Client Billing & Payments

Fees and rates, charges, card on file and autopay, cancellation fees, payment plans, refunds, and financial reports.

• Set client fees and ratesEvery visit gets one fee, chosen in a fixed order. The amount typed on the appointment comes first, then the client's rate for that service, then the client's default rate, then the provider's rate, then the practice price in force on the visit date, then the billing code's default. The fee is snapshotted when the visit is booked, so raising a price later never reprices booked visits, and a client's old rate can be kept with an end date. Practice prices carry an "Effective from" date and a price history. Rates are set under Settings → Services, the provider editor, and the client's Billing tab.
  3 min
• The client billing profileThe client's Billing tab opens with a Billing profile card summarising how they pay. Edit it to set the billing type (self-pay, insurance, or sliding scale), their rates, copay, coinsurance and deductible, the card on file and autopay, superbill and statement preferences, a cancellation-fee exemption, and internal billing notes. A Guarantor card records who pays for a minor or dependant and is printed on superbills. The balance strip at the top shows the balance (with any "$X credit on account"), unpaid charges, and the last payment, with Collect payment, Adjust balance and, when there is credit to use, Apply credit.
  3 min
• Charges and the Billing tabA charge is one billable line on a client's account, with a date, a code, a fee, and how much has been paid. FrontDesk captures one automatically when an appointment is marked completed (one per client for a group), priced from the fee on the appointment, or you add one by hand from the client's Billing tab. The client's share of each charge goes on their balance. A charge with no known fee sits as a draft until you price it. Charges are what payments settle (a payment for no particular visit pays un-invoiced charges first, then open invoices, oldest first), what invoices and superbills list, and what the financial reports count as production. Void a charge to remove it; use Adjust balance for write-offs and discounts, on the whole balance or on one charge.
  4 min
• The Payments page: overview, appointments and payment detailsPayments in the left navigation is the location's billing home, with five tabs: Overview, Payments, Invoices, Balances and Appointments. Overview (where the page opens) shows what clients owe now, visits not yet invoiced or missing a fee, what came in from clients and insurance, AutoPay clients without a card, balances by age with the 60+ day ones to start with, and recent billing activity. Appointments lists each billed visit by date of service with the fee, the client's share, insurance, write-offs and paid status, and the next step on the row (Create invoice, Add payment, View details); switch to Client balances for every client with their balance and default card. View details opens the visit's billing: fee (editable), split, invoices, payments, write-offs and history. Clicking a payment on the Payments tab opens its details: what it paid, credit left, FrontDesk's processing fee and the net, and Stripe's transaction details. Card fees, refunds and Stripe payouts for a date range are under Reports → Financial → Payment processing. The ⋯ menu has Export payments, Filing info, AutoPay clients and Billing settings.
  5 min
• Invoices: create, send, record a payment, voidCreate an invoice from the client's Billing tab with New → Invoice: add line items or Add visit charges, set a due date, tax and discount, then Save Draft or Send Invoice (it emails the client a pay link, so they need an email on file). Every invoice is listed under Payments → Invoices and in the Invoices card on the client's Billing tab; click one to open it. From there, Record payment books cash, a check or anything taken outside FrontDesk, up to what it still owes, and warns when a bank payment on the invoice is still clearing; Void (with a reason) takes what the invoice itself still owes off the balance and stops its pay link, while visit charges it billed stay owed; Edit is for drafts only. A paid invoice can't be voided; refund the payment instead. A view-only member can open invoices but not create, edit or send them.
  7 min
• Card on file and autopayA card on file lets you charge a client without asking each time: automatically through autopay, for cancellation fees, and for payment plans. Staff save the card from the client's Billing tab (with the client's consent), the client saves it in the portal, or you text or email them a link to add it. The card number never touches FrontDesk; it lives in Stripe. Autopay is a per-location switch under Settings → Billing → Payment methods, with a choice of when it charges: Nightly, for open invoices (the default), or When a visit is completed. Nightly autopay charges only invoiced balances, so turn on Daily invoicing beside it: each night, every client's visits not yet on an invoice go on one. Autopay charges only the client's share (their copay if they use insurance). Declines are reported to staff and the client is told; three declines in a row stop nightly autopay on that invoice until the client adds a new card. Automatic charges get a Stripe receipt.
