No Shows and Late Cancellations – what do ACC cover?


Recently a patient in the waiting room asked me if we still bill ACC when people don’t attend their appointments and it got me thinking about No Shows & Late Cancellations and patient’s perceptions of penalty charges.

The answer is no we cannot bill ACC for any appointments that patients do not attend or cancel. ACC is committed to contributing to patient’s treatment costs, however, if the patient is not being treated then it is not ACC’s responsibility to pick up any penalty charges.

Here at Back In Action Physio, we charge patients $25 late cancellation / no show fee. This is for appointments that we are unable to rebook due to late or no notice. We encourage you to write your time down, give you an appointment card and also send you a text reminder the day before. We think this is fair enough reminder and a fair charge. One of the main reasons is to encourage you to give us notice. This means we can offer your appointment to other patients waiting for an appointment to become available.

During our busy times, we have patients ringing during the day desperately trying to get an appointment. Others are waiting for someone to cancel which frees up an appointment time for them. It is a shame when the physio is waiting for time to pass for their next patient when they could be helping another patient during that time. We realise that sometimes things come up and we understand this is not always possible to give us the notice.

Although we advise 24hrs notice we ideally need 4hrs of reception time to fill the appointment. You can email or leave a message the night before. All I ask is if you can’t make an appointment, whatever the reason, please call and let us know. Even if it is only 30 minutes notice someone who lives close by could possibly still make it in. And if we fill an appointment we never charge!

Kelly – Reception Manager