00:00:03:01 – 00:00:30:02
Mara Shorr
Welcome to Shorr Solutions, the podcast. I’m one of the hosts, Mara Shorr. I’m a partner in the medical practice management company. Yes, Shorr Solutions. Who’s the other host, you may ask? Easy answer. That would be my father. Our founding partner, Jay Shorr. Together, we now have an amazing team and clients across the country. Listen as we chat, converse, strategize and commiserate over life and the esthetic medical industry.
00:00:30:14 – 00:00:43:16
Mara Shorr
It’s time for you to listen, learn, and be inspired as we help you kick start your practice. Because who doesn’t want a little more help? Welcome to Shorr Solutions, The podcast.
00:00:46:12 – 00:01:11:06
Mara Shorr
Welcome back to another episode of Shorr Solutions, the podcast. I am one of your co-hosts, Mara Shorr, and the other glorious co-host who just took a big giant deep breath. Because, well, let’s be honest, this topic is going to require taking a big, giant deep breath. Is our founding partner, my father, Jay Shorr. So say hello, Jay.
00:01:12:13 – 00:01:13:16
Jay Shorr
How do you do this?
00:01:14:06 – 00:01:17:19
Mara Shorr
Jay, For anyone that can’t see you, Jay’s trying to do the heart with his fingers.
00:01:18:19 – 00:01:19:08
Jay Shorr
Is that… are really…
00:01:19:09 – 00:01:36:13
Mara Shorr
It looks a little more like a kidney. But that’s okay. So we’re, you know, we’re going to give him some grace on that. So I kidney you, too. Jay. With that, we are going to talk this morning or afternoon, depending on what time you’re listening to this, this podcast.
00:01:36:15 – 00:01:42:03
Jay Shorr
The reason I had to do the kidney now that we’re talking about theft is because you always steal my heart.
00:01:42:10 – 00:02:04:10
Mara Shorr
Ohh, I thought it’s because you got to be kidding me. Okay. Okay. Yes. I’m often told by our teenager that I’ve got the mom jokes. And then Russ, my husband said, no, she’s been doing this since she was like 20. So there we go. I come by it honestly day. So let’s get started.
00:02:04:11 – 00:02:27:09
Mara Shorr
So we’re going to talk about top signs there could be theft in your office. So this is really a topic that requires a great big deep sigh. We once heard Dr. Steve Dayan say the infamous line of if you haven’t been stolen from, you just haven’t been in practice long enough. And this is, he wasn’t the one that came up with that line, but it’s just always, always stuck with me.
00:02:27:09 – 00:02:48:17
Mara Shorr
And Jay has been lecturing on theft for, well, as long as I can remember, not just lecturing me on theft as his daughter, but lecturing about theft prevention. And so let’s go ahead, Jay. We’re just going to dive right in. The top thing I think, to note would be that theft so often people think theft is just money, right?
00:02:48:18 – 00:03:14:01
Mara Shorr
It’s stealing of money. But we’re going to talk a little bit about stealing of money, stealing of time, stealing of office supplies, stealing of medical resources. There’s stealing of prescription pads in the days when you had to physically still write a physical, hard prescription. Jay, it’s your choice to these glorious and very optimistic types. Would you like to start with talking about.
00:03:14:20 – 00:03:18:18
Jay Shorr
We will get to another type of theft and that’s stealing of patients
00:03:19:12 – 00:03:20:22
Mara Shorr
Oh, yes, that’s a good one, too.
00:03:21:06 – 00:04:03:21
Jay Shorr
So most of the time people think of stealing and theft. I always call it safety, health, security, fraud and embezzlement, which much of my career I’ve worked with and here’s the thing. If you don’t have processes in place to uncover potential, perspective or actual theft, then you have to have zero tolerance items, and to me, zero tolerance items are alcohol on the job, drugs on the job, theft, patient and employee staff insubordination.
00:04:03:21 – 00:04:29:12
Jay Shorr
There are zero tolerance items. A lot of other things I will put up with, but stealing of time as well. And we can go onto each one of these things. And I caution people and I caution practices that seriously, if you don’t have processes in place, what is a process, not necessarily a protocol, but what’s a process? A process are security cameras.
00:04:31:08 – 00:04:54:23
Jay Shorr
And I actually just came back from a site visit recently where a staff member was terminated and we had suspected theft, and lo and behold, the cameras had been moved. Now, you understand the camera that goes over the cash box, the camera that goes over the product display, the camera goes over inventory.
