin Management Group blog readers are either Silkin clients or other small businesses, so we like to forward any information we think might be interesting to our readers. Along those lines I just read an interesting article that I though I’d pass along to readers of our different Silkin Management Group blogs.

An article written by Bill Dunkelberg, the President of the National Federation of Independent Businesses, made some very interesting points that I thought I’d summarize and highlight here.

The latest job creation bill is supposed to be paid for by increased taxes on the “rich”. As the author points out, how are we defining rich? Besides the fact that the rich or top 1% of earners in this country are supposedly not carrying their fair share of the country’s burden (as stated by the anti-Wall Street crowd and the administration), the facts show something maybe a little different than this. Let me say, though, before I present these facts that in no way do I approve of the people and companies who put this country in financial ruin the last few years, and who got bailed out by the government and then continued to pay themselves exorbitant salaries at the expense of the tax payers. But these are a very few of the “rich” and very few of this upper 1%.

Here’s some facts for us to look at:

• Our savings rate is extremely low. That results in us having to borrow money elsewhere. If you increase taxes on those who save (it is usually the wealthier people who save), some will move themselves and their savings elsewhere.

• The top 1% is actually only those who earn $350,000 or more.

• If you earn $150,000 you are in the top 10%.

• The top 1% earns 20% of U.S. income and pays 40% of the taxes in the country. That’s right, 1% pays 40% of the income taxes and 25% of all federal taxes. So who is not contributing? It isn’t these “rich” people for the most part.

• The bottom 50% pay just a few percent of the taxes, but receive the lion’s share of the government services supported by the taxes.

Looking at this information shed a bit of a different light on things for me. I think it is important to separate out the rich “crooks”, who were bailed out by the government from their gross misdeeds and continued to pay themselves, at tax payers expense, ridiculous amounts of money from the hard working business owners and employees who work hard and earn a good living and pay their share of taxes. Let us not penalize the productive by associating them with these crooks.

Silkin Management Group clients are all hard working business owners. Some are in the top 1%, many are in the top 10%. They shouldn’t be penalized with more taxes because people are justifiably upset with a few very bad apples. Isn’t it strange, though, that the same government who bailed them out is now associating ethical and highly productive business people with these crooks as a reason to pay more taxes.

Dave McKevitt
Silkin Management Group Consultant

You can find out more about Silkin Management Group by visiting our website at www.silkinmanagementgroup.com

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4 Steps to Effective Selling for Doctors Boulder SILKIN MANAGEMENT GROUP

Posted on November 8, 2011 by

SILKIN MANAGEMENT GROUP

 

An effective sale involves four steps that must be done with a person you are presenting a treatment plan to.  There are no set words you say to the person. Instead understand the concepts and apply them to real life situations.

 

The four steps that must be accomplished with the individual are listed in the order that they should be done.

 

  1. Establish Communicationwith the person.  This means that you and the patient or client have gotten in good communication through simply introducing yourself, asking how the person is doing and establishing some rapport.

 

  1. Deal with any objections or negative concerns the person may have.  It is possible that the person has no concerns and the person will be very open and receptive to what you will present.  In this case this step can be omitted as there is nothing to handle.  But it is important to check if the person does have any negative concerns towards you, past treatment, potential treatment, etc.  Find out and get the person to tell you about it and handle appropriately. For example, the person may have had a bad experience in the past with a different doctor. In such as case listen, acknowledge and assure the person that this will not be experienced in your practice.

 

  1. Identify the non-optimum condition that is affecting the person. Before you begin to explain a non-optimum condition, you must find out what, exactly is non-optimum for them. What are they having trouble with?  What is painful for them or their animal? What is causing them to worry? What concerns them?  It must be a condition that is real to the individual or can be made real to them.

 

  1. Generate an understanding that the problem can be handled. Once the person is aware of the non-optimum condition and he/she truly sees that it is non-optimum, you then need to get them to understand that your particular treatment services or products will resolve their situation.  This can sometimes be done by simply telling them they need to do a particular service or treatment plan.  Other times you might need to use x-rays, diagrams, photos, study models, etc. to get the point across.

 

These are the four basic steps to effective treatment plan presentations and selling.  An understanding of them is necessary to a high level of treatment plan acceptance. This can best be achieved by drilling or role playing various scenarios until you are fully comfortable with how to use these four steps.

 

 

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4 Steps to Effective Selling for Doctors Centennial SILKIN MANAGEMENT GROUP

Posted on November 8, 2011 by

SILKIN MANAGEMENT GROUP

 

An effective sale involves four steps that must be done with a person you are presenting a treatment plan to.  There are no set words you say to the person. Instead understand the concepts and apply them to real life situations.

 

The four steps that must be accomplished with the individual are listed in the order that they should be done.

 

  1. Establish Communicationwith the person.  This means that you and the patient or client have gotten in good communication through simply introducing yourself, asking how the person is doing and establishing some rapport.

 

  1. Deal with any objections or negative concerns the person may have.  It is possible that the person has no concerns and the person will be very open and receptive to what you will present.  In this case this step can be omitted as there is nothing to handle.  But it is important to check if the person does have any negative concerns towards you, past treatment, potential treatment, etc.  Find out and get the person to tell you about it and handle appropriately. For example, the person may have had a bad experience in the past with a different doctor. In such as case listen, acknowledge and assure the person that this will not be experienced in your practice.

 

  1. Identify the non-optimum condition that is affecting the person. Before you begin to explain a non-optimum condition, you must find out what, exactly is non-optimum for them. What are they having trouble with?  What is painful for them or their animal? What is causing them to worry? What concerns them?  It must be a condition that is real to the individual or can be made real to them.

 

  1. Generate an understanding that the problem can be handled. Once the person is aware of the non-optimum condition and he/she truly sees that it is non-optimum, you then need to get them to understand that your particular treatment services or products will resolve their situation.  This can sometimes be done by simply telling them they need to do a particular service or treatment plan.  Other times you might need to use x-rays, diagrams, photos, study models, etc. to get the point across.

 

These are the four basic steps to effective treatment plan presentations and selling.  An understanding of them is necessary to a high level of treatment plan acceptance. This can best be achieved by drilling or role playing various scenarios until you are fully comfortable with how to use these four steps.

 

 

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