Welcome to CEP Data Processing, a division of Cole, Evans & Peterson, CPAs.  We provide billing and accounts receivable management for physicians.  We offer a comprehensive, cost effective service either as an Outsourcing vendor or as an Application Service Provider (ASP).  Our accounts receivable management services are designed to maximize your collections and cash flow, decrease the burden of ever changing governmental and insurance carrier regulations, and allow your practice to focus on patient care.  We believe in the principles of personal service, professional dedication, integrity, and in staying current on the issues and technologies that affect our clients.  We have been successfully building relationships with physicians and other health care professionals since 1967.  For more information about how we can provide service to your Practice, please click the above links. 

What we offer

Your time is valuable.  You want the years invested earning your education and training to be rewarded with fulfilling work and the resulting financial gains.  We can help you focus those goals.  We recognize that no two physician practices are alike or have the same requirements.  By being adaptable and offering you the flexibility to choose varying levels of service, your needs can be met efficiently and economically.

Our Outsourcing business model allows you to:

  • Access the practice’s current financial status from your location(s)
  • Reduce office staff (salaries, employee benefits, training, taxes, workers compensation, etc.)
  • Transfer all tasks related to account setup, maintenance, insurance filling, and patient billing to us
  • Let us receive, respond to, and resolve patient inquiries regarding their account status
  • Let us aggressively follow-up with delinquent insurance carriers

Our Application Service Provider (ASP) business model allows you to:

  • Access your data from your location(s)
  • Retain office personnel
  • Exercise total control of entering, editing, and posting charges, payments, adjustments, refund transactions, etc.
  • Avoid producing claim forms – we generate and submit claims electronically daily
  • Avoid printing and mailing patient statements – we print and mail statements monthly
  • Avoid computer hardware upgrades and software updates – your data is stored on our computers
  • Quit worrying about data disasters – we backup all data every business day and keep at least two copies off-site
  • Call on us for support

You may choose either of the above models or combine different features to suit your practice’s needs.  For example, you may want to control charge entry, but let us handle payments and adjustments, or vice versa.  Flexibility is one of the key reasons for our long history.  Top

Our commitment

We take your business’s bottom line and your total satisfaction seriously.  When you sign on as a CEP Data Processing client, your practice will be assigned a support team comprised of our personnel experienced in accounts receivable management, a communications and networks manager, computer operations staff member, and a computer programmer/analyst.  You will be provided the direct phone numbers and email addresses of your team members so that you may have access to them anytime you have a question, concern, problem, or special request.  You will never waste time being forced through help desks, lengthy phone menus, or entry level support personnel.  Our team approach produces a cohesive unit with complementary skills, assuring your practice's accounts receivable is monitored and improved from at least four different major vantage points.    Top

Your profitability is important to us

We understand that your medical practice is also a business and that profitability is essential.  Many factors affect profitability: 

  • How much is spent for office costs (salaries, employee benefits, training, taxes, workers compensation, etc.)?
  • How many days elapse from the date of service to the date the charge is actually submitted to the insurance carrier?
  • Are your charges submitted electronically or on paper?
  • Is an appropriate maximum amount charged for the service?
  • Is the claim correctly filled out?
  • Is the patient’s insurance correct?
  • How quickly can a denial be corrected and refiled?
  • Are payments processed electronically or on paper?
  • How long until someone notices that an insurance carrier has not responded?
  • How much must be contractually adjusted off?
  • Are office personnel efficient?

Without attention to detail, the outstanding accounts receivable days can quickly balloon – money you should have is tied up elsewhere.  Part of our job is to monitor the details, assuring that the process of charge generation, insurance filing, patient billing, and collections continues smoothly and without interruption.   Top 

Technology

Almost nothing changes faster in today’s world than technology.  Finding and maintaining a cost effective, long term solution for computer hardware and software can be an intimidating challenge, and at worst, a costly mistake.  With either our Outsourcing or Application Service Provider (ASP) business model, you will no longer have to face this challenge - we keep our hardware and software up to date.  We have licensed Computer Processing Unlimited’s (CPU) Med F/M Practice Management software as the core of our accounts receivable management system.  Over 10,000 physicians in a variety of specialties and practice settings currently use Med F/M.  Our long term partnership with CPU continues to be rewarding and successful.