00:04:54:23 – 00:05:13:10
Mara Shorr
And, I am going to chime in here, Jay, And just note for anyone who is wondering, no, you cannot have cameras in the actual patient treatment rooms and you cannot have cameras in bathrooms. So we always want to make sure this… when we talk about theft prevention and cameras, this excludes those areas.
00:05:13:14 – 00:05:39:17
Jay Shorr
So now let me put a caveat on that. I will not put a caveat on the bathroom. All right. The lavatory, because that should never, but there can be cameras inside an exam room and an operatory with consent from the patient, because sometimes we do videos, that’s a camera. But the physical security cameras, what Mara’s talking about without a patient’s consent for obvious reasons.
00:05:40:09 – 00:06:09:15
Jay Shorr
Sometimes we should. And I’ll give you the example of why we should. And, you know, I am never embarrassed to share some of the nightmares and horror stories that went on in my own practice, and now that I refer to my own practice, naturally, I have to make a disclaimer. When I say my own practice is because I was a partner in a very large dermatology plastic surgery practice here in Florida, I am not a physician.
00:06:10:00 – 00:06:37:05
Jay Shorr
And in Florida, unlike California and some other states, you don’t have to be a physician to own or be a partner. And we’re doing a laser treatment on a patient. And they left their purse on a chair. They had the darkened goggles because of the laser. And lo and behold, when the doctor was in another room getting ready to come to this room, the medical assistant was preparing that patient.
00:06:38:01 – 00:07:04:14
Jay Shorr
Unfortunately, the medical assistant helped themself to money inside the patient’s purse. It was not uncovered until the patient went to pay and realized they had just come from an ATM to take out cash to pay for the procedure, The patient said. I think somebody was in my purse while I was in the room. It was very easy to limit down who was in the room.
00:07:05:14 – 00:07:36:12
Jay Shorr
However, we couldn’t see it and there was no proof. Had there been a security camera in the room, that would have been fine. However many times in the room. This happened to have been a laser procedure on the face, so it could have been okay. But as you well know, many times there are patients that this robe and other parts of the body are exposed and they would not consent to have that filmed or under security.
00:07:36:21 – 00:07:43:11
Jay Shorr
So you have to be very, very careful. So let’s go to the first one that everybody thinks about. Cash.
00:07:44:12 – 00:08:03:16
Mara Shorr
Cash and J. I want to make sure I’m going to be the the keeper of a few notes here, because unfortunately, every time you’re bringing these up, I go, Ooh, I want to make sure Jay tells this horror story. And the reason for those of you that are listening is number one. Jay has been doing this a very long time, right?
00:08:03:16 – 00:08:23:04
Mara Shorr
So Jay has been in this industry. Gosh, I’d say it’s 25 years now in this particular industry. I’m not even talking about health and safety and OSHA and your paramedic days, Right. Jay’s been in this industry a very long time. And so in that time we’ve seen anything from pretty ridiculous to pretty horrific when it comes to theft.
00:08:23:04 – 00:08:38:00
Mara Shorr
All of these horrible things didn’t happen to Jay just in the course of like 13 months. Right. It’s not that just Jay had his blinders on. So, Jay, I want to let you know I’m making some notes here about things I’m going to say, Hey, Jay, why don’t you tell the story of that time when, so.
00:08:39:00 – 00:09:25:08
Jay Shorr
So first, it can be money. When you’re stealing money, that’s money out of the cash drawer. That’s literal money. But a lot of other points of theft actually relate to money. Example: a practitioner is performing a procedure in the room, collecting in the room, maybe discounting the procedure and allowing the patient to pay an exorbitant tip. This happened about a year and a half ago to another client where the pay up kind of convinced the doctor to take credit card system like a restaurant that had the line tip, gratuity.
00:09:26:01 – 00:09:47:14
Jay Shorr
And this way the patients were allowed to leave a tip, kind of like a massage parlor where you tip the therapist. And many of the massage parlors that I’ve been to, they actually have an envelope, you know, not to mention, but like massage and there’d be an envelope at the front when you go to pay and you can give a gratuity to the massage therapist who actually gave you that massage.
00:09:48:01 – 00:09:56:13
Mara Shorr
Jay, you are starting to date yourself when people use this thing called cash. I don’t know what you’re talking about, Jay. What is this thing called cash?
