The Massage Pundit

No, I’m not talking about the end of the world, but it got your attention, didn’t it? I’m talking about December 31, the end of the tax year. 

If you’ve been less than diligent in keeping your financial records nice and neat this year, you’ve still got time to get your ducks in a row.  Make it a point during the next month to straighten out your files and start organizing things for your tax person.  Staying on top of your tax situation is a must, and that goes double for the self-employed and independent contractors among us. 

I had a shock last year at tax time because I wasn’t paying enough attention to the bottom line.  I had paid my quarterly estimated tax.  At year’s end, I took my neat little pile to my accountant and asked her to give me a ballpark figure of how much I was going to owe (I always want to owe a little; if I overpay enough to get a refund I feel like I’m loaning the government my money interest free).  She gave it the brief once over and announced a figure I was okay with.

Two weeks later when I went to collect my returns, that amount had increased by almost 7,000.  I nearly croaked!I had spent the year on a debt reduction mission, really cut down on my spending (translation, tax deductions), and subsequently the business kept a good bit more money.  Since I was spending that money on reducing debt instead of giving myself a big raise and living the high life, I really didn’t feel like I had more money, and I didn’t pay enough quarterly tax.  I’m happy to say I’m more on top of it this year.  I still won’t get a refund, but hopefully I won’t have to spend the family vacation money making up a deficit caused by carelessness.

I hope you have a wildly prosperous holiday season, sell more gift certificates than you ever imagined, and remember to save enough to pay Uncle Sam. 

Laura Allen

As massage therapists, most if not all of the conditions our clients present with have a stress component.  Even conditions that twenty years ago were thought to be purely pathological are now known to be caused and/or contributed to by stress.  If you’re stressed for long enough, you’ll get sick, and if you’re sick, you’re almost certainly stressed by it.  My insight into these words of wisdom didn’t help me a bit this last week or so when I got really sick for the first time in a long, long time.

I had an inkling this was coming on a few weeks ago when some lymph nodes swelled right under my jaw.  Thinking I’d nip it in the bud, I asked the lymphatic drainage therapist on my staff to work on me.  The next morning, I awoke to find it had moved out of my neck down to the axillary area.  Normally, I’m the last person to go to the doctor, kicking and screaming all the way, but I had a really busy schedule coming up and just couldn’t take the time to be sick (so I told myself) and forced myself to go.  I’m sorry to say she didn’t grasp the concept that my lymph had been moved by human hands, and due to the swollen nodes at the side of my breast, she insisted I go get a mammogram asap, even though my annual wasn’t due for another four months.  It turned out to be a cyst.

Things escalated in the next few days with a sore throat, coughing, sneezing, some stomach upsets, and all the usual things that accompany a good old-fashioned “sick spell”, as my granny would have said.  I’m on the mend now, but it’s a reminder of a lesson I seem to have to relearn every few years:  when you think you don’t have time to take care of yourself, stress will usually force your hand.  I was allowing a few things that were totally beyond my control to stress me out, obsessing over the fact that I had a class to get ready for and a publishing deadline to meet and people coming for Thanksgiving to cook for and the house is a mess, and I was a great success at making myself sick.  At least I recognize it, LOL!

I have a friend who’s fighting cancer right now.  A family member is in drug rehab trying to straighten themselves out.  Another family member recently had a flooded home that is costing thousands of dollars and backbreaking work to dig out of, and this Thanksgiving there are a lot of people with loved ones who won’t come home from the war.  It makes my problems look pretty ridiculous in comparison, so I’m going to take a deep breath and let them go.

I’m going to stress less and be well, and I hope you do the same.

Many Blessings,

Laura Allen

We have been accepting insurance in my group practice since the day we opened. There was no immediate rush of insurance clients coming in the door, but over the past four years it has steadily grown to the point where insurance clients account for about a third of our business.  The paperwork is time-consuming, and every time you call the insurance company for a pre-authorization you get the same speech: “this is just an authorization, not a gaurantee of payment.”  Seems like an oxymoron, doesn’t it?  And we have so many forms for the client to fill out–an intake, an assignment of benefits, a practitioner’s lien, a release form and so forth until they surely feel like they’re applying for a mortgage just to get a massage.

