The 'Secret Six' Revealed

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"Royal Mail has revealed the identities of the six regional printers it used to produce celebratory stamps for each Team GB gold medal win during the London 2012 Olympics and Paralympic Games," writes Ben Bold on the Print Week website.

Known as the 'Secret Six,' the printers produced tens of thousands of 96-stamp sheets for regions in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Some of the stamps are shown above.

According to the article, each of the printers, whose names and locations were not made public until now, were sent digital files by Royal Mail’s in-house designers of stamps bearing images of gold-winning Team GB athletes just minutes after the medals had been awarded. They then "... had to overprint the stamp images on pre-prepared base sheets, often having to work though the night in order to meet an early-morning deadline, varying from 4.30am to 7am, when Post Office couriers would pick up the stamps so that they could be on sales in Post Offices within 24 hours of gold wins."

Graeme Thurman, sales director for one of the printers, is quoted in the piece as saying, ""Within one hour of a British athlete winning a gold medal, we receive the artwork. The stamps had to be printed on all sites within an hour of that, then trimmed and collated into the unique gold medal bags and ready for the Royal Mail drivers to collect at 7am the following morning, so that they could go on sale at 9am."

To read the entire article, click here.

Dear Santa I've Been Really Good This Year

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Can't figure out what you want Santa to bring you?

Well Potomac Stamps may have the solution. They're offering gift certificates to buy supplies and other cool stamp collecting stuff.

According to their website, "When you buy a gift certificate, the amount is released to YOUR account. You can then email any amount you wish to any person with an email address. Your email can be customized with a personal message, too!"

Certificates come in $5, $10, $25, $50 and $100 amounts.

Click here to visit their site.

Computerized Perforation Measurement Software

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SoftPro has released some new software that will electronically measure perforations along with overprints, cancellations, and can even help determine the difference between rotary and flat press printings

According to a write up on their website, "If you are like most collectors, using a traditional plastic perf gauge is difficult and error prone. Most of us can barely see the tiny lines on the pastic gauges, let alone trying to align them with the stamp. EzPerf solves that problem."

It goes on to say, "Finding that rare perf is much easier with EzPerf's batch option. Lets say you had 40 copies of a very common stamp, but there is a rare perf variety you are looking for. Measuring each one individually can be tedious and difficult at best. With EzPerf, simply scan the stamps & place them into a folder on your hard drive. Then run EzPerf in batch mode & it will measure each one and give you a report of the perforations of each stamp. A quick glance will let you instantly see if any perf varieties are in your batch."

Cost is $39.95.

Shown above is a screen shot of the EzPerf  software measuring perforations.

To learn more, click here.

Strange But True

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Nancy Pope, National Postal Museum historian and curator, writes on the museum's Pushing the Envelope blog,"On November 8, 1958, an employee of Harry Winston’s New York City jewelry store mailed an ordinary looking package at the mail city post office. The package was anything but ordinary. It held one of the most famous gems in America, the Hope Diamond. The employee paid $145.29 to mail the package. Postage accounted for only $2.44 of the total cost. The rest was for insurance totaling $1 million."

In Washington, the package was delivered to the National History Museum by local letter carrier James G. Todd. There Leonard Carmichael, Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution received the package which was addressed to him. Also in attendance were Harry Winston’s wife Edna, Postmaster General Arthur Summerfield, and Ronald Winston, son of jeweler Harry Winston.

After the package was delivered a ceremony was held during which the diamond was given to the museum for public display.
 
However, according to Wikipedia, the Hope Diamond had a curse on it that foretold bad luck and death not only for the owner of the diamond but for all who touched it.  

Pope goes on to say, "At the donation ceremony Mrs. Winston scoffed at the idea of a curse, noting that her family had held the gem without any ill effects.  Carrier Todd had cause to question just how powerful the curse was. Within a single year after delivering the stone to the Smithsonian, Todd suffered a crush leg and head wound in two separate automobile accidents, his wife died of a heart attack, his dog strangled on his leash, and Todd’s Seat Pleasant, Maryland, home was partially destroyed by fire."

Shown above, from left to right, Ronald Winston, son of jeweler Harry Winston, Postmaster General Arthur Summerfield, letter carrier James G. Todd, Harry’s wife Edna, and Secretary Leonard Carmichael.