We utilize proven, stable, and reliable IBM iSeries business computers, Novell Networks, Microsoft Networking, Dell personal computers, and Cisco communications to bring our services to you.  We simply connect your PC(s) to our secured data center via the World Wide Web.  In our experience, this combination provides for secure and reliable system availability which translates into more productive time for your practice. Technology must be useful to be valuable.  Translating your raw data into information that is comprehensive, concise, and meaningful is essential for your management decisions.  Since your data resides on our computers, our programming staff can accommodate special requests for reports or other data mining tasks.  Simply contact either your programmer/analyst or accounts receivable manager team member and describe what is needed.

New clients are always concerned about a systems conversion.  Transferring patient information from an existing system to our system can be accomplished in two ways:  (1) If the existing system has an electronic exporting capability, then the data can be extracted and our programmers can convert and import it to our system; (2) If there is not an exporting capability, then the accounts can be printed and our data entry personnel can enter it into our system.  Top

FAQ

  • How long have you been in business?
    • CEP Data Processing has been in business since 1967. 
       
  • What types of practice do you serve?
    • We serve both hospital based and office based practices.   
       
  • How much do you charge?
    • Generally, with our ASP service we charge per active account.  With our Outsourcing service, our fees are a percentage of monthly net collections – we earn our fees by working diligently for you.  Due to numerous variables our fees can only be determined after discussions with you.
       
  • Can you receive data electronically, for example from a hospital or other facility?
    • Yes, our programmers have already done this type of task several times.
       
  • Do you file claims electronically?
    • Yes, we file claims electronically daily directly to Medicare, Medicaid, Blue Cross, and Web/MD commercial clearinghouse using the HIPAA mandated ANSI data format.
       
  • Is my data safe?
    • We restrict physical access to the computers and to any reports or documents, and we restrict users to only the data they are authorized to see.  We make a backup tape of all data every business day and at least two copies are stored off-site.Our computers self-monitor for problems and alert our staff and IBM.
       
  • Can you deposit receipts into my bank?
    • Yes, just let us know which bank to use.
       
  • How complicated is a transition from my current system to yours?
    • With any transition, we do the work and you gain the benefits.  Generally, there are three types of transitions:
      • No data conversion and the new system begins from scratch
      • Only the demographic data is converted
      • Demographic and transactional data is converted.  This option is obviously more complicated due to maintaining the proper charge/payment/adjustment relationships and reconciling the two systems.
         
  • What reports will I receive and how often?
    • We generate a set of management level reports at the end of each month.  These reports are designed to inform you of the overall financial status of the practice.  In addition, our programmers can data mine your database to provide detailed reports.  All you have to do is ask for what you need.
       
  • What kind of support can you provide?
    • All of our clients are assigned a support team comprised of an accounts receivable manager, communications and network specialist manager, computer staff member, and a computer programmer/analyst.  You will be provided the direct phone numbers and email addresses of your team members so that you may have access to them anytime you have a question, concern, problem, or special request.  You will never waste time being forced through help desks, lengthy phone menus, or entry level support personnel.
       
  • When is your system available?
    • We keep our computers available to you 24/7 with the following exceptions:
      • 11:00 pm to 3:00 am each business day for system backups
      • Approximately five hours in the evening on the last day of each month for dedicated month end processing
      • Any scheduled maintenance (normally performed on weekends – you will have advance notice)
         
  • Since CEP Data Processing is a division of a CPA firm, will I have to change CPAs?
    • Absolutely not.   Top

HIPAA

HIPAA drastically changed medical office policies and technology usage.  Securing patient data from unauthorized access has become vital.  The methods and format of electronically exchanging data have been redefined and regulated.  Our computer hardware and accounts receivable software system can fulfill the technology based HIPAA requirements.  We transmit patient data to insurance carriers in the required ANSI format, enforce automatic sign offs after an appropriate no activity delay, restrict users to only the data they are authorized to see, establish secure internet connections between your location(s) ours, and much more.