Why do payment plans zero out account balance?

[wjstarck]

The staff is complaining that payment plans zero out the balance at the top of the account balanace and in the ledger, as they are concerned that a cursory glance at the ledger may not reveal that a patient may have a balance (if, for instance, the patient were to call on the phone and ask what their balance is).

What is the logic behind this?

[drtech]

I agree. Jordan said it was the best way to do it though, I forget why. In v5.7 there will be another payment plan display with that balance at the top so it should be clearer.

I wish though that there was some way to do it without zeroing out the regular balance and just have a separate "Due" total, but the addition i mentioned above does that pretty well.

[wjstarck]

OK, I'll look at how it's done in 5.7 in VS '08, thanks...

[jordansparks]

No more improvements were made after 5.6, which I'm assuming you're using. It should be quite obvious that the patient has a payment plan by looking a the Account module. There's a big grid at the top.