Find the right accountant: How to save your practice money

Getting a good accountant isn't as easy as it might seem. Here's how to find the accountant you need.

By Robert Kazel, AMNews staff. Jan. 24, 2005.

A good accountant can do physicians' taxes and possibly save them some money. But a great one can be a medical practice's right arm, helping it run with far greater efficiency and improving its bottom line in ways that doctors might never have predicted.

Sometimes what an accountant does for a medical practice can resemble sleuthing. Mark Master, a Jenkintown, Pa.-based CPA whose clients are predominantly medical practices, recalled a recent case when he spotted a stream of money covertly trickling out a physician's door -- one that turned out to involve betrayal by a trusted employee.

The physician had told his bookkeeper to put all routine purchases, such as office products and x-ray supplies, on the physician's credit card so he could amass frequent-flyer points. The employee did -- but also used the card to buy herself a washer, dryer and air conditioner at a chain electronics store, steaks at a wholesale buying club and much more. Her purchases, totaling about $9,000, occurred over the course of about eight months, and the physician never asked to review the credit card bill.

"It probably happens a lot more than we know," says Master, who added that the employee committing the embezzlement was ultimately fired, prosecuted and convicted. "The hardest problem we have with docs is the ones who say, 'I don't want to get involved in the day-to-day running of the office -- Gladys will take care of it.' "

In other instances, what an accountant unearths might be less dramatic but still save physicians a lot of cash over time. Alan Matarasso, MD, a New York plastic surgeon, long had relied on a CPA to figure out his practice's taxes, give guidance on salaries and other personnel matters, and advice on investments. But he said he reaped an unexpected reward when the CPA told him his office telephone bills were too high, and that he should switch to a local reseller of phone services at discounted rates.