Why It’s Important to Run Month-End Tasks

by | Jul 10, 2019 | Business & Team Management, Patient Record Management, Revenue Cycle Management

You are looking at your latest Aging/Credit Balance report, and you notice that there are many accounts with balances in the 0-30 days column, but not many in the other columns. You realize that you have not run month-end tasks, which would cause the balances to age, or rather, move into the appropriate aging bracket columns.

Report prior to running Month End. Notice that all of the amounts due are in the 0-30 days column.

After you run the month-end tasks, the Aging/Credit Balance report should look similar to this:

Report after running Month End. Notice that the amounts due have moved into different columns.

There are multiple month-end tasks that need to be completed. We strongly recommend that you run these monthly, and at approximately the same time each month.

Month end menu showing different month-end procedures.
  • Applying finance charges : This applies any finance charges to accounts with and without payment agreements. Dentrix Enterprise assesses finance charges based on the payment agreement terms for the account.
  • Applying late charges: This applies late charges to all accounts who have not made a payment within the grace period for the payment due date. You can also manually apply late charges to individual accounts.
  • Processing future due payment plans: Posts charges due on all accounts with a future payment plan.
  • Running the month-end update: Running month-end update tasks helps you in several ways:
    • Ages account balances: The month-end process updates patient records so that balances are updated to the correct age. For example, if an account has balance at thirty days in the previous month, the month-end process updates that balance to 60 days.
    • Moves procedures and clinical notes to history: All records are moved into a history or “locked” state. This prevents any further changes or deletions of records.
    • Ledger entries will be placed in history: You will not be able to edit or delete anything in the patient ledger for the previous month or months. You will need to make an adjustment if you need to fix something in the Ledger.
    • Creates totals records: To increase speed when running reports, Dentrix Enterprise month-end tasks create records that are accessed by the reports. This way, the reports run faster since there is a more concise way to gather the information.
    • Resets insurance benefits (optional): Different patients insurance benefits may not reset all at the same time. The month-end process resets benefits used and deductible amounts applied for all patients’ benefits who reset during that month.

Important: You cannot close out the current month until the first day of the following month. For example, you cannot close out the month of June until July 1st.

How To:

Enable Single User Mode

  1. Make certain all other users are logged off.
  2. In the Office Manager, click Maintenance > Practice Setup > Database Mode Setup > Enable Single-User Mode.

Apply Finance Charges

  1. Open the Ledger.
  2. Click Month End > Apply Finance Charges.
  3. Select the appropriate options for your practice and click OK.
Apply Finance Charges dialog.

Apply Late Charges

  1. Click Month End > Apply Late Charges.
  2. Select the appropriate options for your practice and click OK.
Apply Late Charges dialog.

Process Future Due Payment Plans

  1. Click Month End > Future Due Payment Plan.
  2. Select the appropriate options for your practice and click OK.

Running the month-end update

  1. Click Update. The last month to have been run shows in the upper-left window.
  2. (optional) Check Reset Insurance Benefits for <month> to reset all dental insurance plans with a benefit renewal month following the Close Out Month.
  3. (Optional) Select Disable Audit Triggers During Month End Proc. to speed up the month-end process.
Close Out Month Dialog

Additional Information