Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

transferred to the ledger, and this half-year's account is closed. The date of payment should always be noted in the ledger.

Accounts should be sent out every six months, and certainly not later than once every year.

If the practitioner is too busy and has neither time nor inclination to make out his own accounts, the ledger may be handed to an accountant to make up and send out the accounts. This, however, is very unsatisfactory, as you yourself only know the financial position of each of your patients. You may wish to charge a much smaller fee in certain cases, while in other cases, which perhaps have occupied much more time, you may wish to charge an increased fee. If, however, you have considered these points and have entered up all the sums to be charged, then an accountant has only to sum up the figures and send out the bills. He will probably succeed also in getting more money in, as he does it from his purely business point of view, whereas you yourself might not like to unduly press your patients for payment.

The loose-leaf method of keeping books has simplified the practitioner's work very greatly. For each patient there is a visiting list sheet, which is ruled so that it lasts a whole year or more. On it the total number of visits paid, with the total sum to be charged each month, with extras, etc., is seen at a glance. At the end of the year, or when you have ceased visiting this patient, this visiting list is slipped into the ledger, of which it now forms a page. If you recommence visiting this patient, the list is again removed from the ledger and placed amongst

your current lists of patients. The ledger requires no indexing, as all the visiting list sheets when they are introduced are placed in alphabetical order.

When a patient has died or removed, and his account has been finally closed, the whole of the visiting lists relating to this family are removed from the ledger and placed in reserve, so that it never becomes laden with unnecessary pages, and so can be used permanently.

There is also on the market a register which comprises day book, cash book, ledger, etc., all in one, and certainly, when you have once mastered it, it is advantageous to have everything in one volume. There is also a card index system of account keeping, but on the whole I think the loose-leaf system is the easiest and best.

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]
[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]
[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small]
« AnteriorContinuar »