3 Ways for Therapists to Save Time in Private Practice

As therapists, time is one thing that we never seem to have enough of.

We’re often reminded to value our time, but it can be a challenge to know what exactly that means.

So, how can therapists save time in private practice?

If I have a spare hour, should I fill it with a client, take a break for self-care, or work on marketing my practice? Those are all things that need to be done, so they all have value.

How to save time in private practice

A lot of our struggle with time is simply part of the job.

Therapy can be demanding, and involves managing a lot of tasks at once, often on your own.

At the same time, at least part of our struggle with time is self-inflicted. 

There are three relatively easy ways you could start recapturing some of your time today.

1. Act like your time has value, because it does

To take action on this first tip and save time in private practice, another way to say this is: “Stop doing menial tasks.”

Once you start treating your time like it has real monetary value, it becomes easier to make other choices that involve spending money to get time back. 

Here are two examples:

A. My wife and I are both busy people, and we were tired of complaining about how our precious little time together at home was consumed with housework. So we hired a cleaning service to come in occasionally. Our stress levels decreased immediately.

Obviously, it’s easier to make those kinds of choices when you have the money to do so. That said, it’s also possible to get trapped in doing menial tasks because you’re not willing to invest your way out of them.

Which brings me to the second example, one more specific to therapy practice…

B. Some of our customers at SimplePractice process billing transactions outside of SimplePractice and then manually enter the transaction information into the SimplePractice practice management software.

Other processors may offer slightly lower credit card processing fees, but when you do the math, you find that saving that money… doesn’t actually save you money.

Here’s why. Let’s say you process a $100 credit card payment somewhere that offers a slightly lower processing fee—a difference of 0.2 percent, or for this transaction, 20 cents. And, let’s say that you’re in the habit of manually adding these transactions to SimplePractice, so it only takes you one minute. A tedious minute, to be sure—this is not what you went to graduate school for—but just one minute.

I’ve heard people say that the difference in credit card processing fees adds up over time. And it does! But so too does the time you spend entering those transactions manually.

When you do it that way, you’re working for an effective pay rate of $12 an hour. Your time is worth more than that. Whether you use SimplePractice or any other EHR that has this feature, utilize the built-in payment processing for therapists—enter the information once and let the system do the work for you.

The less time you have to spend on tedious work with minimal financial benefit, the more time you’ll have to do work that matters—and pays—more.

2. Shorten your sessions (a little)

Here’s another way to save time in private practice. If you struggle to keep up with your therapy notes or feel burned out at the end of the day from not having had a break, you may want to consider shortening each session by just a few minutes.

If you’re paneled with insurers, you know they don’t reimburse down to the minute. This means you’re likely to get the same reimbursement payout for a 38-minute session that you would for a 52-minute session.

Consequently, by shortening your typical session even just a few minutes, you free up a bit of time without losing any money.

The specific session length you land at is, of course, up to you.

At first, it may feel jarring to go from 50-minute sessions to 40 or even 45-minute sessions. However, by the end of the day, you may be astonished at the difference it can make in how you feel.

If you’re uncomfortable shortening sessions for existing clients, that’s understandable. You can always keep existing clients on their current schedules and make changes specifically for new clients, as long as you can trust yourself to truly hold that boundary.

Over time, your caseload will transition to be only clients who came in knowing that their sessions would be shorter.

3. Simplify your workflows

Clients want and expect a lot of conveniences, and it may feel frantic trying to juggle all of these expectations as they pile up.

How is your client intake process? Do you have an automated paperless intake process? Could you streamline it?

Also, how many different ways can clients contact you? Phone, email, web site, text message? How often do you check each channel? An easy way to save time and stress is to combine those channels where you can. This may be as simple as removing some forms of contact, like your website’s contact form (which, depending on how it’s coded, may not be secure anyway). 

Complex workflows are a disservice to you and your clients alike.

Consolidating your channels and workflows can save you from spending unnecessary time trying to monitor and clean up so many different ones.

Your skills are rare and important.

Your time is your most valuable resource. Spend it where it matters most.

Save time in private practice starting now

When you’re ready to return time from administrative tasks back into your practice and life, consider SimplePractice. We offer a free 30-day trial for new customers. Start yours today!

How SimplePractice streamlines running your practice

SimplePractice is HIPAA-compliant practice management software with everything you need to run your practice built into the platform—from booking and scheduling to insurance and client billing.

If you’ve been considering switching to an EHR system, SimplePractice empowers you to run a fully paperless practice—so you get more time for the things that matter most to you.

Try SimplePractice free for 30 days. No credit card required.