00:09:56:13 – 00:10:08:07
Jay Shorr
Well, I’ll tell you, there are people that still use cash and not going to say it’s right or wrong that are in cash businesses and the are reasons for that, now that it becomes another form of theft.
00:10:08:10 – 00:10:33:02
Mara Shorr
It is, but Jay, since you are talking about taking payment in the room, I’m going to interject here. We’ve seen practices that we’ve worked with and with, look, the gloriousness that is being able to chart on an… whether it’s an iPad or another form of a tablet, Right. But a mobile device, that makes it incredibly easy. So we’ve seen a number of our clients that they take that in, they scribe, they take notes, they chart, etc..
00:10:33:02 – 00:11:00:24
Mara Shorr
Right, but we’ve seen several practices because now whether it’s square or your other credit card processor that goes into that particular device. And so to make it, quote unquote, easy on everybody, we’ve seen practices that take payments in the room very legally, like that is part of their process, but what are your thoughts on letting the provider take the payment inside of a treatment room instead of checking out at a front desk?
00:11:00:24 – 00:11:05:13
Mara Shorr
What are your thoughts there as in regards to how it could potentially open up a practice for theft?
00:11:06:01 – 00:11:40:13
Jay Shorr
Well, depending upon space limitations, there’s many reasons people do it. We have clients that work out of single or double suites where they don’t have a check in, check out. It’s kind of like a shared office space or a PHENIX suite or something similar to that. And for those of you who don’t know what their co-shared office space is, basically, and you go in and there’s a common area that might be a reception area, they’re not necessarily yours, and it’s only for a common waiting room or reception area, but everything is done within the personal suite.
00:11:40:13 – 00:12:08:10
Jay Shorr
It’s kind of like many, many years ago I had a second office that was inside a medical spa. We owned the medical spa portion, but there was manicure, pedicure, hairdressers and they rented chairs and we owned the second floor. All right. That was for dermatology and cosmetic and plastic surgery. And what ended up happening is some of these would take payments in the room.
00:12:08:10 – 00:12:32:01
Jay Shorr
Now, if the owner is the one taking payments in the room, I have absolutely zero issues with that. If it’s a provider, I always have my concerns. And I’m not saying that every provider is disingenuous. I’m trying to say that I always have my eyes wide open. All right. It’s a little bit for me and the rest for you.
00:12:32:05 – 00:13:00:12
Jay Shorr
And I want to make sure because when that provider is taking money in the room, we don’t know that the full amount is being accepted. The full amount is being charged because sometimes there are deals that are made legitimately, but we don’t know, as I was trying to explain the deal in the in the room where the credit card allowed for tips, well, the provider actually charged less for the procedures so that the patient could give a tip.
00:13:01:03 – 00:13:15:09
Jay Shorr
Now, when you have a $350 procedure that’s normally $500 and you see a $350 procedure with a $100 tip before the patient got a $50 discount.
00:13:15:09 – 00:13:24:05
Mara Shorr
And again. When Jay says, this is just putting on the “could this be misinterpreted?”, when he says tip, he means gratuity, not like a laser tip. He means right. Right.
00:13:24:11 – 00:13:45:06
Jay Shorr
So it was a $350 procedure, a $100 gratuity, and still the patient got a $50 discount. All the patient knew is they paid $50 less and here by the provider got $100 tip. I think that waves a reder flag than the red on my shirt.
00:13:45:10 – 00:13:45:20
Mara Shorr
Yeah.
00:13:46:14 – 00:13:59:13
Jay Shorr
All right. I understand. 15%. 20%. I kind of think that gratuities to providers outside of aestheticians is wrong. That’s Jay’s opinion. All right.
00:14:00:00 – 00:14:12:12
Mara Shorr
And Jay, I know we always hate to try and, like, cut each other short as far as how much time we actually have on these podcast. But I have so many things that I want you to answer on this. So I’m purposely going to bring up a new one.
00:14:12:18 – 00:14:16:11
Jay Shorr
But let me get to one other one. Mara and I were on a site visit, one time.
00:14:16:12 – 00:14:18:03
Mara Shorr
Oh, this is a good one. Yes.
