At A Glance
As healthcare costs continue to climb, today’s patients are seeking an improved patient financial experience. They expect more price transparency and greater access to digital patient payment options. Learn how providers can boost collections rates by delivering accurate, upfront patient estimates and more ways to pay.
Key takeaways:
- Patients who have a positive financial experience are more likely to pay their medical bills on time and in full.
- When patients struggle to understand the cost of care upfront or don’t have access to convenient options, it can lead to unpaid bills and rising bad debt levels.
- Providers can leverage technology, like Patient Payment Estimates, to deliver a better patient payment experience and improve patient collections rates.
The patient financial experience can directly impact collections and the entire healthcare revenue cycle. When the experience is positive, patients are more likely to pay, but when patients have a poor payment experience, bills may be left lingering in accounts receivable.
Every financial interaction that providers have with patients – from sending patient estimates to offering payment options – is an opportunity to improve the overall experience and boost point-of-service collection rates.
What is the patient financial experience?
The patient financial experience describes how a patient perceives the value of care based on their financial interactions with a provider. It’s shaped as early as registration when providers first check that insurance details are up to date and look for missing active coverage. And the financial journey continues as providers use this information to calculate the patient’s financial responsibility with a patient estimate. Billing communication, access to digital payment solutions and payment plans, and collections activity also inform the patient financial experience.
Why patient financial experience matters for collections
For providers, delivering a positive financial experience can play a crucial role in collections. When the patient’s financial journey is smooth, it fosters trust between the patient and provider. Patients are more likely to get the treatment they need and pay their medical bills sooner, and providers spend less time chasing collections. However, a negative patient financial experience can lead to dissatisfaction, resulting in delayed payments and increased collections activity.
The link between experience and payment behavior
Experian Health’s State of Patient Access 2026 survey (SOPA) shows a clear link between the financial experience and payment behavior. Just over 80% of patients say an accurate estimate helped them better prepare to pay for care costs. But when they don’t receive a clear estimate, nearly half (48%) of patients say they would postpone or cancel care. Additionally, 63% of patients also say they’d be more confident in paying for healthcare costs with a payment plan.
Impact on key revenue cycle metrics
Patients are more likely to proceed with treatment and pay sooner when they’re better prepared to cover the cost of their medical bills and have clear pathways to make payments. And the impact on key revenue cycle metrics can be significant when patients pay on time and in full. Providers see Days in Accounts Receivable decrease and Gross Collection Rate increase. With fewer patient accounts progressing to collections, organizations may also experience lower Bad Debt Rates and Cost to Collect, while reducing the volume of collection-related patient outreach.
Common pain points that hurt collections
Common pain points that can dampen the patient financial experience and hurt collections include:
| Common pain points: |
| Rising healthcare costs: Paying for care has become more difficult over the last 12 months for 32% of patients, and less than two in five patients feel confident in their ability to cover necessary medical expenses. |
| Missing estimates: Nearly eight in ten (77%) patients feel it’s important to get an accurate estimate before receiving care, but are only receiving estimates from providers 45% of the time. |
| Surprises on medical bills: Estimate accuracy has improved in the last 12 months, but nearly a quarter of final patient bills end up being much more expensive than the initial estimate. |
| Lack of payment plans: Many providers still don’t offer payment plans, even though 63% of patients say payment plans help them feel more confident in their ability to cover their medical costs. |
4 ways to improve patient financial experience and increase collections
Here’s a closer look at key ways providers can deliver better patient financial experiences and improve collection rates.
1. Provide accurate price estimates upfront
Providers can help patients better prepare to pay their medical bills by sending accurate price estimates upfront. Digital tools, like Experian Health’s Patient Payment Estimates, enable providers to automatically generate patient-specific cost estimates based on data from insurance benefits and contracted payer rates. Estimates can then be sent to patients digitally via a mobile device with a secure text link or via a self-service web portal.
2. Simplify billing communications
After treatment, providers can improve patients’ financial experience by simplifying billing communications and making it easier to access and pay medical bills online. When patients can access a self-service portal to pay their bills, they can make secure payments and meet self-pay responsibilities without waiting for bills to arrive. This can speed up the time to payment and reduce the administrative burden for busy front desk staff.
3. Offer flexible digital payment options
Patients want convenient ways to pay their medical bills and more flexible payment options. Offering payment plans helps patients split the cost of steep medical bills into more manageable amounts, while secure, digital payment methods can make it easy for patients to pay their bill anytime, anywhere.
4. Use data to segment and engage patients
Collections Optimization Manager uses machine learning to score and segment patient accounts based on propensity-to-pay, which helps billing staff automatically know which accounts to prioritize. This improves the patient experience by accurately screening accounts, so that patients who don’t owe any payments are not subjected to unnecessary collections efforts.
The role of technology in enhancing the patient financial experience
Experian Health data shows that 70% of patients want their healthcare experience to be like other experiences they pay for, while 59% of patients say they want more digital and mobile options to communicate with providers. From registration to estimates, billing and collections, technology-based solutions like Patient Payment Estimates help providers enhance the patient financial experience by delivering greater financial clarity and increased price transparency.
FAQs
The patient financial experience describes how patients perceive the value of care based on their financial interactions with a provider. Price transparency, pre-service cost estimates, billing, payment options and collections can all shape the patient financial experience.
When patients have a positive financial experience, they’re more likely to prepare for the cost of care and pay medical bills sooner. But when patients don’t fully understand their financial responsibility before treatment or when estimates are inaccurate, payment delays are common and accounts often end up in collections.
Providers can improve the patient financial experience by providing accurate, upfront estimates, simplifying billing communications and offering flexible digital payment options. Tools like Experian Health’s Patient Payment Estimates can deliver personalized breakdowns directly to the patient’s phone, and help improve price transparency.
Learn how Experian Health’s Patient Estimates solution helps healthcare providers improve patient financial experiences and minimize revenue leaks.
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