Gotcha!

You can run, but you can't hide. Eventually, I will catch up with you. I try to run my office efficiently and collect the fees at the time of service. Usually I have no problem but sometimes people are just deadbeats. I call and mail bills but I am ignored. That's OK. I will deal with them in the future. I never send anyone to collection. I do not think it is fair to ruin someones credit for a few hundred dollars. I would rather wait it out. Most times things come full circle. This happened yesterday. I got a call from a former patient that wanted to come back and see the doctor. I looked up his name and could not find him.I went into our old computer system and there he was. Last seem in 2002. I informed him that he has owed us $134 since 2002. Somehow he didn't seem to remember this bit of information. I told him that his account was locked out until the payment was made. He immediately gave me his credit card number and I cleared his account. I also informed him that he had to be credit card on file for any future appointments as I would never again wait for payment. He had no choice but to agree. It took ten years but ....gotcha.