Medical collections specialist vs billing assistant

The differences between medical collections specialists and billing assistants can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. While it typically takes 6-12 months to become a medical collections specialist, becoming a billing assistant takes usually requires 1-2 years. Additionally, a medical collections specialist has an average salary of $36,249, which is higher than the $33,745 average annual salary of a billing assistant.

The top three skills for a medical collections specialist include patients, healthcare and medical collections. The most important skills for a billing assistant are patients, data entry, and medicaid.

Medical collections specialist vs billing assistant overview

	Medical Collections Specialist	Billing Assistant
Yearly salary	$36,249	$33,745
Hourly rate	$17.43	$16.22
Growth rate	-8%	-3%
Number of jobs	83,342	34,070
Job satisfaction	-	-
Most common degree	Associate Degree, 28%	Bachelor's Degree, 40%
Average age	46	46
Years of experience	12	2

What does a medical collections specialist do?

Medical collections specialists are responsible for the collection of insurance claims. The responsibilities of this position include locating debtors, contacting debtors to address the overdue payments, keeping records of debts, collecting updated information on client accounts and payments, processing payments, and reviewing records to ensure they are accurate. They also conduct follow ups for insurance reimbursement, repossess claims, draft appeals, and resolve unpaid claims.

What does a billing assistant do?

A billing assistant is primarily in charge of performing support tasks to maintain smooth billing operations in an establishment. Their responsibilities typically include preparing and processing invoices for clients, sending billing adjustments, printing and reviewing invoices and billings, receiving payments, and monitoring delinquent invoices, sending reminders as necessary. They may also close and balance payments, calculate discounts, and maintain records of all transactions. Moreover, a billing assistant must be alert and proactive for any errors and inconsistencies, dealing with them accordingly.

Medical collections specialist vs billing assistant salary

Medical collections specialists and billing assistants have different pay scales, as shown below.

	Medical Collections Specialist	Billing Assistant
Average salary	$36,249	$33,745
Salary range	Between $30,000 And $43,000	Between $27,000 And $41,000
Highest paying City	Tracy, CA	Baltimore, MD
Highest paying state	Connecticut	Washington
Best paying company	Pacific Medical	University of California, Berkeley
Best paying industry	Professional	Technology

Differences between medical collections specialist and billing assistant education

There are a few differences between a medical collections specialist and a billing assistant in terms of educational background:

	Medical Collections Specialist	Billing Assistant
Most common degree	Associate Degree, 28%	Bachelor's Degree, 40%
Most common major	Health Care Administration	Business
Most common college	-	Stanford University

Medical collections specialist vs billing assistant demographics

Here are the differences between medical collections specialists' and billing assistants' demographics:

	Medical Collections Specialist	Billing Assistant
Average age	46	46
Gender ratio	Male, 19.5% Female, 80.5%	Male, 14.2% Female, 85.8%
Race ratio	Black or African American, 12.8% Unknown, 4.1% Hispanic or Latino, 20.8% Asian, 3.7% White, 58.1% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.5%	Black or African American, 10.2% Unknown, 4.3% Hispanic or Latino, 22.0% Asian, 6.8% White, 55.9% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.8%
LGBT Percentage	8%	7%

Differences between medical collections specialist and billing assistant duties and responsibilities

Medical collections specialist example responsibilities.

Manage accounts for healthcare clients, review detailed patient information for payment resolution while abiding HIPPA privacy and security regulations.
Job duties include collecting on HMO, PPO, Medicare, and HMO Medicaid.
Work directly with Medicare and HMO Medicaid plans, and statewide HMO/PPO/POS plans.
Reprocess denied medical claims using extensive appeal tactics or special appeals processing instructions for commercial and government carriers.
Adhere to all HIPAA guidelines as well as various policies and guidelines.
Provide itemized billing statements and screen HIPAA authorization forms for hundreds of legal firms.

Billing assistant example responsibilities.

Manage all billing accounts including Medicare/Medicaid, HMO and individual accounts.
Post insurance payments, explain patient what the EOB is about, collect payments from patients.
Communicate annual contracting, CPT, and ICD-9 yearly changes to doctor's offices by creation of formal notification.
Experience with billing systems and practices with CPT coding, ICD-9, and usages of coding for productive billing.
Bill insurance companies using ICD-9 coding.
Used denial reason codes on paper & electronic EOB in EMR/EHR software to examine denials.

Medical collections specialist vs billing assistant skills

Common medical collections specialist skills

Patients, 19%
Healthcare, 14%
Medical Collections, 7%
Medicaid, 5%
Patient Accounts, 5%
Appeals, 5%

Common billing assistant skills

Patients, 21%
Data Entry, 11%
Medicaid, 5%
Patient Accounts, 4%
CPT, 3%
Front Desk, 3%

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Medical Collections Specialist
Medical Collections Specialist vs Billing Assistant

Updated January 8, 2025

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