4 reasons to use an appointment reminder

In today’s fast-paced world, we’re forced to manage a ton of things everyday ranging from work pressures to parenting and everything in between. Sometimes, it’s overwhelming to handle so many things at the same time. As a result, we either forget important things or we just break down with anger and frustration.

The biggest casualty in such tense situations is appointments. How many times have we forgotten a doctor’s appointment? Countless.

One good way to handle this forgetfulness and oversight is to use technology to our advantage. There are many appointment service providers today who are more than happy to send reminders about appointments, so there are no misses.

From a healthcare provider’s perspective, an appointment reminder is a much needed tool, as it will ensure that clients don’t forget their appointments. In fact, this much-needed tool can bring about many benefits for healthcare providers, including some of the ones listed below.

Reduced waiting lists

Automated appointment reminders give visitors an option to cancel or reschedule their appointment if they can’t make it for their current appointment. This allows the healthcare provider to give appointments to other clients on the waiting list.

As a result, waiting lists are shorter and at the same time, the healthcare provider can bring in more customers as well.

Improved response rate

Most people are busy, so informing them a day before the appointment helps them to plan better. Clients will not only appreciate you for the reminders,  but they will also have the chance to schedule their day and increase their response rates. All this can augur well for a lasting client-provider relationship.

Reduce administration tasks

An automated appointment reminder  reduces the workload on administration staff. They no longer have to look through each appointment, call the client and remind them. All this is taken care of by the software, so the admin staff can focus on doing better things like providing good customer support.

From an organization’s point of view too, it helps to streamline their resources and improve their overall efficiency.

Maximize revenue

Every missed appointment costs money.  Healthcare professionals have to be paid anyway, but when clients don’t show up, there is no revenue. This is why no-show rates eat into a provider’s annual revenues.

To avoid this loss of income, it’s a good idea to remind clients, so the chances to fill that appointment slot is greatly increased.

Besides bringing in revenues, automated appointments can save money. Every call costs money, so if the hospital staff has to call and remind each patient, it could end up being a costly exercise.  These appointment reminders are cost-effective, as they charge way less for each call.

You even have the option to send a text message to your clients, as some clients find it intrusive to attend calls.  Based on the client’s preferences, you can set up the software.

In all, appointment reminders can be just the tool that all of us need to keep track of our appointments.