Posts Tagged ‘SymKey’

FAQ: How do I enable/disable zeroing out the provider contract value for the SymKey Deny scenario?

Monday, June 28th, 2010

Answer: One of SymKey’s global settings allows users to configure whether or not to zero out the contract value when SymKey denies a line in either the Professional or Hospital Claims modules. In SymKey v. 1.20 and later, the configuration of this action is reserved for users with an Admin security level.

To change the setting, click the “Global Settings” link in the “Configuration” section on the left side of the SymKey main menu. Once the “Global Settings” window opens, either check or uncheck the “Zero-out Contract Value when denying a line” checkbox, according to your organization’s business rules.

If you do not have sufficient rights to access SymKey’s Configuration section, please see your administrator or contact HCIM Product Support at support@hcim.com or 888-454-0202, option 2.

FAQ: How do I enable and configure COB checking?

Thursday, June 17th, 2010

Answer: SymKey® allows users to configure the handling of claims with COB (Coordination of Benefits). When EZ-CAP® determines that a member has other coverage, it flags that claim as COB. SymKey can be configured to either pend COB claims for review if the coverage is Primary, pend for review when there is any other coverage, or ignore COB flags. In order to configure or change COB checking in SymKey 1.31 or later, users must have Admin level security rights.

Global COB Checking Configuration
On the left side of the SymKey main menu, click the “Global Settings” link in the “Configuration” section. From the “Global Settings” configuration window, either check the “Check Coordination of Benefits (COB)” checkbox to pend claims that EZ-CAP identified as COB or uncheck the checkbox to ignore all COB flags that SymKey encounters. You can also select the options below that checkbox to “Pend claim if COB and member has other Primary coverage” or “Pend claim if COB and member has any other coverage.”

Batch Level COB Checking Configuration
When “Check Coordination of Benefits (COB)” is enabled in SymKey’s Global Settings, users can still ignore COB pending at a batch level within SymKey’s Professional, Hospital, and Batch Processing modules. When configuring a Professional or Hospital Claims batch, simply check the “Ignore Pending for COB” checkbox in the “Global Options” section of the module. In the Batch Processing module, check the “Ignore Pending for COB” checkbox to the right of the “Source Claim Status” section. When “Ignore Pending for COB” is selected, SymKey will ignore the configured global setting to pend claims with COB for that batch only. Once the “Ignore Pending for COB” checkbox is unchecked or the SymKey claims processing module is closed, SymKey will no longer ignore the globally configured COB Checking setting.

FAQ: How do I configure how SymKey responds to certain EZ-CAP system error/warning messages?

Thursday, June 10th, 2010

Answer: In SymKey® v. 1.31 and later, only Admin level users have sufficient security rights to configure or change how SymKey responds to EZ-CAP® system error/warning messages. From the SymKey main menu, click the “EZ-CAP Messages” link under the Configuration section. This will open a window that shows every message that SymKey has encountered while running EZ-CAP. There are three sections in the window:

The Title section shows which EZ-CAP subsystem generated the message.
The Message section displays the specific EZ-CAP error or warning.
The Action section is a drop-down menu that displays how SymKey will respond to receiving that message and is the only editable area of the window.

If you would like to change the Action for a given message, click the drop-down arrow next to the appropriate action and select one of the two options: Pend or Ignore. When you are finished with your changes, simply close the window.

FAQ: How do I configure or add new SymKey users?

Thursday, June 3rd, 2010

Answer: In SymKey® v. 1.30 and above, the Users link is under the Configuration section on the left side of the Main Menu. The rights to add/change SymKey users is limited to the Admin security role. If the Users link is enabled, then you have sufficient rights to make these changes. Selecting the Users link from the Main Menu will take you to the Users configuration screen. From here, you can add a new user, delete an existing user, or reset a user’s password.

To add a new user, click the “New User” button, enter a User ID, choose an appropriate security role, enter the password in the next two fields, and then click the “Save New User” button to add the new user to the list. To delete a user, highlight the user to be removed from SymKey and then click the “Delete User” button. You will be asked to confirm your deletion. To reset a password, highlight the user in the list and then click the “Reset Password” button. You will be asked to enter a new password for the user.