If you can afford to wait to get paid for your services, insurance can mean an increase in business, because many people who couldn’t afford to pay for massage out-of-pocket will take advantage of it if they can get it for a small co-payment.  Just be sure you’re not depending on that insurance check to arrive in time to pay your rent.  There may be hoops you need to jump through in order to be a provider for some insurance companies.  For some of the companies we deal with, sending in a copy of our massage licenses and liability insurance was enough; others have had us send in photographs of the entry, bathroom and treatment rooms, I suppose to be sure we’re in compliance with the ADA (or to see if we have a clean office; who knows?).

In spite of the extreme diligence I use when filling out claim forms–they want every i dotted and every t crossed–there is still the occasional time when a claim is turned down because the authorization number was written incorrectly, or the time frame expired or some other reason.  Insurance companies are in the business of saving themselves money, and any legitimate reason to refuse a claim means more profit for them, so of course they will refuse any time they can.

Not all insurance companies pay for massage, particularly in states that don’t yet have licensure, and even among those that do, their policies on paying can vary greatly from state to state.  Many Floridians move to North Carolina.  Apparently several of the major companies that don’t pay for massage here do pay in Florida.  I have more than once had a very upset person in my office who was used to getting their massage paid for before they moved here.  One big company will only pay here in North Carolina if the massage is performed in a chiropractor’s office–a totally ridiculous policy–that the same company doesn’t have in South Carolina, less than twenty miles away. 

There are definitely a lot of pros and cons to accepting insurance.  I’d love to hear what kind of experiences other therapists have had with it.

Have a great Thanksgiving, and don’t overlook it as a marketing opportunity.  A gift certificate makes a wonderful gift for the hostess that’s been slaving over a hot stove to make a meal for friends and family.

Laura Allen

Last night we had our fourth annual open house at my office; it’s actually an event publicized by our Chamber of Commerce called Business After Hours, and it’s always a great way to get new people in to see what we’re about.

I persuaded my mother to make ham biscuits as part of the refreshments; this is the South, and hey, the announcement of ham biscuits will draw a crowd like flies to honey!  Myself and a few of my musician friends played a few tunes to entertain while our staff members worked the room, welcoming people and telling them about our services.

The best thing about an open house is that people who have never been to your business will come; they might be drawn in by the announcement of free food and music but then they’re a captive audience.  And it’s not just good for us; it’s good networking for the whole community.  It’s nice to see people who have businesses and services that can benefit each other make that connection.  Last night, a new person in town who’s building a house met a craftsman who sells recovered building materials from period architecture and they struck up a deal for a marble fireplace right here in my office.  A person who just started a publishing company connected with a lady who has written some as-yet unpublished children’s books.  It was great to see people enjoying themselves and doing good for their own business while doing good for ours. 

You don’t have to get fancy with the food and entertainment.  If you’ve never had an open house before, give it a try.  Even just a few new people coming in is going to enhance your business.

Greetings, colleagues! Halloween is the official start (to me, anyway) of the holidays. Apparently at least one customer agrees – I sold my first Christmas gift certificate of the season Halloween morning.

If you’ve been in business through more than one Christmas, you know how that goes.  In looking back at Christmases past, I see my gift certificate sales have steadily increased every year, and that reminds me to get ready for the next season—Redemption. Try to remember that money from gift certificate sales is money that you have received that you are going to have to give someone something in exchange for later on, and don’t go crazy spending it all on your holiday shopping.  During the month of January there’s no cash coming through the door, just a bunch of smiling people coming in for their free massage, and meanwhile your expenses go right on.

Recently a number of states have enacted new laws governing gift certificates and their expiration dates.  Just to mention a few of these, in California, Connecticut, Montana and
New Hampshire, no expiration date is allowed at all unless the certificate is for more than 100.00.  In Rhode Island, Washington, and Florida, certificates cannot expire unless they have been donated to a charity.  In Illinois, the expiration date must be five years from the date of sale. Some states actually have laws requiring you to turn money over to the state for your unredeemed certificates after a certain period of time.  It seems to me like it’s just one more way for big government to squeeze the small business owner! The laws vary widely from state to state.  You can find out about the laws in your particular state by visiting the National Conference of State Legislatures website at http://www.ncsl.org/programs/banking/GiftCardsandCerts.htm

Be sure your gift certificate policies comply with the laws in your state, and Happy Selling!