Automatically Charge Clients for Appointments

Healthie comes with built-in payment processing support, enabling providers to bill for one-time and recurring self-pay services. Client Packages can be created to bundle appointments and services together, and then offered to clients to self-purchase and book. Providers can also invoice for services.

Additionally, providers have the ability to set a price for appointment type(s), and automatically schedule charges for clients on a per-session basis. Automatic billing for appointments is supported on Plus Plan and above.

Note: This setting is separate from the main automated billing feature that you use to automatically create and submit CMS 1500s to bill insurance.

This article reviews how to configure an account to support automatic charging for appointments.

Enable Pricing for Appointments

Within Appointment Settings, account admins will see the option to enable Pricing per Appointment Type. This setting must be enabled in order to set a price per appointment type.

For multi-provider teams, this setting will be enacted for all team members.

Set a Price per Appointment Type

Within Appointment Types Settings, account admins can edit specific appointment types to add a set rate.

Edit a specific appointment type > Pricing > Set Default Price

Advanced Pricing Options

Within Appointment Settings, there is the option to enable more advanced pricing options, depending on your business needs.

Adjust Pricing Per Provider

For multi-provider organizations, it may be preferred to charge differently for an appointment type, depending on the provider.

This can be done within Settings > Appointments > Payments and Credits > Advanced Pricing

Learn more on adjusting appointment rates per provider here.

Adjusting Pricing per Client

If preferred, a custom price can be determined on a per client basis, for any appointment types.

This can be done within Settings > Appointments > Payments and Credits > Advanced Pricing

Learn more on adjusting appointment rates per client here.

Adjust Pricing Based on Appointment Duration

If you've set a custom price for an Appointment Type, you have the option to automatically adjust that price based on the actual duration of a session. The most common use-case is to charge clients more if the session went over on time.

For example, if the default price was set to $100 for a 1 hour session, the client would automatically be charged $150 if the appointment was recorded to be 1 hour 30 minutes in duration.

Learn more about pricing based on appointment duration here.

Enable Automatic Billing for Appointments

Within your Payments and Credits Settings, enable the option to Automatically charge for appointments set as occurred. Automatic charges include automatic appointment charges and recurring packages (e.g. meal plan subscriptions and programs).

The Automatically charge for appointments set as occurred checkbox controls whether a client can be automatically charged for one of the options below:

If the setting is turned ON to automatically charge clients for appointments that have been set as occurred
If a package has been set up to have recurring billing

Note: If a client’s auto-charge setting is OFF, the client’s credit card(s) will not be automatically charged. If a client’s auto-charge setting is OFF, the client will be sent an invoice for the appointment or recurring charge.

When you set an appointment as occurred, a client who has a valid payment card on file will have a charge scheduled for the day after tomorrow.

These charges will automatically post to the Payments page. The description will always be designated as Appointment, and will include the date of the associated appointment.

Clients will automatically receive an email notification and receipt of the automatic charge, once processed.

Enable Automatic Invoicing for Appointments

When you set an appointment as occurred, if the client does not have a valid payment card on file, an invoice will be generated and sent to the client via email.

Learn more about automatically invoicing clients.

Trigger an Automatic Payment or Invoice

Automatic billing for appointments is tied to your calendar. An appointment status must be set to Occurred. A notification banner will appear, confirming that an automatic payment (or invoice) will be rendered.

Manage a Scheduled Payment

As with any scheduled payment, providers have the ability to take further action to manage the payment, or stop the payment, before the payment occurs.

From the Payments page, click the [...] next to the payment. A drop-down with available actions will display, including:

Option to export to a Superbill (payment will still process)
Option to send a receipt to the client (clients will automatically receive a receipt of payment via email)
Option to download a receipt
Ability to stop the automatic payment (payment will not process)
Option to edit the payment details
Option to delete the payment (payment will not process and will no longer display on the Payments page)