Don’t miss out on Business Process Automation Opportunities

Wednesday, June 2nd, 2010

I recently visited one of our current SymKey® for EZ-CAP® clients in the Midwest. We met with our client’s COO for a couple of hours on a Monday morning. She shared with us the exciting activities and long term strategies that their organization has been working on in their efforts of continuous improvement and striving to bring ongoing “value-add” to the physician groups that they manage. As one of their strategic partners, she asked us to work with her operations staff to identify new business process automation opportunities to increase their claims auto-adjudication and the use of our SymKey for EZ-CAP product that they have been licensing for the last 18 months. She just knew that additional opportunities existed. I told her that we are always available and willing to work with our clients on these operational efficiency improvements efforts. We will be scheduling an onsite trip to work with this client in the next one to two months. When our customers further leverage their utilization of SymKey, their return on investment is increased and operational gains are achieved, which results in real bottom line gains.

I like to refer to these efforts as “peeling back the layers of an onion.” Just as someone peels back each layer of an onion to find a new fresh layer, so must operational managers and staff continuously review and identify current manual business processes that can be automated. Historical decisions as to why certain manual processes were established must be revisited and  re-analyzed on a regular basis (every six to 12 months). The justification for the manual process must be questioned and new opportunities must be explored to automate current processes with the use of tools such as SymKey. In today’s health plan/payer operations, there are generally several layers of operational processes and pending of claims that can be reviewed and analyzed on a regular basis to identify the manual processes performed by staff that are either outdated or that can be automated.

HCIM’s support staff and operational consultants are always willing and available to work with our current and prospective clients to identify new opportunities to further utilize SymKey’s automation and consistent processing of claims and authorizations. I am looking forward to going onsite and working with this specific client as a strategic partner to assist them in peeling back new layers of the onion and further increasing the automated-adjudication of claims with SymKey for EZ-CAP!

SCPMCS licenses SymKey for EZ-CAP Hospital Claims Module

Tuesday, June 1st, 2010

Southern California Physicians Managed Care Services (SCPMCS) signed an addendum to their existing SymKey® for EZ-CAP® Professional Claims module three-year licensing agreement to add the SymKey® for EZ-CAP® Hospital Claims module, effective June 1, 2010. SCPMCS has been a SymKey® client since 2009.

FAQ: How do I generate the SymKey Hard/No Dup reports?

Thursday, May 27th, 2010

Answer: In SymKey® v. 1.30 and later, click the “Hard Duplicates” link under the Modules section on the left side of the main menu. In the Hard Duplicates Generator window, you will see that the checkboxes for SymKey’s default configuration are preselected. By default, the Hard Duplicates Generator will match the following:

  • Claims in status 1, 2, or 3 (Suspect Claims) received during the past month against claims received at any date that are in status 5, 6, or 9 (Target Claims)
  • Only look at suspect claims where EZ-CAP has marked any line on the claim with a “DUP” flag in the P7 field
  • Suspect claim matches target claim’s header info for:
    • Member ID
    • Vendor ID
  • Every suspect claim line matches a unique line on the target claim by:
    • Service Date From
    • Service Type
    • Service Code
    • Billed Charge

You may further refine the matching criteria by checking the appropriate checkboxes. When you are ready to run the report, click the “Create File” button. SymKey will search for the duplicate claims that meet your criteria and begin building a batch file. Once completed, SymKey will save the new file under C:\SymKey\Files\Source by default. You can then run that duplicates file in the appropriate SymKey Professional or Hospital Claims module and deny them per your business rules. For more information, refer to your SymKey User Guide or contact HCIM Product Support at support@hcim.com or 888-454-0202, ext. 2.

05/26/2010: Successful SymKey Go Live at MedPOINT Management

Wednesday, May 26th, 2010

WALNUT CREEK, Calif. – May 26, 2010 – HealthCare Information Management, Inc. (HCIM), a nationally recognized and certified managed care information technology software and consulting services firm specializing in business process automation, announces a successful go live of their SymKey® Professional Claims module and Virtual Auto-Post™ module at MedPOINT Management, located in Woodland Hills, Calif.

HCIM’s newest client, MedPOINT Management, signed a three-year licensing agreement for the SymKey® for EZ-CAP® Professional Claims module and Virtual Auto-Post™ module in February 2010. MedPOINT went live on the SymKey Professional Claims module and Virtual Auto-Post module in March and April, respectively.

