CARES Act for Pediatricians Q&A

Finance
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61

I was the one who posted my error of putting our group TIN, but then my name as the provider (see above). Here is the follow up: As promised, the United rep called me this morning, and said the enhanced portal was now allowing changes- I logged in, submitted our TIN and Group name in the submit another TIN field, and within 10 seconds the TIN was approved. I was very impressed with the service from the United reps: they were helpful, and followed through- so even though we do have many problems with payments with United for our patients, they have been stellar when I needed help with this application.

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62

Thanks so much for putting together the instructions. I spent WAAY too much time yesterday pretending I knew a little about Excel.
My big gap is COVID expenses. As a solo practitioner who reports income on a Schedule C, Iā€™m guessing that all of my time invested in e-mails, webinars, writing Facebook posts, writing messages for patient distribution, planning new office workflows etc. cannot be counted as a COVID expense. True? This isnā€™t addressed on the HHS website.

63

No, that is a very legit example of a COVID-related expense. Your time is valuable!

64

Thank you. That will really help.
Can you give me a rough ballpark figure for appropriate hourly salary for CARES purposes? I donā€™t have a clue, since my salary is literally whatever is left over.

65

Well, what did you make in the average of the last couple years, divided by the number of hours you typically worked a week, divided by the number of weeks you typically worked in a year? If you made $150,000 working 35 hours a week, 48 weeks a year, thatā€™s about $90/hour.

If you hired a clone of yourself, what would you pay them for what kind of schedule? :grin:

66

Just got a call from Optum.

  1. They said even if you did not put a (-) sign, on Line 13, they will interpret it as a loss.

  2. They do not have a formula for the $ to be distributed. Minimum 2% but they will account for % Medicaid, losses, expenses etc.

67

For anyone using OP, how do I pull out a report of my payer mix related to revenue. It sounds like we need to report that ā€œXā€ percent of our revenue was from Medicaid and ā€œYā€ percent is from private payers. I am having trouble figuring out how to do that in the system. I appreciate any advice.

68

Sorry. No idea what happened there.

For anyone using OP, how do I pull out a report of my payer mix related to revenue. It sounds like we need to report that ā€œXā€ percent of our revenue was from Medicaid and ā€œYā€ percent is from private payers. I am having trouble figuring out how to do that in the system. I appreciate any advice.

69

The recommended OP process is is outlined in the guidebook posted here CARES Act Provider Relief Fund - Application Guidance Document on pages 28-29.

70

Hereā€™s a guide for calculating losses (Field 13) and payer mix (field 17 to 24) for eClinicalWorks users.CARES ACT PRF FOR ECW USERS.docx (239.1 KB)

71

so did we decide for line 13 if best to put the negative sign or not?

72

Put the negative sign for losses.

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73

See my document below for ECW users. I used EBO 36.14 for % payer distribution and registry, encounters for loss calculations.

74

See my document below for ECW users.

75

Thank you so much! This is quite helpful and thank you for taking the time to provide screenshots and details.

76

Can you pay for your EMR with PPP funds anyway? I didnā€™t think that would count as a utility. Health Insurance shouldnā€™t be counted for that either correct? We are about to submit our forgiveness app for PPP and want to be sure I havenā€™t missed a big ticket item with those. thanks

77

Hi Dr Young

You cannot pay for EMR with PPP funds. You can with Cares Act PRF. This discussion section is not for PPP, but for the PRF. Read the FAQ I posted on 6/12. HHS will be updating this FAQ based on the webinar held last week.

78

Hi. Thank you. I think I must have misunderstood the post about that. I didnā€™t think so, but wanted to be sure I hadnā€™t missed something. I am going through those now!

79

Good evening -
I have read the FAQ links and provider relief instructions thoroughly, but have a few questions remaining.

  1. After the COVID crash mid-March, as we worked to get information out to our families, I hired a company to redo my website so that I could put real time updates on there and helpful links. Can I add this to my expenses?
  2. As we used multiple EMR updates, new patient portal updates, and made&downloaded new Telehealth templates all specifically for COVID, can we add our EMR costs for those months to the expenses?
  3. I am assume even COVID Pay for payroll expenses when employees were out but being paid will go to PPP and not this, correct?
  4. As long as the 2019 return is filed we can use 2019 correct? We donā€™t have to have anything back from the government do we? I am going to file this week so that can use 2019 if able.
  5. Should I register on the CARES homepage before giving my accountant all the paperwork to log in and complete the application, or should I let him do that as well.
  6. Do we have to supply the data worksheets they request and upload them?
    Thanks
    Staci
80
  1. Perhaps in part. If your new website had additional features that permitted COVID-related communication, you could expense that. On the other hand, it would be hard to justify the expenses in, say, creating a new logo and a refreshed appearance and better graphics as COVID expenses.
  2. Your EMR fees are not COVID-related expenses. You would have paid all your EMR expenses irrespective of whether or not COVID had occurred. You can expense your time in creating new workflows in your EMR that wouldnā€™t have happened except for COVID.
  3. Not enough information to answer the question.
  4. Yes.
  5. Up to you.
  6. Yes.