To read the entire article, click here.

Some Simple Stamp Soaking Solutions

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Ken Stewart writes on the Junior Philatelists on the Internet website, "Soaking stamps is one of the basic skills the beginning collector must master. There is nothing difficult about soaking stamps; but care should be taken before, during and after soaking to avoid damaging the stamps . . . a little patience doesn’t hurt, either. Used stamps are generally collected off paper and, therefore, learning the techniques for achieving this are important."

He offers several tips including this these two...

"If you wish to soak a stamp off of a postcard or envelope without cutting up the envelope or post card (people will often offer to let you have stamps off of their mail if you don’t destroy the mail), here is how to do it. Cut two pieces of filter paper (from a new coffee filter) that are a little larger than the stamp you wish to remove. Wet these two pieces of filter paper until they are about to drip. Place the filter papers on top of each other and on top of the stamp. Cover with a small inverted plate or a watch glass (you can get these from broken clocks) and leave for about one-half hour (practice will get this down to a science). The purpose of the plate or watch glass is to retard evaporation. The stamp should slip off easily. Place the envelope or card somewhere to dry, and place the stamp face down on a Formica top or a smooth metal surface. The stamp will pop free when dry."

According to Stewart, "You can soak large amounts of cheap stamps using the following method. It sounds like it won’t work, but it does. Place several pounds of stamps in a large tub of lukewarm water (the stamps should be sorted for colored paper as above). After about ten minutes, gently agitate the mixture with your hands for about a minute every ten minutes until it appears most of the stamps are coming free (about an hour). Let the stamps settle and pour off the water laden with gums and dirt. Add new water. Agitate and let stand several minutes and then again pour off the water. Do this several times more to get all of the gum out. Practice again makes perfect. After it looks like all the gum has been washed out, pour off the water and put the mass of wet stamps somewhere to dry. When dry, the stamps and paper will be easy to separate (any ones that don’t are resoaked). This process is hard on stamps that have ink that runs like the 4-cent Lincolns from the 1954 Presidential set. So you will have to learn which stamps not to soak this way. This is a very efficient way to soak kiloware after you have taken the good stamps out. "

To read his entire article, click here.

Confusion, Misinformation Could Hinder USPS's Early-Retirement Push

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Confusion reigns among the 115,000 postal workers who received notices in the past few days about a buyout offer. The confusion could limit the number of APWU-represented career employees who accept the U.S. Postal Service’s $15,000 incentive to retire or quit.

”The Postal Service's voluntary early retirement annuity estimates are as bad as before,” says Don Cheney, a long-time critic of the U.S. Postal Service’s communications with its employees regarding retirement benefits.

As usual, the errors tend to understate what employees’ benefits will be upon retirement, says Cheney, an APWU member who for the last nine years has been advising postal workers and writing about errors in retirement estimates the U.S. Postal Service provides its employees.

(See How Does the Postal Service Discourage Early Retirement? Let Me Count the Ways, Why Does USPS Make Retiring Difficult When It Has So Many Excess Employees?, and The Postal Service's Early-Retirement Snafu for more on how the Postal Service’s poor communications have undercut its previous efforts to downsize by offering early-retirement incentives.)

“I am receiving numerous inquiries about the retirement incentive,” former APWU president Bill Burrus wrote a few days ago. He urged the union’s current leadership to designate a knowledgeable officer or staff member to help members who have questions about the early-out incentive.

“This is an important time in their lives and they are in need of timely answers to their questions,” Burrus wrote. And they won’t get those answers from the Postal Service. As Cheney notes, USPS offers no retirement counseling to employees taking early retirement until after the decision to retire is irrevocable, which postal unions claim is contrary to federal regulations (not to mention common sense).

Referring to a recent estimate one employee received, Cheney says, “This 51-year-old individual in the FERS retirement system was not told whether they are eligible for the SS [Social Security] annuity supplement, how much it would be or when it would start.”  He adds, “If VERA [Voluntary Early Retirement] eligibles in FERS knew they would get about $800/month more in their FERS annuities at Minimum Retirement Age (MRA), more would take it,” he adds.

