By line or page?

• By line or page? - wondering

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I am a Southern California IC for two chiropractors and soon starting a third chiropractor in a few weeks.  I charge $1.50 - $3.00 per page.  Usually the notes are 10-25 gross lines and sometimes (1-2x/wk) a  60+ line report.  I do approximately 150 reports a week total with the two chiros.  So after paying gas, paper, ink, taxes, etc., I feel like I am making very little for what I am putting out. 

So now I am considering charging by the line, but worry on how much to charge.  I print out all reports, pick up and deliver 2x/wk, and pay for all materials including disks for backup.  I feel I should be making more, but worry what to charge.  Does anyone have an amount that sounds fair?  I was thinking in the lines of  .16 or .17 per line, does that sound right?

TIA~

I do a lot of MRI/CAT scan/neuroradiology, etc.  These are sometimes long drawn-out reports and sometimes go to 2 to 2-1/2 pages. 

Most companies that pay by the page only pay at most $2.00 a page.  You can make more by the line. 

I'm trying to get my own docs and want to set rates that are equivalent to everyone else so as not to undercut and lower our industry standards. But, I can't seem to find out what rates are locally, soooo, as much input as possible would be appreciated.  Anyway, I know that local family practices have been quoted by the hour, by the minute, by the line, by the page, and so on.

I don't really want to do by the minute -- it makes them feel like they have to dictate at sonic speed. Some of them balk at by the line because no matter what you tell them, they feel like they are penalized for having nice formats. They balk at by the page because they think you will extend it to 2 pages for more money. Then there are the ones who gripe about hourly rates because they feel like you will type slower to make more money. I actually typed a sample tape for a local practice a year ago and based on my rate the office manager figured it up PER PATIENT and said it was too much!! 

I know family practice docs and nurse practitioners don't make that much money but dangit I gotta feed my family too.

So help, please!!!!

When I worked for a national, up thru 2 years ago, I was getting $1.75 page and heard they got $4.

You can get an idea in the difference using documents you have already created, assuming you're working in Word. Simply open a document and check the properties. Click on the statistics tab and you will see the number of lines as well as characters with and without spaces. If you're currently getting paid by the line and a line is 65-characters with spaces, do the math and see how that number of lines compares with the number of lines in your stats.

One thing to keep in mind: if you have a blank line between paragraphs, instead of hitting the enter key twice, format your document to give the appearance of blank lines between paragraphs.

A gross line is anything on a line versus 65 gross characters per net line the other way.  You make more money working for the gross line than for the 65 gross character line, as long as the line rate's OK.

at SBC, told him what I was using the service for, and got the okay to use it -- $49/month unlimited. 

I have also used The Neighborhood, and their unlimited is truly unlimited.  I also explained to them when I signed up what I was using it for and their comment was "unlimited means just that -- unlimited, no matter what."  I cannot remember how much they were, but it might be worth checking into for you.  (www.theneighborhood.com)

Good luck!

I get paid gross line and from top to bottom of the page.  My rate is lower which is what the docs like and on chart notes just take the line count for word.  Kind of like your two lines on a page you get the page.  One word on the line, I get the line.  Also with my clinic notes, there is just one blank in between patients but I do get that line.  Of course I cut apart the notes for the clinic so that kind of pays it.  I also make good money and can't complain. 

You need to turn it around so the doctor feels he is "saving money" by being charged by the line and therefore for only the part of the page that is completed.  Tell him that if you charge by 1/4 of the page anything over 10 lines would be a mininum of $1.50 - 2.00  and so he would be paying for part of the page that would not be filled up.   The same applies if he were to go only 1 line past the 1/2 page mark and thus pay for the entire page.  So make it seem more economical for him.  Also make sure that you figure your line charge out in the font you want to type in and if he wants a smaller, convert it over to charge out.  As long as they know that a gross line -- which is what I charge -- consists of how many characters in the Courier 12 font in, you are not cheating.  But show him how it would be beneficial for him to do the line charge and don't go with an attitude of "my way" show him you are looking out for him.   I would probably start out around 12 cpl per gross line as you will probably get a lot of standards that you can set up, etc.   So if work up to 200 to 300 lines per hour that is very good pay. 

Patti

I know it really depends on many factors, but I was wondering if $1.30 per page is a good rate?  I haven't typed a per page rate in years and I don't remember!  This would be a psych. account.  This company gives a template (I get paid for the template lines).  I am thinking this seems kind of low.   Any help would be appreciated.

Oh, gosh...I almost fell over when I read this.  Maybe I missed something here, but when I had my own private accounts a few  years ago I was charging $5-$6 per page, which was actually low at that time.  The reason was that these docs were excellent dictators (hand-picked, of course), and $ wasn't an issue. 

I'd be interested in any other input.

Good luck.

Mebbe just got my first OWN ACCOUNT YAY!  He said to charge him the "going rate" since I pay him that.  This could be the start, baby!  (I hope)

for instance...

MEDICATIONS:

Effexor

Prevasid

A 65 character line without spaces is black marks on the page only and 65 w/spaces is everything... tabs, spaces, numbers, letters, bold, etc.