When you have great home care software, all the hassles like scheduling, EVV, billing and payroll get easier. This allows you to focus on hiring great caregivers and delivering superior care. With Ankota Cares, you can get started today.
Manage client demographics,
care plans, calendars,
and balances. Full visibility
Assign care tasks and
track their completion
on each shift
Schedule visits and track
their completion and billable/
payable amounts with EVV
Manage caregiver info,
certifications, skills, pay rates
and shifts
Calculate billing amounts
based on hours or units with
rate tables.
Manage payroll based on
shifts, and rates including
travel and OT
Electronic Visit Verification, or EVV, is the standard for tracking the completion of home care visits. EVV captures arrival and departure times and locations and streamlines billing and payroll.
Medicaid home care agencies need to manage authorizations, billing in units, claims, and remittance with EVV, and managed care billing is hard.
Home care scheduling needs to be simple. Just click on the calendar and set up weekly shifts don’t require rescheduling. But it also needs to be powerful to handle fill-ins, assessment scheduling and optimization.
For home care agencies that market directly to consumers and long term care insurance participants, you need billing via credit cards and bank transfers plus referral source tracking.
Ankota provides enterprise grade, HIPAA compliant home care software to home care agencies with thousands of clients. Even if you’re just getting started. You can begin now with full confidence that Ankota will continue to meet your needs when you scale. Ankota Cares makes home care agency management and electronic visit verification (EVV)available to start right away at an affordable price.
Electronic Verification Software (EVV) is an integral component of home care agencies. It allows for a more comprehensive home care solution. The software is able to capture the exact arrival and departure time of the caregiver as well as the location of home care visits. This streamlines billing and payroll and enables reimbursement.
EVV verifies that your home care services were performed appropriately. Moreover, it is required by law per the 21st Century Cures Act. You need to have electronic proof of the following items to be compliant.
Your home care software needs integrated EVV. The most common EVV methods are Mobile Apps that verify location by GPS, and voice telephony that verifies location via caller ID (ANI). The alternate method is a token device (FOB) placed in the home.
EVV via an Offline Mobile App is critical to compliance. EVV is mandatory, but not all home care recipients have land-line phones nor do they have good mobile coverage in the home. The solution is an EVV mobile app that works offline
Medicaid programs are administered at the state level. Each state makes its own decisions on how to administer their EVV program. To find out how EVV is implemented in your state, click here. Outlined below are three key models.
Scheduling is at the heart of home care agency management. The best in home care scheduling software is simple, visual and calendar-based. Most caregiver scheduling follows repeated weekly patterns but in other circumstances, self-scheduling is appropriate. Home healthcare scheduling software helps with the tougher challenges like filling open caregiver shifts, scheduling assessments and optimizing schedules to minimize travel. This is a critical part of a comprehensive home care software solution.
The most basic and simple home care scheduling approach is to set up recurring weekly patterns of care. For example, if Jasmine sees Mrs. Johnson on Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 10:00 AM to 1:00 PM, you click on the calendar on their first day (e.g. Monday), enter the times, click the other days (Wednesday and Friday) and save that as the pattern.
If you deliver consumer directed services, your scheduling software should let you assign caregivers to the consumer and create visits when they clock in. This gives the consumer control over the schedule, while you as the agency owner can provide oversight.
Another home care scheduling model is appointment booking. This is often used for assessments, and occasional specialty visits such as case management or phlebotomy. Your software needs to propose specific available time slots to the consumer.
The best home care scheduling software has powerful scheduling features for filling open shifts, scheduling periodic assessments and case management visits, and optimizing routes in order to minimize driving time and maximize the time for care
Home care agencies performing Medicaid-reimbursed services need special software to be effective. The best Medicaid home care software handles authorization units, electronic visit verification (EVV), claim submission.
Your home care software needs to manage authorized units. Units are generally 15-minute blocks of care. Medicaid will tell you how many units of care you can deliver in a week month or other time period. You should schedule to use all authorized units without going over.
All Medicaid programs require you to have home care software with electronic visit verification. This is a fraud prevention mandate signed into law in the 21st Century Cures Act. Visit our EVV page for more information. Key EVV features are as follows:
In order to bill Medicaid, your software needs to submit electronic claims or visit records that include proof of EVV. Ultimately the claims are processed by Medicaid or their chosen MCOs and you will receive payment accompanied by Electronic Remittance Advice. Then you need to reconcile your accounts.
Each state Medicaid program has different requirements for its home care agencies. This can include special rounding rules, care plans, specific EVV rules, claim submission rules, required documentation and more. Be sure to consult your state’s Medicaid site for specific rules. Here are some key features you should look for.
Private duty home care agencies serve individuals who pay for their own services or who have reimbursement through Long-Term-Care-Insurance (LTCI). The best private duty home care software not only tracks the clients, scheduling and billing, but helps with referral tracking, allows credit card and EFT payments, and keeps family members updated on their loved-ones’ care. Get started with Ankota Cares.
To start, you need all the “basics” of home care software including client management, care plans, caregiver management, scheduling, caregiver EVV telephony and mobile apps, billing and payroll
The strongest and fastest growing private duty home care agencies cultivate relationships with referral sources and cultivate those lead sources in order to grow. Your home care software needs to track referral sources and leads.
The best way to keep your revenue flowing from your private duty agency clients is to be able to accept payments via credit card or Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT). Your home care software should accept credit card payments.
One tough challenge for home care agencies is staying connected with the families of the clients you care for (who are often paying the bills). You need ways to stay in tough and keep families abreast of their loved-one’s care.
A collection of "How-tos" and "Frequently asked questions"
for home care agencies
EVV stands for Electronic Visit Verification. It is the standard method in the home care industry for tracking caregiver clock-ins and clock-outs. EVV streamlines billing and payroll, and if you are reimbursed by Medicaid or other government payers, it’s the law.
Medicaid programs are administered individually by each state. Although electronic visit verification (EVV) is a national mandate (per the 21st Century Cures Act) each state decides how to implement their program. You can find out how EVV is implemented in your state by clicking here.
CDS stands for Consumer Directed Services. In this model, the consumer receiving the services is responsible for choosing their caregiver and setting their schedule, whereas home care agencies only “administer” the care. This model has different names in different states like CD in several states, “registry” in Florida, and EOR in California.
Medicaid home care agencies need the following key features in their home care software:
Note that each state’s Medicaid program is different, so be sure to check the rules for your state(s).
Home health aide visits records require electronic proof of completion (called EVV). This is often captured with a GPS location. The problem with many home care EVV apps is that they require mobile network coverage. An offline mobile app allows clock-in and clock-out even when out-of-coverage.
EVV (electronic visit verification) can work in several different ways. The most common is with a mobile app that captures location via GPS. The other prevalent method is via telephony, where the caregiver clocks in and out from the clients land-line phone using caller-ID for verification of location.
The cost of home care software is generally a fee per-client-per-month averaging $12-$15. There is often an up-front project fee and a monthly minimum fee.
AnkotaCares offers home care software starting at $99 per month for up to 9 clients and offers two free months when you sign-up.
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