"There is still the misconception among FERS employees of an age penalty in a Voluntary Early Retirement,” Cheney says. “The opposite is true in most cases.”

Also tending to discourage early retirements is the mistaken belief that the IRS charges a 10% early-withdrawal penalty for money taken out of a Thrift Savings Plan by early retirees, he says.

 “Congress made an exception for federal and postal employees that retire or separate at age 55 or later. For them, there is no 10% IRS early withdrawal penalty,” Cheney says. “Younger retirees can avoid the IRS penalty by withdrawing their money as an annuity.”

Slow processing of retirees’ paperwork and payments has also tended to discourage early retirements, but this time around at least some postal workers may benefit from the backlogs at the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). The 21st Century Postal Worker, a web site serving APWU members, passes along this message:

“For all that put their retirement paperwork in prior to the [incentive] announcement, call OPM ASAP and ask if your paperwork has been processed. If it has not been processed (there is a 6-8 week wait), the effective date of retirement can be changed to reflect the incentive memo. Do NOT DELAY! Do not hang up until you actually reach a representative from OPM. Do NOT leave a call back. Stay on the phone until you make sure the paperwork is reprocessed and you fax in a copy to change the date of retirement.”

8 Questions About Newsweek's Future

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Google News indicates that more than 1,000 articles were published Thursday about Newsweek magazine abandoning print but continuing as the digital Newsweek Global. Still, many questions remain unanswered, including: 

Recent Newsweek cover -- and a parody

1. Will some of the millions of dollars no longer being forked over to the U.S. Postal Service, paper mills, and printers be reinvested in more and better content? 
2. Will Newsweek Global’s covers still inspire hilarious parodies? Or will lack of visibility at airports, grocery stores, and dentists’ offices mean its covers will no longer matter, regardless how hard Tina Brown tries?
3. What will happen to current subscribers who don’t have internet or computer access or just don’t want a digital publication? Will they get their money back? 
4. How will advertisers respond to Newsweek Global and its lack of ratebase (guaranteed minimum circulation)? 
5. What does this mean for TIME magazine? Will it benefit from its archrival’s loss of visibility, or will it get sucked down the same toilet? 
6. Will Newsweek Global be only a digital magazine – for example, with numbered pages and a regular publication schedule? Or will some subscribers view its content on an unpaginated, paywall-protected web site that is continuously updated? 
7. Is Newsweek truly abandoning print, or will it become a zombie on newsstands like Life and U.S. News & World Report, living on in “bookazines” (special issues)? 
8. Will Newsweek Global survive? 

Added thought: It turns out the Mayans weren't quite right: 2012 isn't the end of Time, it's the end of Newsweek.

Related articles:

• Newsweek Takes a Stand: Profits Are for Wimps
• What Exactly Did Barry Diller Say About Newsweek's Future?  
• Tina Brown Follows Husband's Footsteps -- Sort Of

Superstorm Sandy's Seven Lessons About Print Media

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Many readers in the mid-Atlantic region report a new appreciation for print media in the wake of Sandy’s mayhem. Among the observations they passed along are:

1. The best photos are still created for print media. Iwan Baan rented a helicopter to capture the stunning image that graced the cover of New York magazine’s post-storm issue. No one goes to those kinds of lengths, or expense, to produce a photo that will only appear in digital media. 
2. Print works just fine when the power is out. 
3. Print’s battery doesn’t die. 
4. If you own a printed product, you don’t need a wifi connection to access it. 
5. This came from a New York reader: "When I awoke to what looked like a war zone Tuesday [Oct. 30], I thought I was completely cut off from the outside world – no power, no Internet, no phone, no battery-operated or hand-cranked radio (since rectified). But when I ventured outside my apartment building, I spotted a newspaper box with an amazing sight: that day’s edition of the New York Daily News. It had obviously ‘gone to bed’ too early the previous evening to have all the news of the storm, but I eagerly dug in. At that moment print was clearly the superior technology for conveying news."
6. A New Jersey resident wrote: "We didn’t get enough rain Monday night [Oct. 29] to cause any flooding, but by the next morning most major roads were blocked by downed power lines and utility poles and practically the whole town had no electricity. The whole region was such a mess that the local daily newspaper didn’t even try to publish that day. Our street was eerily quiet most of the morning until we heard the familiar whirr of a motor. There was our letter carrier coming up the street, delivering mail as if nothing had happened. It was days before UPS and FedEx got their deliveries to our area straightened out, and my neighbor was still complaining a week after the storm about not being able to access the books and magazines she had bought for her e-reader (‘How’s that Kindle workin’ for ya now, sweetheart?’). We received several magazines by mail after the storm and never missed a mail delivery during the week the power was out. 
7. And another Jerseyan: “Our Republican governor pointed out that we seem to be getting a 'Storm of the Century' every couple of years. NOW do you believe in global warming?” Yep, the storm should be a wake-up call that it's time to move beyond simplistic slogans like “Go green, go paperless” and “Paper is all natural” and dig in to the serious work of making our media choices more earth friendly. 

