596: 3 Best Practices to Prevent Embezzlement - Matthew Nelson - a podcast by ACT Dental

from 2023-06-30T03:00

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3 Best Practices to Prevent Embezzlement

Episode #596 with Matthew Nelson

Three in five dentists experience embezzlement. Don't let it happen to you! To prevent this from happening in your practice, Kirk Behrendt brings in Matthew Nelson, a practice management analyst from the California Dental Association, with three best practices that will keep embezzlers at bay. Know the red flags and do your due diligence before it’s too late! To learn what they are and what you can do, listen to Episode 596 of The Best Practices Show!

Episode Resources:


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Main Takeaways:

Recognize the red flags of embezzlers.

Be involved with spot-checks and audits.

Make it known to your team that you audit.

Always do background checks on applicants.

Call references at the official business number.

Remember that embezzlers steal in multiple ways.

Quotes:

“There is a survey from the ADA from 2018. In the survey, about 49% of the dentists that responded said they had experienced some type of embezzlement or employee theft. What we're finding now, Dentistry IQ had an article, they said three in five. And with COVID-19, and with people furloughed and laid off, doctors started to open more of their own mail and finding weird things. Three in five, that's 60%. That's a pretty big impact.” (6:04—6:35)

“[The reason why dentists may be more susceptible to embezzlement is because] I don't think there's a lot of training. A lot of dentists don't think it will happen to them because it's their staff that they hired and brought in. Third-party payments are hard to track. Things like consultants, bookkeepers, CPAs, the second set of eyes, all of these things are usually the first to go when things aren't going how they're supposed to. There is, in healthcare more than any other industry, this sense of entitlement that the staff feels. Like, ‘If I didn't book this appointment, or if I didn't do this treatment coordination, or if I didn't get this person to say yes to doing this treatment, the doctor wouldn't even have this.’ More in healthcare than anywhere else, we see this amongst staff.” (6:52—7:41)

“Circling back to the impact, obviously there's financial loss, but there's turnover. And listening to a lot of your shows, obviously, you are a big proponent of time and having time back. When there's turnover, you're recruiting and staffing and training, and...

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