6 Signs Your Dental Practice Accounting Needs Help

Are ineffective accounting processes hurting your dental practice? Whether you have a general dentistry practice or focus on specialty services such as endodontics, restorative dentistry, or periodontics, accurate accounting is critical to continued success.

No matter how good you are in your field of practice or helping your patients, ineffective financial management will limit the growth of your business and prevent you from reaching your full potential. If any of these 6 problems are true for your practice, it’s worth taking the time to fix them:

1. You spend too much time on daily administration                                                         

There’s no doubt that running a busy dental practice requires a lot of daily accounting processes, from billing clients to processing payroll to reconciliations. However, if it feels like the time you spend on accounting is taking away from your ability to focus on patients or growing your business, it’s a sign that you need to improve your tactics. With the right systems and partner in place, you can automate time-consuming processes, simplify your finances, AND spend more time with patients.

2. You aren’t protected against errors or theft

Unfortunately, mistakes (and even outright theft) by staff can cause your dental practice to lose money without you even knowing it. Delayed reconciliations, manual processes, and inadequate cash flow controls can all lead to misplaced money. With greater financial visibility and tighter controls, you can be certain of every dollar coming and going from your bank account.

3. You don’t know your average collections cycle (or it’s too long)

How long does it take for a patient to pay their bill? What’s the average number of overdue days for late payments? How can you shorten your cash flow cycle? Does your business have clear policies on extending credit or making late payments? An ineffective or lengthy collections process can really hurt your bottom line. This is a sign you need to set up better methods for billing, reminders, and collecting payments.

4. Financial reporting is a burden rather than a help

If financial reports are more of a monthly complication than a helpful tool, it’s time to reconsider what metrics you’re measuring and how you’re tracking them. Regular reporting and performance tracking should be one of your biggest allies in making good decisions for the future of your business. If you’re struggling with this, it’s time to invest in better reporting.

5. Your forecasts or budgets are not accurate

If your budget is consistently misaligned with your actual spending, or if forecasting feels like an abstract art rather than a science, it’s time to protect your profits by setting up a better financial foundation. Without accurate financial insight, forecasting and budgeting will continue to be a struggle.

6. You aren’t sure your taxes and tax reporting are correct

Taking care of payroll taxes, sales taxes, and local taxes can be pretty daunting and confusing. Unfortunately, the penalties for mistakes can also be very costly in terms of both time and money. If you’re not totally confident that you’re in compliance with tax and reporting regulations, it’s time to gain some peace of mind by improving your accounting systems and getting help from experts to audit for gaps and errors.

Is it time to invest in better accounting?

If your practice is suffering from inaccurate accounting or inefficient administrative processes, Performance Business Analytics can help you improve your systems, grow your business, and simplify your life. We help general and specialty dental practices including orthodontists, endodontists, periodontists, oral and maxillofacial surgeons, and restorative and prosthodontic practices reach their goals. Contact us today to learn more about transforming your practice.

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