Some PBS3 (DOS) users have had significant problems converting their data because of incorrect balances. These balance problems are caused by differences between the way PBS3 and PBSW2 calculate balances
PBS3 figured out a balance by looking for the most recent Balance Forward item, and then adding charges and subtracting payments from that time forth. PBSW2 pays no attention to those balance forward entries, but instead goes to the very start of the items in the charges and payments and adds up all the charge items and subtracts all the credit items to get the balance.
PBS3 stored the balances in a set of 6 fields which included a total as well as five aged fields. PBSW2 does not store aged balances, but instead calculates them at the time of a printout. (The PBS3 oddity that a charge incurred on the last day of the month was suddenly considered 30 days old on the first day of the next month was eliminated.)
Checking it out
To check on the balances and determine the extent to which they differ in the two programs, you can run a List report of the Balances in both pbs3 and pbsw2. (In each program that requires that you create a printjob under lists, and select the Balances form in each.) Compare the total balance reported for each patient and see if they match. The aged portion of the balances will not match because of the difference in the way they are calculated, as explained above. Do not try to do statements to compare the balances; what you get on statements will be different depending on how the printjob is set up and the methods used in each program to calculate the balance.
There is a balance recalculation tool in pbsw2, located in the Files Menu: Recalc all Balances and Copays. Running that routine will recalculate the total balance and the copay for each account. Any records that required correction will be listed. Note that this routine does not make the balance equal to the one in pbs3; it merely adds all the charges, subtracts all the payments and then saves the result in the Balance field of the pbsw2 patient record. At the end of the routine, you can save the results to a file named "Recalc Balances mmddyyyy.txt". If you wish to view or print that textfile, use Windows Notepad.
For any one account, if you want to see exactly how the balance and the copay was developed, you can do so by printing a Wide Ledger Report, which is simply a ledger report with the printjob width setting set to 140 columns. You can do this for one account from the patient notebook ledger page by clicking the button at the bottom of the page, changing the print combobox from insurance or statement to ledger report, and then click the print button; the table of printjobs appears, and you select a printjob with width=140 and print. When you look at the printout, notice how the balance on the right side is a running balance. If you see any Balance Forward entries that have an asterisk next to the amount, that is an incorrect amount stored in the Balance Forward item. The Wide Ledger Report also shows you exactly how the total copay was developed, line by line.
Fixing the problem
If the sum of the charges and the credits does not match your knowledge of what the balance should be for a given account, then you must add a fudge factor to make up the difference. Either add a credit or a payment to adjust the balance up or down. I would advise adding it at the very beginning of the file. You can use the "Starting Balance" method described in the help file, or use the Adjust Up and Adjust Down items in the paytable.
One neat way of doing this would be to clone the record, start the new cloned account off with a "Starting Balance," and then inactivate the original record. Here's how to do that::
1. Create a "Starting Balance" PAYCODE item. Go to Lookup Tables, Paycodes, and edit one of the lower case items- one that is free, that you are not using for something else. The Description of the item will be "Starting Balance" of course. The STYLE of the item will be "CHARGE".
2. Go to a patient account that has a balance but no ledger items (either one that you have just entered, or a clone, or one whose ledger items you have deleted), and in the Ledger page, click on ADD NEW. When the PayTable pops up, select the item you created in step 1. The Enter New CHARGE dialog will appear. Notice, it says CHARGE, not Balance. Enter the date and the amount of the starting balance and click ok. (Make sure that the date precedes any items you may have entered into the ledger.)
Using this method, you will be able to ASSIGN payments, both insurance and patient, to this Starting Balance item.
If you are working with a patient account that was converted from pbs3, you should delete all ledger items from the account, and put in just the starting balance itself. If you want to keep those ledger items, it might be best to clone the account, inactivate the old one that has the ledger items, and then insert a starting balance into the new clone (when you clone an account, the ledger items are not duplicated).
If you have any comments, questions, or suggestions, please send email to info@blumenthalsoftware.com