00:14:18:18 – 00:14:46:08
Jay Shorr
In Orlando, Florida. And we happened to have been speaking to a PA, and what we were doing was auditing. And we found out that there were Thermage tips missing. Now, understand, every time you perform a procedure with a Thermage, there’s a tip and there’s a cost to a tip. And we found out, it doesn’t matter how we found out, that the PA worked at another two facilities.
00:14:47:01 – 00:15:08:16
Jay Shorr
He was helping himself to additional Thermage tips that he was using at another facility. He was charging the provider the cost of the tip that he helped himself to, that the first provider that we were doing a site visit for paid for. And then he was getting paid for the procedure, being paid for the procedure in another practice.
00:15:08:16 – 00:15:36:19
Jay Shorr
It’s not theft. There wasn’t a non-compete, it was an independent contractor. However, he did steal the tip. The answer to that when we brought it up because we said, well, we have a spreadsheet that we’ve created that we have to list the tip. The tip has to be numbered like every syringe of a filler and a box of neurotoxins bottle, so that we know where every unit went, where every syringe went and we couldn’t find these tips.
00:15:37:02 – 00:15:42:21
Jay Shorr
The provider said, I make enough money. I can’t be bothered with some of that.
00:15:43:06 – 00:15:45:05
Mara Shorr
Well, this was the owner.
00:15:45:05 – 00:15:45:16
Jay Shorr
The owner?
00:15:46:13 – 00:15:47:22
Mara Shorr
Yeah, this is the owner.
00:15:48:14 – 00:16:18:11
Jay Shorr
Unfortunately, that owner is out of business today. All right, Seriously. And it’s because of that Plus other things. They were diverting patients to another practice. That’s another form of theft, and that has to be for non-solicitation in clauses when you hire people, and that’s a whole other webinar, by the way. So be careful because it is consumables, disposables that people are taking from the office that the owner paid for, another form of theft.
00:16:18:14 – 00:16:38:22
Mara Shorr
And Jay, in… just… I don’t know if we want to say… adjacent to that, or related to that, right. Whichever word we’re going to go with, as you call it, anyone that’s ever listened, it is no secret I am Jay’s daughter. Therefore, over my 39, almost 40 years, I have just really taken on a lot of Jayisms. Sometimes It was much to Jay’s dismay.
00:16:38:22 – 00:17:09:01
Mara Shorr
But often he finds it to be ridiculously hilarious, but with that being said, let’s talk Jay about, as you phrase it, an employee running a business within your business. And so that is part of what you were talking about, but let’s talk about some, you know, for example, injectables that do need to be reconstituted or they need to be diluted and how we have seen theft with syringes that are filled with products that have been…. that have walked away.
00:17:09:14 – 00:17:30:03
Mara Shorr
How we have seen “a little for you, a little for me”, and they have gone on to take the product from the bottle or the vial and take it home and go on to sell that to another… another patient, and then you even saw that a number of years ago in your own practice when you saw a slew of non-responders.
00:17:30:03 – 00:17:50:14
Mara Shorr
So let’s… I’m giving all the spoiler alerts here, but let’s go ahead and talk about some of those instance…
00:17:30:03 – 00:17:50:14
Mara Shorr
Yes, we are going to take a slight break, a slight intermission, because what kind of business would be if we didn’t tell you about our own services? I want to take a minute and talk to you about the conversion cascade course and all that it has to offer.
00:17:50:23 – 00:18:19:08
Mara Shorr
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00:18:19:08 – 00:18:50:00
Mara Shorr
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00:18:50:05 – 00:19:16:19
Mara Shorr
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00:19:17:01 – 00:19:45:21
Mara Shorr
You can finish it at your own pace and you’ll have lifetime access. Yes, that is for the lifetime of the course, and a special thank you for being our podcast listener. We’ll give you 20% off. Yes, 20% off. Just enter the Discount code podcast. Yes, podcast to start saving now. So click on the link in our show notes to sign up for the Conversion Cascade online course and start acquiring more patients now.
00:19:46:09 – 00:20:00:18
Jay Shorr
Okay, so let me share two ways. First, the provider that is not the owner, because there would be no incentive for the owner to do this. You don’t steal from yourself right?
00:20:00:18 – 00:20:01:02
Mara Shorr
Right.
00:20:01:22 – 00:20:31:10
Jay Shorr
But here’s what… I want to give you a couple examples. A provider, let’s say it’s another doctor, it’s a PA, it’s a nurse practitioner or whatever. They actually overcharge a patient. All right. So that the provider would never know. So instead of 20 units, they charge the patient for 30 units. And that’s why I’ve always been against charging by the unit for a neurotoxin.