Related articles:

• Print vs Digital: Who Survives The Zombies: A really fun infographic 
• Going Paperless Doesn't Mean Going Green, The New York Times Proves  
• 10 Questions About Toshiba's No-Print Day  
• 12 Telltale Signs That You Are A Printing Geek

Congress Is Fixin' To Fix the Postal Service

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Word is spreading of a bipartisan, bicameral effort among Congressional leaders to fix the U.S. Postal Service. Before anyone gets too excited, let's remember that "fix" can also mean:

• Castrate or spay
• Restore or repair
• Kill and preserve a specimen so that it can be studied under a microscope
• Give someone a dose of an illegal drug
• Take revenge (as in, "I'll fix him!")
• Arrange an outcome dishonestly, such as with a bribe or by stuffing a ballot box
• Establish something in a way that prevents it from changing (such as a fixed rate)

I'm just sayin'.

USPS Underestimates How Many Employees Will Take the Money and Run, Poll Says

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The majority of voters in a Dead Tree Edition poll predict that more than 20,000 APWU members will accept incentives to quit.

Of the 1,577 votes in the poll that ended tonight, only 16% agreed with a postal executive's recent estimate that 16,000 to 20,000 of the 115,000 eligible employees would accept the buyout package. Nearly 62% of voters predicted a higher number.

But voters also concluded that the "in the range of 35,000" estimate from William Burrus, former APWU president, is too high. Only one-fifth of voters predicted that more than 30,000 members of the Postal Service's largest labor union would call it quits.

The buyout package includes $15,000 and, for many employees, an even more valuable opportunity to take Voluntary Early Retirement.

Dead Tree Edition estimates that, if successful, the buyout program could reduce the Postal Service's compensation costs by more than $1 billion annually. But USPS seems to be doing little to present the buyout package in the best light, for example sending thousands of employees inaccurately low estimates of their retirement benefits.

Ironically, the APWU, which stands to suffer a significant loss of dues income as a result of the buyouts, is doing more than USPS to clear up the confusion about retirement benefits that may dampen response to the offer.

For example, it sent out a bulletin today informing members about the FERS annuity supplement, about which the Postal Service has been mostly silent. And Burrus urged those considering retirement to "take the money and run" because the Postal Service is unlikely to offer them a similar incentive in the future.

Related articles:

• USPS Seeks 'Soft Landing' For Downsized Employees, Donahoe Says 
• USPS Planning Retirement Incentives To Help Downsizing, Donahoe Testifies
• Response to Buyout Offer Better Than USPS Expected  
• New Poll: How Many Postal Workers Will Take the USPS/APWU Buyout Incentive?
• The Hidden Benefit of Postal Service Retirement 

Politicking Leads To Profitable October for USPS

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Bolstered by election-related mailings, the U.S. Postal Service experienced something unusual in October -- profitability.

USPS released preliminary financial results late yesterday showing net income of $61 million last month, the first month of Fiscal Year 2013, versus a budgeted loss of $244 million and last year's loss of $139 million.

If not for a $467 million charge for prefunded retiree health benefits, the agency's net would have been $528 million -- a profit margin of more than 8% on revenues of $6.03 million. Those prepayments have been likened to an interest-free loan to the federal treasury that are designed to obscure the true size of the federal budget deficit. (See Congress Hears the Truth About Postal Service Finances.)

