The owner asks “how much are we owed?” and the quick answer is the total accounts receivable. The useful answer is the same number split by how old it is, because $40,000 that is mostly under 30 days is normal and $40,000 that is mostly over 90 is a problem. Dentrix’s Aging Report gives you the split.
Where is the aging report in Dentrix?
Open the Office Manager. On the Reports menu, choose Ledger, then Aging Report. A dialog opens with a set of options, then the report goes to the Batch Processor where you can preview, print or save it.
Which options matter?
| Option | What to set |
|---|---|
| Provider range | All providers for the practice total; one provider when you want a doctor’s own AR |
| Billing type | All, unless you keep a separate billing type for payment plans or collections |
| Minimum balance | $0.01 to see everything, or $25 to skip small balances that cost more to chase than they return |
| Last payment before | Leave blank for the full picture |
| Include credit balances | Untick for a collections list, tick for a true net AR figure |
| Patient or insurance portion | Run both ways at month end: patient portion for the billing coordinator, insurance portion for the claims coordinator |
| Sort | By balance, highest first, for a working list; alphabetical for filing |
The account balance that Dentrix ages is the guarantor’s balance, so the report lists guarantors, not individual family members.
How do I read the columns?
Each guarantor row shows the balance split into four buckets by the date of the charge: 0 to 30 days, 31 to 60, 61 to 90 and over 90. At the end of the report there is a total line with the same four buckets and a grand total.
Two rules of thumb for a general practice that files insurance for patients.
- Most of the insurance portion should be in the first two buckets. A claim that is correct is usually paid within 30 days of being sent, so insurance balances over 60 days mean a claim was denied, never sent, or is waiting on an attachment.
- Most of the patient portion over 90 days will not collect itself. Every month a patient balance ages, the chance of collecting it drops. The over 90 column is the one to read first.
A worked example
A practice runs the Aging Report at month end with all providers, credit balances excluded.
| Bucket | Amount | Share |
|---|---|---|
| 0 to 30 | $38,200 | 51% |
| 31 to 60 | $16,900 | 23% |
| 61 to 90 | $8,400 | 11% |
| Over 90 | $11,300 | 15% |
| Total | $74,800 |
The practice produces about $110,000 a month net, so total AR is about 0.7 months of production, which is comfortable. The over 90 bucket is $11,300. Running the report again for the insurance portion only shows $4,100 of that is insurance, so $7,200 is patient balances over 90 days.
That is the list for the billing coordinator this week: the patient balances over 90, sorted highest first, with a call, a statement or a payment plan for each. The $4,100 of insurance over 90 goes to the claims coordinator with a different job: find out why each claim is still open.
How often should I run it?
Run it on the last working day of the month, before statements go out, and keep the PDF. Then run it once more a week later for the over 90 bucket only, as a check on the follow-up. The month-on-month change in the over 90 column is the simplest collections metric there is.
What Calibic adds
The AR card inside Insurance, claims and AR is LIVE for Dentrix. Calibic reads the procedure, payment and adjustment views over read-only SQL and shows the same four buckets every morning, split by patient and insurance portion, with the over 90 figure tracked as a line over time. Each bucket opens to show the accounts behind it. No report to run, no Batch Processor.
Calibic does not post payments, send statements or write to Dentrix. The Aging Report in Dentrix stays the figure you reconcile against.
See the AR view on the Insurance, claims and AR product page. The sibling guide on Dentrix reports every office manager should run puts the Aging Report in its weekly place, and the Dentrix integration page lists what Calibic reads.