Accounts Receivable, Two Ways
Accounts Receivable — what patients and insurers still owe you — is one of the most-watched numbers on a Scoreboard, and one of the easiest to misread. SOPHIE can show it two ways, because practices asked to see it both ways: everything owed right now, and the figure for one week.
Both rows are collected from the same aging report in your practice management system. Lower is better for both.
The two rows
| Row | What it is | How often it's read |
|---|---|---|
| Accounts Receivable (Total) | The aging report with no date filter — everything outstanding right now, whenever it arose. | Every night. While a week is open, its cell shows the latest reading; once the week closes, it keeps the last reading taken in that week. |
| Accounts Receivable (Week) | The same report with its date filter set to that Scoreboard week. | One figure per week, refreshed each night while the week is open. While the week is open, the filter runs from Sunday through today; once it closes, Sunday through Saturday. |
Both are net figures: the total outstanding minus credits already sitting on patient accounts, such as prepayments and overpayments. That money is already in your practice, so it isn't counted as owed. If your own aging report reads higher, that is almost always why.
If the two rows disagree
They can, and that's expected. The arithmetic behind both is identical; the only difference is whether the report was asked for a date range. So any difference between them comes from how your practice management system applies its own date filter — SOPHIE doesn't adjust either number. Neither row is a "corrected" version of the other.
If you want the difference explained, your practice management system's documentation or support is the place to ask. You can also contact SOPHIE support and we'll help chase it.
A/R is a balance, not a total
A/R is a level: what's owed as of a day. It doesn't add up from week to week. So:
- A quarter or year figure is where the balance stood at the end of that period — not the sum of its weeks, and not their average. If you check SOPHIE's quarter figure by adding up the weeks, you'll get a number many times too big.
- The goal is a single Target that applies to the week, the quarter and the year alike. See Setting up metrics and goals.
- History starts the day A/R was connected. Your practice management system can only say what's owed today, not what was owed six weeks ago, so earlier weeks stay empty. A week with no reading stays empty too — SOPHIE never repeats a reading forward or fills in a balance between two weeks.
Other A/R figures you can track
If you want more detail, add your own metrics and collect any of these (see Numbers collected from your practice software):
- Total outstanding balance — before credits are taken off. This one can be narrowed to an age bracket: 0–30, 31–60, 61–90 or over 90 days.
- Patient balance and Insurance balance — who owes it.
- Account credits — the credits that the net figures take off.