The volume of Standard mail -- derided as "junk mail" by critics -- was up 16% over October 2011. Standard class revenue rose only 10%, evidence that the big volume increase was concentrated in the kind of low-priced mass mailings of letters used by political campaigns.

Also helping the bottom line was better productivity: The Postal Service delivered 9% more mail pieces than in October 2011 but needed only 3% more work hours to accomplish that.

One Patient's Surprising Post-Op Pain: A $12,000 Bill

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Meet David Galbraith. David is a successful business owner and generally healthy individual who has required relatively minimal extended healthcare in the course of his adulthood. That’s why he found his recent experience with an outpatient surgery quite jarring—and not very patient friendly at all.

When David exhibited symptoms, he was referred to a respected physician who accommodated a prompt appointment and swiftly booked a procedure. David, familiar with the high deductible of his insurance coverage, was pleased to take care of his situation in short order without concern regarding cost. After all, he understood his coverage, as he’d chosen it himself, and he’d asked the right questions in that process. Other than being told when and where to report and how to physically prepare for his simple operation, he received no other counsel from the healthcare provider, particularly regarding costs and payments.

The procedure went extremely well. “The whole thing took no more than 45 minutes,” David reports. “I arrived at the hospital at 7 a.m. and was home by 10:15.”

Perhaps that’s why it was so shocking when he received a bill for over $12,000 three weeks later. Though the dollar figure was unexpectedly high, David was most concerned that he’d been given no warning beforehand and that the bill received was so poorly presented. The language was cryptic, and while the statement was very detailed (“$57 for a hospital gown?!”), the information was not presented logically.

“There were excessive details, yet none of it really made sense to me as a patient,” David explains. “It was difficult to understand...and left me asking why (individual line items) cost so much and what could I have done differently to keep costs down.”

Ultimately, David was forced to spend valuable time on the phone with his insurance company and the provider trying to make sense of the bill and reconcile it accordingly. All told, he’s spent far more time dealing with billing than he did receiving care.

“Now that more of us are on high deductible plans, there needs to be simplified bills for patients,” he summarizes. “When we get a bill we don’t understand, it is both time consuming and frustrating to straighten everything out.”

For David, the frustration isn’t so much about the costs of the care (“It’s okay to pay fair market value…”). He’s most distraught by how poorly the information was conveyed. From obvious lack of financial counsel prior to the procedure to the baffling bill that showed up in the mail three weeks later, he experienced gaping holes in the communications process. Those holes would likely have been filled with a simple pre-admission conversation about billing and a patient friendly statement with clear summarization and key information called out.

Certainly, the walk in David’s shoes is well worth the journey, as his experience is an all too familiar one. Though many of us in our industry are genuinely committed to the idea of patient friendly billing standards, they are not always put into practice. We remain tethered to outdated modes of billing while the trends have catapulted forward. Here are three “Do Now” steps we should all employ to avoid putting patients in adversarial roles come billing time.

- Pre-admission Counsel and Estimations: It’s extremely helpful to provide patients a road map so they understand the financial aspects of their care before it occurs. It should be standard policy that all patients be counseled regarding payment responsibility and cost estimates based on their health coverage prior to admission.

- Online Pre-registration: By pre-registering patients online, providers have the opportunity to vet coverage issues, make determinations about charity care cases and offer patients more detail regarding potential payment responsibilities. This approach requires system updates, but it is well worth the effort. If your organization is not presently set up for online pre-registration, take this as your cue to pursue this solution.

- Friendly Billing Statements and Options: Apply the HFMA standards for patient friendly billing to your statements immediately. Redesign the statements to be more patient-friendly, with key information highlighted and details appropriately summarized for more simple comprehension. Give patients more ways to pay by offering online account management.

At Emdeon, we understand that patients who are confused about their financial responsibilities are more likely to pick up the phone and call your billing department instead of picking up their pen to write a check for payment. That’s why developing a clear and concise, patient-friendly billing statement is important for your bottom line. Call 877.EMDEON.6 (877.363.3666) or visit us online to discover how Emdeon ExpressBill Services can help improve cash flow at your organization.







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What's the Big Deal About Payment Automation?

