A letterhead allows you to personalise your correspondence by including your practice's address, contact details and even a logo or corporate design. In Genie, you can modify the letterhead that prints on your invoices, as well as the letterhead you choose to include on correspondence to patients and other practices. The following article walks you through the process of configuring letterheads in Genie.
Before you begin
It’s important to understand how your preferences are currently configured in relation to letterheads and whether these preferences need to be adjusted to suit the needs of your practice. Your practice may be configured to have the same invoice letterhead for all providers, or it may be set up so that each provider has their own individual letterhead.
Open the Practice Preferences via the File menu and double-click on the relevant practice. Navigate to the Practice Letterhead tab and confirm whether the tickbox Use Individual Letterheads is ticked. If it isn’t, your practice is configured to use a Practice Letterhead that applies to all providers and the instructions under Practice Letterhead will apply. If Use Individual Letterheads is ticked, your practice is configured to use individual letterheads for each provider and the instructions under Individual Letterheads.
If you have multiple sets of Practice Preferences configured, the letterhead that prints on invoices will be dependent on the practice that has been selected for each specific invoice. With that in mind, you’ll need to ensure the Practice Letterhead has been configured in all relevant sets of Practice Preferences.
The Practice Letterhead is stored within Practice Preferences. To open the Practice Preferences, navigate to File > Practice Preferences and then double-click on the relevant practice. Navigate to the Practice Letterhead tab. Here, you can create your letterhead in the space provided. Genie can fit approximately 8 lines onto an invoice letterhead, depending on font size. If you find your letterhead is being truncated on invoices, you should either reduce the font size or cut back on the number of lines.
The Create Default button can be used to generate a default letterhead that includes the name of the practice as it has been entered in the Practice Details tab, as well as the address and contact details.
The Insert Picture button can be used to add an image to the practice letterhead, e.g. a logo.
- Click the Insert Picture button to open the Picture Library.
- If you want to add a picture that isn’t already in your Picture Library, click Add.
- In the Add Picture window, click the Browse button to locate the image on your computer.
- Select the image and then click Open.
- Give the image an appropriate Picture Name. Make any adjustments to the Size and then click OK.
- Highlight the image that you want to add in the Picture Library and click OK. You will then be prompted to either insert the image in Text Flow or in Page – there is no right or wrong choice, and you will most likely need to try both to determine which option is more suitable for you. Click OK to insert the image.
Always use the Save button to close the Practice Preferences to ensure your changes are retained.
To enable individual letterheads for each provider in the practice, open the Practice Preferences (File > Practice Preferences), navigate to the Practice Letterhead tab and tick Use Individual Letterheads. Ensure you use the Save button to close the Practice Preferences. If Use Individual Letterheads has been ticked, the letterhead that prints on each provider’s invoices is stored in the Correspondence tab of their User Preferences. To open a doctor’s User Preferences, navigate to File > All User Preferences and double-click on the relevant user. Navigate to the Correspondence tab.
As with the Practice Letterhead, Genie can fit approximately 8 lines onto an invoice letterhead, depending on font size. If you find your letterhead is being truncated on invoices, you should either reduce the font size or cut back on the number of lines.
The Copy from Practice button will copy the Practice Letterhead, which can then be adjusted without affecting the letterhead stored in the Practice Letterhead tab of the Practice Preferences.
The Insert Picture button can be used to add an image to the practice letterhead, e.g. a logo.
- Click the Insert Picture button to open the Picture Library.
- If you want to add a picture that isn’t already in your Picture Library, click Add.
- In the Add Picture window, click the Browse button to locate the image on your computer.
- Select the image and then click Open.
- Give the image an appropriate Picture Name. Make any adjustments to the Size and then click OK.
- Highlight the image that you want to add in the Picture Library and click OK. You will then be prompted to either insert the image in Text Flow or in Page – there is no right or wrong choice, and you will most likely need to try both to determine which option is more suitable for you. Click OK to insert the image.
Always use the Save button to close the User Preferences to ensure your changes are retained.
Referral/Reply Letter Templates
It’s possible to use the Practice Letterhead or a provider’s individual letterhead on Referral/Reply letter templates, however, each letter template needs to be configured individually. If a letterhead has been added to the Default Letter template, it will populate on each new letter template you create.
To add either the Practice Letterhead or a user’s individual letterhead to a Referral/Reply letter:
- Open the Referral/Reply letter writing window by clicking the red quill icon and choose your desired template from the Template drop down menu
- Click on Edit Template on the right-hand side of the window.
- If you want to include the letterhead in the ‘header’ section of the letter, ensure you have made the Header visible (View > Header) and you’ve adjusted the margins accordingly.
- Position your cursor where you want your letterhead to be inserted and on the left-hand side in the Expressions column, double click on Your Letterhead. The Your Letterhead expression can insert either the Practice Letterhead or a provider’s individual letterhead into a letter template, however it’s worth noting that this isn’t a live link to the Practice Preferences or User Preferences. Any changes to the letterhead in the Practice Preferences or User Preferences won’t automatically appear on letters - every time you update the letterhead in the Practice Preferences or User Preferences, you’ll need re-insert it into your letter templates using the Your Letterhead expression.
- If your practice is using one letterhead for all doctor’s, you will be prompted to select the practice. Highlight your practice, click Select and the Practice Letterhead will be inserted into the letter template.
- If each doctor in the practice is using a separate letterhead, you will also be prompted to select which doctor’s letterhead you want to insert in the letter. Highlight the doctor, click Select and the doctor’s letterhead will be inserted into the letter template.
- Alternatively, if you do not wish to use the Practice Letterhead or one of the doctors’ individual letterheads for Referral/Reply correspondence, you can forego using the Your Letterhead expression and create a new letterhead in each Referral/Reply template.
- Click on Save when you have finished editing the template.
It’s possible to use the Practice Letterhead or a provider’s individual letterhead on Merged Letter templates, however, each letter template needs to be configured individually.
- Open the Merged Letter templates by clicking the golden pages icon.
- In the Merged Letters window, double-click on the template you wish to add a letterhead to.
- If you want to include the letterhead in the ‘header’ section of the letter, ensure you have made the Header visible (View > Header) and you've adjusted the margins accordingly.
- Position your cursor where you want your letterhead to be inserted and on the left-hand side in the Expressions column, double click on Your Letterhead. The Your Letterhead expression can insert either the Practice Letterhead or a provider’s individual letterhead into a letter template, however it’s worth noting that this isn’t a live link to the Practice Preferences or User Preferences. Any changes to the letterhead in the Practice Preferences or User Preferences won’t automatically appear on letters - every time you update the letterhead in the Practice Preferences or User Preferences, you’ll need re-insert it into your letter templates using the Your Letterhead expression.
- If your practice is using one letterhead for all doctor’s, you will be prompted to select the practice. Highlight your practice, click Select and the Practice Letterhead will be inserted into the letter template.
- If each doctor in the practice is using a separate letterhead, you will also be prompted to select which doctor’s letterhead you want to insert in the letter. Highlight the doctor, click Select and the doctor’s letterhead will be inserted into the letter template.
- Alternatively, if you do not wish to use the Practice Letterhead or one of the doctors’ individual letterheads for Merged Letters, you can forego using the Your Letterhead expression and create a new letterhead in each Merged Letter template.
- Ensure you save the template by clicking the blue disk icon in the top left corner of the window.