Manual batching of invoices is used for Medicare and DVA bulk-billing where HIC Online is not being used, or for private health funds and hospitals who may prefer to receive a weekly or monthly batch of invoices for services performed.
Before you begin
If you use Medicare and DVA online billing, then manual batching may not be needed. For more information on online billing please refer to Bulk Bill and DVA Online Claiming.
Manual Batching Window Overview
To access the Manual Batching window, navigate to File> Maintenance and Reports> Daily. Select the Manual Batching option which will open the Manual Batches window.
On the left, a list of previous batches which are awaiting payment and receipting will appear.
Clicking on the Show Finalised radio button will display batches which have been receipted already.
Clicking on a batch on the left will display a list of the items in that batch on the right.
You can delete a batch by highlighting it and selecting. This doesn't delete any of the items. It simply removes them all from the batch so that they will appear in the next batch created.
A batch can be reprinted at any time by clicking on the button
If a batch has been fully receipted, but for some reason isn't showing as finalised, click to finalise this manually
To create a new batch:
1. Click on the New Batch button.
2. Select the type of batch from the radio buttons at the top of the window i.e. Medicare, DVA or Other
- Note: Clicking on the Other radio button will display a list of account holders that have the Batch Process Invoices tickbox ticked in their account holder record in Open> Account Holders. e.g. health funds/overseas students' batches.
- In this example, we will click on the Medicare button. This makes visible a menu from which we can choose the Provider
3. Once a provider is selected, a Select Site menu appears, in case there are multiple sites with different provider numbers.
- Note: If you are creating a batch for Other, then this menu does not appear, as it isn’t necessary to split the batch into different sites.
4. Once a site is selected, a field for the Batch No becomes visible.
- For Medicare and DVA it is a good idea to use the batch numbers on the DB1 manual batch headers sent to you by HIC, or you can make up your own batch numbers. It is a good idea to make the batch number consist of 2 letters followed by 4 numbers, the first letter being the type of batch it is e.g. for a Medicare Batch use something like 'MA0001'. Make the next batch 'MA0002' and so on.
- This will avoid any conflicting batch numbers if you move to HIC Online, where the batch numbers are automatically generated in the format of a single letter followed by 4 numbers.
5. Once you have entered a batch number, press Tab and you will notice that this batch number is applied to all the items in this list.
- If you are batching to Medibank Private, and you also do batches for Overseas Students, you will get an extra prompt advising 'There are overseas students' items amongst this batch. Do you want to batch these now?'
- If there are items that need to be withheld from this batch, highlight by holding Ctrl/ Command while selecting each item, and then choosing either
or
as appropriate. Any removed items will appear in the next batch created.
- Please note: The maximum number of items permitted in a manual batch is 25. Where a batch would have more than 25 items, Genie will separate the extra invoice(s) in the list into a subsequent batch.
- For Medicare and DVA batches it is a good idea to
before saving and mark off what is in your batch with your manual vouchers; the manual vouchers are what must be sent to Medicare/DVA.
6. Click on the Save button.
- This will print a Summary Sheet of all the items in the batch, and for DVA a DB1 form for the provider to sign before the paperwork is mailed.
- The New Batch window will automatically close, and the new batch will appear in the list of batches awaiting payment.
When you receive payment for a manual batch from Medicare, DVA or another organisation, you must receipt it through the Manual Batches window also.
To receipt:
1. Highlight the batch to be receipted in the list of batches on the left of the Manual Batches window, and then click on the Receipt button.
2. The usual Receipt window will open as shown below. Enter the cheque amount in Medicare Chq for Medicare and DVA, or Fund Chq for a Private Fund or other organisation.
- If the cheque amount exactly equals the amount you have claimed (an unusual occurrence!), then all you have to do is click on the Auto-Fill button and then click on the Store button to save the Receipt. (There’s no need to print a receipt for Medicare or DVA).
Dealing with Exceptions
Quite often Medicare or DVA will either not have paid for an item at all or will have paid a different fee to that claimed. In this case, we need to either fix the problem with the item that is preventing them from paying, and then remove that item from the batch and resend it with the next batch. Alternatively, we need to adjust the fee charged to match what they have agreed to pay.
Example 1: We have forgotten to enter in the Item Notes field that this was a second visit on the same day, then Medicare will usually refuse to pay. In this case, we first need to fix the problem.
You do this by double-clicking on the item in the Receipt window. This will open the Edit Sale window.
Before you can make any changes in this window, you must first click on the Edit button. Then enter “2nd visit etc.” in the Notes field. Click on the Save button to close this window. Then click on Remove Item From Batch to remove the item from this batch, so that it will be resent with the next batch.
Example 2: Medicare/DVA has paid the item but at a different amount. In this case we need to edit the fee. Double-click on the item to open the Edit Sale window above. Click on the Edit button and change the fee to whatever they are paying. This will then leave a record in the Audit Trail. Click on the Save button to close the record, but do NOT remove it from the batch.
Once you have dealt with all problems and your claimed and paid amounts match, you can then receipt your payments. This can be done by selecting the Autofill button to automatically allocate the correct payments against each item.
Finally, click on the Store button to save the receipt.
This batch will now be listed in the Show Finalised column of the Manual Batches window.
Note: If Medicare, DVA, or another organisation pay for multiple batches on the one cheque, receipt each batch separately using the batch total, not the cheque total, and use the same cheque number which will then total correctly on the banking report.