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Would you consider the capability to get paid faster and more completely while also reducing manual processes and the need for full-time staff to be a big deal? Of course you would. The evolving healthcare landscape demands that providers of all sizes find solutions to not only collect more revenue, but be more efficient in doing so. Any alternative that results in greater reimbursement and staff efficiencies is, simply put, a big deal.

That’s where Emdeon Payment Automation comes in. Providers nationwide are reaping the benefits from automated solutions for processing paper Remittance Advice (RA) and Explanation of Benefits (EOBs) for one streamlined workflow. We’re empowering providers to eliminate burdensome, manual processes related to paper with automation to post commercial insurance payments promptly and accurately.

Rather than just tell you of Emdeon Payment Automation’s powerful impact from our vantage point, we’d prefer to show you its benefits through a recently-released case study featuring a prominent medium-sized organization’s surprisingly simple and quick journey to big time benefits.

Download this compelling case-in-point to discover:

• The shortcomings of a bank’s EOB processing system and lockbox services
• How long it took and how many people were needed to post payments and correct Electronic Remittance Advice (ERA) errors for this provider organization
• The many, measurable ways Emdeon Payment Automation improved the situation
• An executive’s firsthand account of Emdeon’s implementation process and support
• How long it took for the provider organization to break even on its investment in Emdeon’s solution

While this Emdeon Customer Success Story is a relevant read for any organization seeking a practical, simple-to-implement payment automation solution, it’s particularly fitting for providers that are:

• Still using an inordinately large dedicated staff to handle manual commercial payer payment processes
• Currently tied to a bank for payment process and lockbox support
• Struggling with posting errors and subsequent revisiting of items posted
• In need of higher first-pass yield, reduction of denials and all-around better data accuracy
• Looking for a simple-to-integrate, automated solution that will enhance efficiencies and bring big deal results

With Emdeon, achieving those big deal results can be a relatively small feat. We cover all the details to get you up and running with automated payment solutions promptly and offer integration to make workflows as seamless as possible. Click here to download the case study and learn more!






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What to Expect When You're Expecting (...A Bill, That Is!)

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Tips for Teaching Patients What to Expect Before the Statement Arrives

It’s human nature to fear the unknown. The quake of uncertainty arises during many of life’s big challenges. Leaving home for the first time, getting married, having a family… receiving a hospital billing statement.

Yes, holding a billing statement from a healthcare provider can be a white-knuckled experience when the Total Amount Due puts an unexpected strain on the household budget.

Many professionals in the business of Accounts Receivable and collections in the healthcare industry report that people generally want to pay their bills but are hindered in doing so promptly or in full if their billing statements are complex or hard to read. Add the innately daunting details of a healthcare encounter to a billing statement, and it’s simple to understand why patients are so fearful come payment time.

Today, many providers have taken steps to make statements more approachable and understandable. They’re using better designs organized for easier review, incorporating colors to call out key information and tailoring language with the recipient in mind. Nonetheless, fears and confusion associated with billing remain. What’s a provider to do?

Here are some practical ideas to help educate patients about the billing process.

Show & Tell at Registration
Begin educating patients about their bills at the point of registration by familiarizing them with the statement layout. Display a poster-size version of a statement in the patient registration area with visual callouts highlighting key aspects of the design. If your facility has different statement templates for subsequent notices, display the entire statement series so patients are acquainted with what to expect.

Interactive Explanation Online
Extend this “show & tell” approach to your website. Create an easily accessed page that shows interactive first, second and final notice statements. Create clickable highlighted information to engage patients as you explain how to find essential balance information, due dates, etc.

Continuous Improvement Based on Feedback
In the latest report issued by the PATIENT FRIENDLY BILLING® Project Report “Case Studies in Customer Service”, the case study of Sharp Grossmont Hospital’s approach to improving patient statements serves as a motivating template for providers. The Sharp Grossmont team met regularly to identify and address the portions of patient statements that generated the most calls and questions. Over time, the organization redesigned its statements to reduce calls and empower patients to better understand their payment requirements and options.

Pre-Statement Communication
Don’t blindside patients, especially those facing large out-of-pocket balances. Make it standard practice to pull reports identifying these patients, and send them pre-statement correspondence to prepare and guide them regarding what’s to come. Call them directly and proactively offer financial counsel to help ease the payment process. Starting the conversation early will make it easier to stay in touch during the payment process.

