How is your company doing?
This is a question I often ask DME/HME providers. The answers I receive are usually glowing and upbeat, but often, what I am told is just a cover story. I have made the following recommendation to several home care company owners, and by trying it, they have uncovered many ways to improve their operations.
My suggestion is that you place yourself in the shoes of a potential buyer of your company. Then go through every facet of your operation with great care, thinking only as a possible purchaser. You might consider doing this together with an accountant. I recognize that it is very difficult to look upon your “baby” without any prejudice, but try it.
If you have been honest with yourself, you can then put into place all the ideas that you thought of as a potential buyer. This will prove to be a very valuable exercise, and certainly an interesting eye-opener. The benefits that your company will realize as a consequence of this study can make this effort more than worthwhile — and may also help you locate some new disciplines that could help you to further diversify.
Customer Satisfaction
I just received a report from one of HomeCare magazine's readers about what he described as “customer satisfaction,” and how this has been helping him build goodwill and new sales.
When the company receives a new referral, after their first transaction, the provider sends a brief thank-you note to the customer. He also sends a similar note to the referral source, including physicians and discharge nurses or planners at local hospitals, which the provider said were certainly some of his prime targets.
He explained that after he started sending these appreciation notes, the discharge planners began to direct more referrals to his company. This is interesting, because some of the hospitals in his community operate their own DME locations.
When the planners give patients a list of close-by DME locations, their own store is listed first, and then the others. But this provider found that he was getting oral referrals when patients asked about the various companies as the lists were passed out.
The patients and the referral sources appreciated this provider's service, and that is what customer satisfaction is all about, isn't it?
Whither the Web
I suppose that because I am not computer-literate and am unable to do much more than use my computer as a fancy typewriter, I may have some kind of advantage. I do not shop on the computer, I do not share any information via the computer and I live in dread that some hacker or dishonest person will be able to steal my identity.
Today these professional nerds can obtain people's bank records, get copies of one's financial history and can even break into government institutions and credit card organizations. I wonder if this Web is similar to that of a spider. A spider's web will lure other insects, trap them and then have a fine meal. Isn't this what appears to be happening today because the Web is so filled with holes allowing dishonest people — spiders — to get in and steal whatever they want?
I think about this often as I read in the newspapers and hear on television how the Web has become a playground for thieves.
Is there a way to protect all the information that has been gathered on the Web? I know that there are many companies and professionals seeking that answer. I hope they find it soon.
Lobbying
Under the big umbrella of the American Association for Homecare, we went lobbying recently in Washington, D.C. We were joined by DME/HME providers from all over the United States, and many of the industry's vendors.
As our industry's “lobbyists,” we were welcomed by our Congress members and their aides, and were able to speak to them in person about the problems our industry faces to ask for their support.
I know you all join me in saying “thank you” to the industry association, and I hope next time you'll join in AAHomecare's Lobby Day, too.
Sheldon “Shelly” Prial is based in Melbourne, Fla., with Prial Consulting and also serves as the director of government relations for Atlanta-based Graham-Field Health Products. In 1987, he founded the Homecare Providers Co-Op, now part of The VGM Group. He can be reached by e-mail at shelly.prial@worldnet.att.net or by phone at 321/255-3885.
