A group of Jacksonville, FL-area hospital systems have begun letting patients pay their bills online in an effort to save time and money. The hospitals involved include St. Vincent's Medical Center, Orange Park Medical Center and Memorial Hospital of Jacksonville. In doing this, the hospitals are on the cutting edge, as only 16 percent of U.S. hospitals provide this option, according to the American Hospital Association. Still, hospitals stand to benefit substantially. Transitioning from paper processes to electronic ones could save the industry $35 billion and about 2.5 billion pieces of paper each year, according to the Healthcare Financial Management Association.

One early adopter of this approach is St. Vincent's, which uses ExpressBill Online by Emdeon Business Services to handle the payments. It began offering web payments with Emdeon in 2003, after having been a longer-term user of the vendor's statement processing software. To pay using the web, St. Vincent's patients simply enroll online, then choose a payment source (checking account or credit card).

To learn more about online bill payment:
- read this Jacksonville Business Journal article

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