  6 min
• AutoPay clients and add-card linksSettings → Billing → AutoPay clients lists every client with whether they are enrolled in autopay, their default card and whether they have been asked for one. Filter by Enrolled, Needs a card, Not enrolled or Card on file, search, and switch AutoPay on or off per client or for the clients you tick. Import AutoPay list reads SimplePractice's AutoPay list (a CSV with a Client column) and enrolls the same clients. A client can be enrolled before they have a card; nothing is charged until they add one. Ask for cards sends a secure add-card link by email, text or both, to everyone enrolled who needs a card or to the clients you pick; clients asked in the last 3 days or who already have a card are skipped. The link works for 30 days without signing in, and saving a card turns autopay on.
  3 min
• Client credit and Apply creditCredit on account is money a client paid that never came off their balance: a payment taken with "Apply payment to outstanding balance" unticked (kept as a credit toward future visits), or a payment bigger than what they owed. It shows as "$X credit on account" next to the balance on the client's Billing tab and on their Payments tab. Visit charges captured later use it by themselves. To use it on what they already owe, press Apply credit and confirm: it applies as much as the balance allows and pays the oldest open charges and invoices first. Only the account owner, an admin, a practice manager or a biller can apply credit, and it can't be applied at athena-connected locations.
  3 min
• Cancellation and no-show feesThe cancellation policy lives under Settings → Billing → Payment methods. Set the notice window (24 hours by default), a late-cancellation fee and a no-show fee, whether to charge the card on file right away, and a first-missed-visit waiver. Every way a visit can be cancelled late or missed applies it. When staff cancel or mark a no-show, on the web, in the mobile app or through the Setup Assistant, the fee is shown first, with a choice to apply or waive it. The fee becomes a charge on the client's account and, when allowed, is taken from their card. Waive removes a fee that is on the balance; Refund and waive gives back a fee charged to the card and removes it in one step. Putting a missed visit back on the calendar reverses its fee by default.
  7 min
• Set up a payment planA payment plan splits what a client owes into equal weekly, biweekly, or monthly installments. With autopay on, each installment is charged to the client's card on file on its due date. Only a card decline counts as a failed attempt; a declined card is retried every three days, four attempts in all, then the plan stops and the office is told. If the client's autopay is off, or the location's card payments aren't connected, the installment waits and the plan never stops over it. If their bank asks them to confirm a payment, they get a link to pay it in the portal. A plan never takes more than the client owes and finishes as "Paid off early" once the balance is paid another way. Closing or archiving the account pauses its plans.
  8 min
• Refunds, chargebacks, and disputesRefund from the Payments page or the client's Payments tab. Card payments taken through FrontDesk are refunded through Stripe and the money goes back to the card, out of the practice's Stripe balance; FrontDesk's fee is not returned. Cash, check, and cards run on an outside terminal are recorded as refunded so the books are right. A refund puts back on the client's balance only what that payment had taken off it, reopens the charges it had paid, and reopens a paid invoice; a voided invoice stays void. Each refund goes out once, even after a double click or a retry. When a client disputes a card payment with their bank, FrontDesk marks the payment Disputed, tells the office, and if the dispute is lost books it like a refund. Refunds made in the Stripe dashboard sync back automatically.
  4 min
• Financial reportsThe Financial tab on the Reports page answers how much you produced and collected, who and what it came from, who owes you and how old it is, and whether today's drawer matches. Six cards compare the period with the previous one; tables break it down by provider, service, and location; A/R aging shows open charges in 0–30, 31–60, 61–90, and 90+ day buckets; a payment plans section shows what is scheduled and at risk; the daily close lists every transaction for a day by method; and Payment processing lists card charges with FrontDesk's fee and the net, refunds, and Stripe payouts. Every table exports to CSV, and a weekly or monthly digest can be emailed. Owners, admins, managers, practice managers and billers see it.
  4 min