Managing your time at your job is essential to getting projects accomplished. Most people work for a paycheck, not considering how important their actual job duty may be to their employer.

Prioritizing your work is the first key to managing your time. First of all, if you have deadlines for certain tasks, you need to meet them.

Using a 1-31 file is extremely helpful for daily tasks. For example, if you are researching information, a 1-31 file can be extremely helpful. First get 31 file folders and number them 1 through 31.

Let's use checking insurance claim status as our example. Once your claims are filed, on a daily basis hopefully, print a day sheet or ledger sheet of all claims filed that day. Considering most insurance claims are paid within 2 to 3 weeks, file the "day sheet" 21 days from the date you first filed the claims. If the claims were filed on the first of the month, then "file" your day sheet in the folder marked "14". When the 14th of the month rolls around, pull the folder first thing in the morning to check on claims that should be in process if not already paid. With this method, you have a "daily" task of checking on your work everyday. Claims filed on the second of the month would have their day sheet or ledger filed in the folder marked 15 and so on.

Another way to manage your time is to give yourself time limits on certain aspects of your job duties. As an example, claims should be filed daily and should be the first thing you do in the morning, from charges generated the previous day. Two hours should be sufficient,if not overly generous, to allow yourself to enter your claims. Your next task should be posting payments received from patients and insurance carriers. Depending on the volume, this should account for 2-3 hours of work. As you are posting these payments, you should be able to define any claims that may require a letter to appeal a denial or rejection. If needed, these appeal letters should be generated almost immediately due to time constraints imposed by the insurance carriers.

Once these task are completed, you should have 2-3 hours to check your 1-31 file to call on claims status. Any claims showing not received can be added to the next days charges to refile. Therefore, the next day you use the same process again.

Some medical billing offices may be set up where one person files claims, one person posts payments, one person checks claims status and one person writes all of the appeals. If this is the case in your office, then I would suggest you set goals to accomplish a certain amount of work in a certain time period. You need to be quick but concise. Medical billing is basically an accounting position and should be treated as such.