“After learning about SymKey® from the MZI EZ-CAP® sales staff, we arranged an on-site demo early this year. By the end of the presentation, we were negotiating with HCIM on the purchase of the SymKey® for EZ-CAP® Professional Claims module and Virtual Auto-Post™ module, as we quickly realized the benefits of automating parts of our claims adjudication process. During implementation, HCIM’s staff helped us customize the batch processes and scenarios to match our claims rules. We have been using SymKey for three months and are very pleased with the results. HCIM’s staff has even been readily available to answer our questions after hours and on the weekends when we do some of our claims processing,” said Linda Deaktor, Director of Medical Affairs at MedPOINT Management.

“The MedPOINT installation and training went very smoothly. On our first day of training, we were already creating reports and running SymKey® batches in production. MedPOINT is a perfect example of just how well SymKey’s abilities can be leveraged to quickly move claims out of inventory into a completed status – applying adjustments, denials and corrections as needed along the way,” said Jimmy Williams, HCIM Business Analyst.

About HCIM
Incorporated in July 2000, HCIM delivers technology solutions and consulting services to the managed care/payer industry. HCIM offers many innovative software solutions, including the SymKey®, ScanClaims™, and Appeals Manager™ product suites, which increase productivity by automating and tracking the adjudication of claims, authorizations, appeals, and provider dispute resolutions.

HCIM’s trained professional consultants offer payer software application implementation services such as database development, database analysis, custom report development, custom software development, testing, and the interface and integration of third party applications. HCIM’s industry-experienced consulting group also offers operational consulting services, including workflow analysis, organizational review, business process reengineering, realignment of resources, training, conversions, system configuration, and business rules configuration. HCIM’s veteran consultants are well equipped to help clients achieve optimal efficiency in such areas as claims processing, utilization management, HIPAA compliancy, and EDI.

For more information about HCIM’s products and services, call 888-454-0202 or e-mail sales@hcim.com.

Download the PDF!

FAQ: SymKey won’t open a batch of UB04 claims – it keeps trying to open EZ-CAP’s UB92 module, which is disabled. Is SymKey broken?

Thursday, May 20th, 2010

Answer: No, SymKey is not broken. There is likely an issue within EZ-CAP’s claim structure, where the UB04 claims that you are trying to open are labeled as UB92 claims in EZ-CAP’s tables. Before SymKey opens a claim, it queries EZ-CAP’s tables on the backend to determine which module it should use to open the claims. Since EZ-CAP is telling SymKey that the claims are UB92 claims, SymKey will not open them in EZ-CAP’s UB04 module. While you are able to manually open UB92 claims in the EZ-CAP UB04 module, SymKey will not do so because once the claims are saved in the UB04 module, they can no longer be opened in the UB92 module. For this reason, SymKey will only attempt to open UB92 claims in the UB92 module. When the UB92 module is disabled for the SymKey user, SymKey will fail against user rights in EZ-CAP.

If you would like to process claims labeled as UB92 in the UB04 module, you can manually open each claim in the UB04 module and save them as UB04 claims. Alternately, you can modify the SymKey user security in EZ-CAP to enable the UB92 module so SymKey can process the claims as they are.

Can BPA help you ditch the Sticky Notes?

Thursday, May 20th, 2010

During my time spent as an Operations Manager, I remember that my claims processors had sticky notes all over their monitors and cheat sheets that they would use to remind them of manual or special processes for certain providers or members. Not everyone had the same sticky notes, nor did they all have the same handwritten notes on their cheat sheets. This was always an impediment to providing consistent service and claims adjudication results. No matter how hard they tried to remember everything, there was just too much to remember for all the claims they encountered on any given day. As Operations management staff, we were always on the lookout for tools that would allow us to automate our business processes. 

When I first saw the rudimentary running of the precursor to SymKey®, I knew that it could lead to the Business Process Automation (BPA) tool that I had been looking for and desperately needed. I immediately envisioned what has since become SymKey, a tool that has been in use by over 20+ clients in the past five years. HCIM has worked to expand our BPA vision to our other software solutions and services (ScanClaims™, Appeals Manager™, and other HCIM custom software applications) that are in current use by our clients throughout the managed care/payer industry, and on multiple platforms.

HCIM’s BPA solutions and services are cost-effective, user friendly, easy to implement, and provide both real productivity gains and a tangible return on investment. I invite others with my similar operation experiences to check out HCIM’s BPA solutions and services. You too can have the tools to eliminate the sticky notes and handwritten cheat sheets in your office.