Virtual credit card payments from dental payers
A virtual credit card payment is an insurance payment sent as a single-use card number, by fax, mail, email or portal, instead of a check or EFT. The practice runs the card through its terminal and gives up the processing fee. It often comes with a PDF remittance, not an 835, and the practice can ask for EFT instead.
Also calledVCCVirtual cardSingle-use cardVirtual card payment
By Dr. Maya Arnaout, DDS, VP of RevenuePublished 3 min read
How does a virtual card payment work?
The payer, or a payment vendor working for it, sends the practice a card number, an expiry date, a security code and the exact amount, usually with a remittance listing the claims it pays. Someone at the practice runs the card through the office’s card terminal for that amount, and the card processor pays it out, minus its fee, with the rest of that day’s card payments.
Some practices start receiving virtual cards without having asked for them, with the opt-out instructions in the small print.
Single-use card ending 4417
Pays 3 claims · Remittance attached as a PDF
$1,184.00
Run through the office card terminal
Posted to the PMS
Dana Whitfield$412.00
Marcus Lee$268.50
Priya Raman$503.50
Posted in full$1,184.00
Booked in the accounts
Card processor payout+$1,149.66
Card processing fee$34.34
Together$1,184.00
What do virtual card payments cost the practice?
- The processing fee: the card processor takes its percentage, as with any card payment, so the practice receives less than the payer paid.
- Staff time: each card is keyed by hand, its remittance matched and its claims posted.
- Harder reconciliation: the money lands inside a card processor payout, mixed with patient card payments, not as its own deposit with a trace number.
- Expiry: a card that is not run before it expires has to be reissued.
How do you switch from virtual cards to EFT?
Ask the payer, or the payment vendor named on the card notice, to pay by EFT, a direct ACH deposit, and enroll for the ERA at the same time so each deposit comes with a file to match it. The virtual card fees guide walks through opting out step by step, for every tax ID and location.
How should a virtual card payment be posted?
Post the full amount the payer paid to the patient accounts, the same as a check or EFT. The processing fee is the practice’s cost, not a patient adjustment: book it as a card fee in the accounts. Then match the card processor’s payout, net of the fee, to the deposit in the bank.
Bank reconciliation covers how card payouts tie to the bank and the books.
How ScoutIQ handles it
ScoutIQ reads virtual card payments and their remittances like any other payment and posts what the payer paid to each claim in your PMS. Cards can be processed inside ScoutIQ with the card fee split out, each one is matched to the remittance that explains it and to the bank deposit, and the fee is booked to QuickBooks or Xero.
Insurance Billing Automation
ERAs and EOBs read; EFT, check and card payments reconciled.
See Insurance Billing Automation