Medical Billing Companies & Consultants in Chattanooga, TN

Healthcare Billing Services, Inc., known as HBSI, is an outsourced medical billing company based in Chattanooga, Tennessee. It has operated since June 2000 and takes on physician practices throughout the United States, not only in its home region. Its purpose is to remove the administrative load of reimbursement work from healthcare providers so that their staff can spend more time on clinical care and less on chasing payers.

Specialties Served

The intake form on the company's site points to the types of practices it typically supports:

• Anesthesiology and CRNA groups
• Neurology
• General surgery
• Internal medicine and family practice
• Cardiology
• Podiatry
• Skilled nursing facilities

Practices outside these fields can also inquire, since the form includes an option for other specialties.

Billing and Claims Work

HBSI enters charges from the coded encounter forms a practice supplies, checking CPT and ICD-10 codes for accuracy and adding modifiers when a case involves unusual circumstances. Patient demographics and insurance details are keyed in by its staff.

Each claim is reviewed before it goes out, and filing is electronic whenever a payer accepts it, with paper used only when required. The firm bills government, commercial and private insurers at the primary, secondary and tertiary levels, and it runs a monthly follow-up cycle on unpaid claims.

Appeals for denied or underpaid claims are started as soon as payments are posted, and a five-step method is used both to prevent denials and to fix them quickly. Payments are posted from check copies and EOBs sent by the practice, while deposits keep flowing to the provider exactly as before, so HBSI does not handle client funds.

Patient Relations and Reporting

On the patient side, HBSI mails monthly statements, answers patient calls about bills and insurance, sets up payment plans and tracks charity and indigent write-offs. Past-due accounts are reviewed each month, but the practice alone decides whether an account goes to collections.

Refund requests from patients or insurers are verified first, after which the practice receives a form explaining the amount, recipient and reason. Clients get monthly reports such as practice analysis, referring provider data, an activity summary and breakdowns by provider, payer and CPT code, which help them follow charges, payments and receivables.

Patient data is handled under HIPAA rules and is never sold or used for marketing.

Engagement Model and Background

New relationships follow three steps: a no-cost consultation held in person or by phone, a written plan built around the practice's needs, and a formal contract signed together with a business associate agreement to keep HIPAA obligations clear.

HBSI was started by CEO Steve Reno and his wife, and it remains owner-run, so clients deal with the founders rather than a remote corporate team. The company describes its values as mutual partnership, integrity and open communication, and it presents its own earnings as tied to what clients actually collect.

For buyers who want a long-standing, small, owner-led billing partner that leaves control of funds and collection decisions with the practice, HBSI offers more than two decades of experience in this work.