00:20:31:19 – 00:21:02:24
Jay Shorr
And people are going to say, hey, you’re crazy. We’ve always done it that way. But I was always charging a patient by the area. Now then you can say, Well, how do I know how many units went into those areas? Well, what happened was that they would charge the patient for an excessive amount of units and the provider would take the difference between what they actually used and what they said they used and take those ten units, five units, another ten units, another five units.
00:21:03:22 – 00:21:26:13
Jay Shorr
If you’re doing 5 to 10 patients in a day, and the next thing you know, you’ve got a little stockpile at home and then you’re treating friends and family, or you’re taking people from the office and saying, I’ll charge you if you’re doing it by the unit, $8 a unit, $7 a unit. And people are going to say, well, how are they charging $7 a unit when it costs a little over six?
00:21:26:22 – 00:21:29:09
Mara Shorr
Well, they got that product for free.
00:21:29:09 – 00:21:53:10
Jay Shorr
Didn’t cost any unit and stole it. All right. The other side of the coin was the old teenage, young adolescent water in the vodka bottle. When you were having parties and you stole the vodka from your mom and dad and then you filled it with water to make it look like nothing was taken. And then what ended up happening is we ended up getting an inordinate amount of nonresponders.
00:21:54:10 – 00:22:01:14
Mara Shorr
Jay, for the record, I was never able to do that because you don’t drink vodka. Just like to clear that up. I couldn’t do that as a kid.
00:22:01:21 – 00:22:28:11
Jay Shorr
All the vodka in our house was still sealed with it… They were props, actually, but what ended up happening is they would dilute with saline. And we called the company that sold us the neurotoxin. I’m not going to mention any names because they’re several, and they said, send us the bottle… that these… because it was a specific lot number.
00:22:28:11 – 00:22:47:21
Jay Shorr
You know, that if you order 25 bottles at one time, they’re all going to have the lot… same lot number. And if you order 25 today and maybe ten tomorrow, it might… the ten tomorrow might be different in production. We ended up finding that, the company told us that, it was so over diluted that they were shocked that there was any response.
00:22:47:21 – 00:23:10:01
Jay Shorr
And of course because they were non-responders since we charged by the area, we guarantee that you’ll respond. And we just kept injecting and injecting. But when it happened over and over and over again, look, there can be a person that doesn’t respond. It just can happen, but when it’s multiple people who don’t respond from the same lot number, we found it inherent to contact the manufacturer.
00:23:10:17 – 00:23:11:18
Jay Shorr
So that’s another way.
00:23:12:03 – 00:23:21:23
Mara Shorr
So Jay, here’s a… here’s a question. As you always say, this is a loaded question. Have you ever had a Botox bottle break when you drop it, let alone several, and that’s why they disappear.
00:23:22:02 – 00:23:24:13
Jay Shorr
Or Jeuveau, or…
00:23:24:14 – 00:23:35:13
Mara Shorr
I’m sorry. Any, any product that comes in a glass container. Right. Any sort of glass container I’ve ever had them just keep breaking on you regularly.
00:23:36:02 – 00:23:45:00
Jay Shorr
I have to tell you, I’m not going to sit here and speak that it is impossible. It has never happened to me, and I have dropped bottles
00:23:45:00 – 00:23:46:00
Mara Shorr
Dropped frequently.
00:23:46:10 – 00:23:57:08
Jay Shorr
And I have dropped bottles and I have found, honestly, the bottle actually bounced. They didn’t drop like a glass or a light bulb and shatter.
00:23:57:17 – 00:23:58:01
Mara Shorr
Right.
00:23:58:12 – 00:24:26:12
Jay Shorr
But once again, we had a practice that we were consulting for and the PA did off-site events on behalf of the client. By the way, and shared that a couple of bottles broke, they dropped them, they went through their arm, dropped and the bottles broke and they didn’t bring the glass back. They just said that they threw it away and all the product was missing.
00:24:28:06 – 00:24:51:00
Jay Shorr
This happened to be the same person, by the way, that added the tips on with the new credit card processing machine. I have never seen a bottle of the neurotoxins break and lose all the product. I just have not. If that is the case, then do me a favor. And I used to be in the supermarket business, by the way, before I got into this.
