External Agent Access to Your Account

This article is intended for:
  • Practice Owners
  • Managers
  • or Independent Therapists sharing office staff
What: TherapyAppointment offers a tool to that assists in two different situations:
  • If you employ a front office staff member who works with you and other independent professionals with billing or scheduling, this tool allows them to access your account
  • If you contract with an external billing or practice management company to help you with billing or scheduling, this tool lets them work with your account to assist you

This type of account is useful if: 

  1. You hire front office staff to assist a group of independent providers
     Though they are legally independent, you want the front office to be able to assist you and the others from their one account.

    or...
  2. You use an external service, usually called a billing service, to assist you with claims and scheduling
     They may provide service to several different groups of professionals beside yourself.

We recommend in both of these situations to have them sign a Business Associate Agreement with you to ensure HIPAA compliance. It is essential for a billing agent, and a very good idea for a front office person working for several independent therapists.

If you work with a "true" group practice, i.e. an incorporated practice that bills under a single group tax ID, you don't need to use this tool. You can use a simple "admin account" for an employee of a true group practice (article: Adding and Managing Staff & Roles). Such an employee need not sign a BAA, though you are required to give them regular training on HIPAA.

If you would like to provide instructions to your external agent about how to set up their account, have them follow the instructions from this article.

Once your Front Office Worker / Practice Management Company / Billing Company has an External Agent account set up with TherapyAppointment for them, they will ask you to connect with them.

We think this is best done with a phone call or online meeting. 

The process they will ask you to do is the following. Go to:

  • Practice Settings (left menu)
  • Select Staff (top tab)
  • Select the button at the top right corner of the page shown below:

From here:

1. Contact Your Agent

  • Contact your Practice Management Company / Billing Company if you’re not already on the phone with them
  • Then click 

2. Enter Agent Codes

  • Enter both the Token Letters and Code they give you into the provided fields
  • Then click 

3. Complete Setup

  • Click the Profile Button with your agent’s name on it highlighted below:

  • This will take you to the Roles selection screen
  • Turn on each role needed for your external agent, steps: Manage Staff Roles

🎉 Congratulations! You've successfully connected your external agent to your group!

⚠️ Hints:

  • Provide the external agent with a Manager role if:
    • Their role will involve providing you account set up processes and/or adding or editing insurance settings and CPT codes
  • If their role is less extensive, then the Scheduler and/or Biller role may be all the access they need

End Access for External Biller / Agent

If you end services with this agent, be sure and remove their privilege to access your account by going to:

  • Practice Settings (left menu)
  • Select Staff (top tab)
  • Under the section External Agents, find the agent
  • Click their name, loading their staff profile
  • Under the section Roles, click the red button (top right):

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