For years, customers have been telling us that they want to increase their efficiency in generating invoices and posting payments. In this week’s issue, we’re going to discuss the Batch Invoice Creation feature in CPR+. Next week, we’ll discuss the Batch Cash Posting capability.

So now you’re asking yourself – “Can I really create a batch of invoices without touching every one?” The answer is YES you can! In fact, it’s easy.

You’ve got Delivery Tickets that have been confirmed which are in your “Ready-To-Bill” list. Each Delivery Ticket (DT) has a Payor assigned to it and contains billable items (drugs, equipment, supplies, per diems, etc.) with pricing that was pulled from the payor’s Special Price Matrix. With the Batch Invoice feature, you can create a batch of invoices, one for each DT, with just a few clicks of your mouse. 

Here is how it works. You can create an invoice batch for one payor or multiple payors, and for any date range you desire.  Once this criteria is set, CPR+ loops through your “Ready” Tickets and, for each DT that meets the criteria, creates a New Invoice to the Payor assigned to the DT, copies the Billable Items from the DT to the Invoice Line Items, saves the Invoice, assigns the DT to it, then moves on to the next “Ready” DT and the process is repeated. Invoices that will be sent electronically are saved in your Ready to Submit Electronically list. Invoices that will be printed are saved in your Invoices Ready to Print list.

Before creating the Invoice Batch, we recommend that you run and review your Delivery Tickets flagged as Ready. Click the Print (F7) button in the RTB list and select “Ready” Tickets and check the Include Delivery Ticket Line Items and Group By Payor. This will generate a report displaying the total billable charges for each Delivery Ticket, grouped by Payor. This mirrors the invoices that CPR+ will create with the Batch Invoice Creation feature. Once you have reviewed the report and corrected any inaccurate data, you’re ready to begin. 

Step 1) Click the Create Invoice Batch (F8) button.

Step 2) Set your Batch Invoice Filter Options. You may filter the RTB by Date of Service and create an Invoice Batch for One Payor or All Payors, and/or One Biller or All Billers. 

Step 3) Click the Continue (F2) button. CPR+ will now begin processing all Delivery Tickets in the RTB list that meet your Batch Invoice Filter Options. When finished, you will be prompted to print a Batch Invoice Creation Report. 

This report displays all of the Delivery Tickets that were batch created and groups them in batches by Invoice Type. You can see Start/Stop dates, Line Item Descriptions, Quantity, Billed and Expected Amounts, Invoice Totals and Batch totals. Once a batch is created, it is placed in a “Pending” status. This gives you the opportunity to review the invoices that were batch created before they are printed or sent to the electronic claims queue. 

To access the pending Invoice Batches, click the link in the upper left corner of the RTB list. Next, highlight the Invoice Batch you’d like to work on and click the View/Edit button. 

From here, you can make final edits to the line items prior to the actual creation of each invoice. Invoice claim data can also be edited at this time. Once you’ve reviewed and edited all of the invoices in an Invoice Batch, click the Create Invoices (Ctrl+F8) button.

This will generate the Batch Invoice Creation Report. All invoices processed in the batch will be sent to their respective electronic claim queues for transmission or to Batch Print lists for paper claims.

So that’s it – it’s simple. If you’re still touching every Delivery Ticket and creating invoices one at a time, give the Batch Invoice Creation feature a try. You’ll have your Ready-To-Bill file in shape in no time.

Next week, we’ll show you how to batch post all the payments you’ll soon be getting. If you have questions about this feature, don’t hesitate to give us a call.

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Know Your Database Engine
By Ron McCoy

CPR+ stores your data in a database engine. Do you know what version you are running? To find out, go to the pull down menu for File, Info. You will see the CPR+ Technical and Setup Information form. In the Database Type field, you will see the database engine you are running. You may be running any of the following: SQL Server 7.0 / MSDE, SQL Server 2000, SQL Server 2005 Express Edition or SQL Server 2005.

The following is a summary of those database engines. MSDE is the older Microsoft Development Engine.

NOTE - MSDE will NOT be supported for the Windows Vista operating system. If you are planning on upgrading to Windows Vista, you should plan on upgrading to SQL Server Express at the least, and possibly a more robust version of SQL Server.

SQL Server 2005 Express Edition is the next version of MSDE, is fully compatible with the full version of SQL Server 2005, and is available from Microsoft for free. It is very easy to install and manage (you don’t need a DBA). This version supports one CPU and 1 gigabyte of RAM. Maximum database size is 4 GB. SQL Server Express can be seamlessly upgraded to the full SQL Server 2005 database when your business requires it.

Why are there so many versions of the database, and why is this information important to you? First, Microsoft has improved their database engine over the years, so this is why you will find different versions of SQL Server. Microsoft has added new functionality and made the core database engine more secure and faster with each new version released. You should be aware of what database engine you are running, since there are some limitations in both speed and functionality that can affect CPR+. The performance of CPR+ is greatly affected by the database engine you are using. CPR+ will take advantage of some of the newer features in the latest version of SQL Server.

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