00:24:51:15 – 00:25:12:06
Jay Shorr
and if we dropped products or they broke with the tops still sealed, the manufacturers said, If you give us the bottle, the glass with the top on it, we’ll give you credit for it. It was an RTV, a return to vendor. All I want to know is bring me the bottle back with the top before you pop it.
00:25:12:06 – 00:26:02:09
Jay Shorr
To get out, whatever. 1/10 or 2/10 is left in the bottle. And now what happened? That’s $1,000 or more because 100 units or 300 units at whatever you’re charging per unit is about maybe $1,000. If you’re charging $10 a unit, $12 unit 100 units, 1000 to 1200 dollars. This is what this practitioner stole from the owner. So these are different ways or I’ve heard and this has happened, by the way, they didn’t put the needle on tight enough on the syringe and they were injecting and the needle popped off of the syringe and they allege that all the product shot out.
00:26:04:03 – 00:26:16:09
Jay Shorr
Okay, I can’t doubt that this can happen, but when these things happen over and over again in a practice, the red light goes on and I mean the red light redder than my shirt, right?
00:26:16:10 – 00:26:43:10
Mara Shorr
There’s a big old red flag. And that, you know, one of the as we are starting to approach the end of this particular conversation, and I will share with you that, Jay and I could go on forever on this. If you’ve ever spoken with us on a regular basis, our clients know this. We are so, so strong when it comes to theft prevention because of all the reasons you have just heard, what we have seen so many examples, both with our own practice.
00:26:43:10 – 00:27:02:17
Mara Shorr
When we are consulting with clients, and so I think it’s something when you continue to see very interesting ways, we’ll call them creative, when there’s very creative ways for that opportunity, we always are overcautious. Jay calls himself What is It? a pessimistic optimist, right? That’s what I.
00:27:02:19 – 00:27:05:16
Jay Shorr
No, I am an optimist, pessimist.
00:27:05:16 – 00:27:07:13
Mara Shorr
Oh, no. I thought it was the other way around.
00:27:07:20 – 00:27:08:22
Jay Shorr
It is either way around
00:27:09:09 – 00:27:10:12
Mara Shorr
Depends on the day.
00:27:10:18 – 00:27:15:18
Jay Shorr
It’s a pessimistic optimist because I always look at the negative side of every positive situation.
00:27:15:18 – 00:27:39:19
Mara Shorr
And that’s our that’s our job. When we go into a practice, that’s that’s our job and our role. But what I will say is that all of these things that we’ve just talked about, this is all the more reason to make sure you have very strong inventory control, whether that is an old school spreadsheet that you’re using or whether that is inventory within your practice management, your EMR system.
00:27:39:24 – 00:27:59:14
Mara Shorr
Right. We want to make sure and so many of them offer this now, but really talk to the companies you’re working with about their inventory control and then also making sure somebody is regularly reviewing your financials as well. And I recommend a third party, whether that is your accountant, whether that is a consultant. We do this for our clients, right?
00:27:59:14 – 00:28:20:10
Mara Shorr
This is our podcast. Jay We’re allowed to say that this is something we do for our clients. We do this so that as Jay says the Fox isn’t watching… right, and we don’t have somebody that could potentially be stealing and somebody that never wants to open the books for anybody. And then therefore we go, That’s a bit of a red flag, right?
00:28:20:10 – 00:28:45:18
Mara Shorr
So we want to make sure that there is somebody that it’s not the fox watching the henhouse situation, and and really, there’s a third party looking at financials, looking at inventory control systems and even sometimes having somebody review camera footage if there is any really discretion or discrepancy, I should say. So there is a reason, guys, that we are so big on policies, procedures and control.
00:28:45:24 – 00:28:47:05
Jay Shorr
I want to caution.
00:28:47:14 – 00:28:48:00
Mara Shorr
Yeah.
00:28:48:10 – 00:29:19:05
Jay Shorr
I really want to caution. A practice owner, by the way, because I can’t tell you how many times I have uncovered theft. In multiple ways. Whether it is theft of the money. The procedure was performed, it was entered into the EMR, EHR… then, it was paid by cash by the way, and then deleted and the cash taken from the procedure.