Want to learn more about helping your patients better understand their financial responsibilities? Call 877.EMDEON.6 (877.363.3666) to learn more or visit us online.






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It's 10 O'Clock. Do You Know Where Your Patient Data Is?

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If nothing is more important to a healthcare provider than caring for the well-being of patients, protecting patients’ personal information runs a very close second. Patient care is guided by the Hippocratic Oath but it is also heavily regulated by HIPAA mandates requiring that provider organizations keep a watchful eye to safeguard patient data too.

If your organization uses email to transmit patient billing files, you are likely subjecting precious data to potential compromise. The causes of possible data leakage through email are vast including human error, system hacking and unauthorized access. All around, transmitting patient billing files using email is a high risk procedure that comes with enormous consequences should the method fail.

That’s why Emdeon ExpressBill Services is designed to protect patient billing information throughout statement printing and mailing and especially when files are initially uploaded from the provider’s patient billing system.

The key to our data protection? Emdeon leverages a password-protected File Transfer Protocol (FTP) site which allows customers to transfer files to this secure site ensuring only the provider and Emdeon can access the files. This method is like an armed guard escort leading the file directly from one locked safe to the next reducing the risk of misdirected, leaked or intercepted data. Our eye on file security doesn’t stop there. After the files are uploaded, they are automatically scanned to evaluate data integrity and file completeness. Another bonus? Data can be sent 24 hours a day, seven days a week and customers have the flexibility to select whether file processing should start in real time or on a pre-determined schedule.

Keeping sensitive data protected and secure is at the core of Emdeon’s business. Did you know that Emdeon powers the single largest financial, administrative and clinical information exchange in the U.S. healthcare system? Recently, Emdeon opened the second of two new data centers that serve as the central nervous system for the largest and most powerful network in healthcare. With a Tier 3 infrastructure, these centers allow us to provide a single, interactive and standards-based transaction processing and analytics platform.

Take a comprehensive look at your patient billing data processes. Do you see any potential leaks in the system? Call 877.EMDEON.6 (877.363.3666) to learn more about Emdeon ExpressBill Services!






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Be Thankful for Postage Stamps

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"...Thanksgiving is well documented by the stamps that come to life in our albums. We can use them to remind us of the history of the holiday and to serve as visual aids when we explain the holiday to the youngest who share our turkey banquet," writes Janet Klug in a recent Refresher Course article that appeared in Linn's Stamp News.

"Ah, the stories that stamps can tell. And for a hobby that teaches so much and provides endless fascination, I am truly thankful," pens Klug.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Shown above, We Give Thanks Stamp issued in 2001.

To learn more about Thanksgiving stamps, click here.

Post Office Tests Same Day Delivery

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The Associated Press (AP) reports, "Emboldened by rapid growth in e-commerce shipping, the cash-strapped U.S. Postal Service is moving aggressively this holiday season to start a premium service for the Internet shopper seeking the instant gratification of a store purchase: same-day package delivery."

According to Hope Yen of the AP, "Teaming up with major retailers, the post office will begin the expedited service in San Francisco on Dec. 12 at a price similar to its competitors. If things run smoothly, the program will quickly expand next year to other big cities such as Boston, Chicago and New York. It follows similar efforts by eBay, Amazon.com, and most recently Wal-Mart Stores Inc., which charges a $10 flat rate for same-day delivery."
Yen goes on to pen, "The delivery program, called Metro Post, seeks to build on the post office's double-digit growth in package volume to help offset steady declines in first-class and standard mail. Operating as a limited experiment for the next year, it is projected to generate between $10 million and $50 million in new revenue from deliveries in San Francisco alone, according to postal regulatory filings, or up to $500 million, if expanded to 10 cities."
To read the entire article, click here.

Dear Santa I've Been Really Good This Year

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Can't figure out what you want Santa to bring you?

Well Potomac Stamps may have the solution. They're offering gift certificates to buy supplies and other cool stamp collecting stuff.

According to their website, "When you buy a gift certificate, the amount is released to YOUR account. You can then email any amount you wish to any person with an email address. Your email can be customized with a personal message, too!"

Certificates come in $5, $10, $25, $50 and $100 amounts.

Click here to visit their site.