00:29:19:05 – 00:29:42:04
Jay Shorr
Because when you do your final daily tally, at the end of the day, the procedure that was deleted won’t show and therefore the provider or the front desk person may have taken that money. It happened to me, believe me, of all the things and controls I had in place, I created all these controls by things that happened to me, and I’m not embarrassed to share them because that’s what made me stronger.
00:29:42:09 – 00:30:04:01
Jay Shorr
And I caution you all that when you want to put a process in place for prevention of these items and your staff gives you the excuse that they’re too busy to do these processes, that is just another step. That’s the first red flag redder than this shirt. All right.
00:30:04:18 – 00:30:15:11
Mara Shorr
In case anyone who is watching the video hasn’t guessed. If you’re just listening to this, Jay has on a shirt with red stripes in it. So if anyone can’t see, this is… Jay does indeed have a red striped shirt.
00:30:15:11 – 00:30:58:02
Jay Shorr
I figured anyone that’s just listening would figure that out. However, the person who fights you by putting on we have spreadsheets that can go in the cloud or servers. For those of you who still have servers, still, that if they say it’s just too busy because these spreadsheets are done in real time and they can be audited by anybody, us included, and when they say they don’t have time, that’s one of the first things that you’ve got somebody here because an honest person wants the control to make sure that there’s no accusations against them.
00:30:58:14 – 00:31:35:04
Jay Shorr
I always loved having secured measures in place because it eliminated the possibility of me being accused in any situation of being one of the people that are going to be investigated for theft and I do this all the time and I go in and sometimes it’s just too late. And what do I say to the client to be done with the staff member unless it’s egregious and tens of thousands of dollars walk away from it after you fire them because it’s going to be a thorn in your side hours of lost sleep at night.
00:31:35:20 – 00:32:03:10
Jay Shorr
And if you’re going to go prosecute them, it’s going to take forever. Nine times out of ten, the person is not going to be prosecuted. You’re not going to get your inventory back. You’re not going to be made whole. And it took a part of your life away. Put the processes in place and make sure that the red flags that you see are implemented and hire people to audit you and to make sure that you’re not being stolen from, it is your money.
00:32:03:18 – 00:32:32:10
Jay Shorr
It’s your hard work. The only thing theft does is not have to pay taxes on the moneys that stolen from you that wasn’t accounted for. And nobody wants to not pay taxes that way. The last thing I want to caution you about is people who pay cash. Cash legally must hit the books and you will hear people say that they wait until they get an abundance of cash and then take it to the bank.
00:32:32:10 – 00:32:54:07
Jay Shorr
I am so against that because I believe cash needs to be deposited every day. Because how much cash was received that day, the audit trail is how much money got deposited that day. And if you only go to the bank every couple of days, then make a separate deposit that day, even if it didn’t get to the bank of that cash.
00:32:54:20 – 00:33:13:18
Jay Shorr
And another positive the next day of that cash so that when you get to the bank, even though it might be once or twice in that week, they were all multiple deposits that had that cash for the audit trail of what was received that day. And these are processes in place that you need to put together.
00:33:14:01 – 00:33:34:14
Mara Shorr
And with that, we wrap up another episode of Shorr Solutions, the podcast. We hope that we have not only inspired you but maybe scared the pants off of you just a little bit more. Thank you so much for joining us and we can’t wait to have you join us again.
So that wraps up today’s episode of Short Solutions, the podcast.
00:33:34:14 – 00:34:06:08
Mara Shorr
If we mentioned any Web links, you can find them in our show notes to work directly with me, Jay and our award winning team of consultants to increase your practice’s efficiency, increase revenue and decrease costs in your esthetic practice. Schedule a free consult with us today. We will help you establish and refine your aesthetic practice’s protocols for maximum efficiency and productivity, decrease your expenses and increase profit with our expert financial analysis of your practice.
00:34:06:19 – 00:34:42:07
Mara Shorr
Attract more patients, convert calls to consults, convert consults to treatments, and keep patients coming back. For more. With our sales coaching and complimentary access to our conversion cascade online course recruit, hire and, improve your team members and manage any staff turnover with our human resource expertise plus so much more. Head on over to the show notes and click on the link to schedule a free 30 minute consult with us today and if you enjoy today’s episode, don’t forget to spread the word and share this episode or one of your other favorites with your friends, colleagues and the rest of your team.
00:34:42:12 – 00:35:06:00
Mara Shorr
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00:35:06:11 – 00:35:09:03
Mara Shorr
Thanks so much.
