Home Forums Discussions General Discussion Amazing Charts Pricing

I think there should be some sort of tiered pricing based on number of doctors/users. I think so much increase a shocker.

Also there should be sort of a per incident support and also some sort of a yearly gaurdian support, also maybe something to keep getting the updates.

Don't you all know that the initial plot for Terminator wasn't a Dept of Defense computer system, but was a hospital-based EMR that became self-aware and, when they attempted to shut it down, it changed its name and infiltrated the DOD? It intially changed its name on the hospital servers to SoarNet, then CHITT-Net but at the DOD changed it again to SkyNet.

Just joking.

Wayne,
"I'll be Bach... You be Beethoven" lol

We have been in love with that whole series since the first grade B original... Nancy just loves end of the world as we know it, doomsday type story lines... And I'm a part-time sci-fi lover myself and the original concept of going back in time to destroy the mother of you enemy so he can never be born and mess with the whole time space continuum thing is just great... Oh let's not forget that John Connor has to send his own father back in time on what basically is a suicide mission, with his dad Kyle Reese never knowing their own real relationship to one another... What a great set of twists and turns.. Gotta love it...

Just think of all the references we all use these days that came from these movies... Like the insurance industry will keep coming after all your doctors until you are dead.... they don't have any feelings, they don't even rest, that all they do, that's all they'll ever do..."

Now everyone let's not forget with healthcare reform or what is actually being passed off as healthcare reform on the horizon, "it was never our job to actually stop Judgement Day, but merely to survive it.... (John Connor).

Be Well,
Paul

But on a serious note, as I've have said for years we don't want to be the cause of shooting the golden goose who is laying our eggs here... Keeping AC alive, viable no less profitable is in all our own self interests. I too have pushed and strongly believe in a use any clearing house you need to or want integrated PM module side as I was one of the first advocates of such a thing so many years ago...

As opposed to have two different version of AC for those of us who know the Terminator references to CHITT and govt and private corporate intrusion on medical privacy are not all that far fetched, I would simply like a radio button in the Set-up features of the Admin section where we of good conscience can choose whether or not we care to be part of big brother's brave new medical world. Perhaps even allow for such a choice button to be available in the demographics section so each patient, parent and guardian can freely choose whether or not they care to join in this most massive invassion of privacy designed mostly during the wonderful previous, con law, civil rights respecting (gag, cough, cough...) Bush administration....

As for what to pay... Yeah I guess us soloists should have to shoulder a decent share of the costs involved... But don't tell me that each and every doc in a larger practice doesn't benefit from each improvement to the end product and it's functionality and more or less than a soloist does or does not now... Right? Perhaps each doc should have to pay the same amount as an annual user fee, with then the tech support being done in bundles of slightly decreasing in nature since AC does stand to benefit a bit from servicing 10 docs all in one service call... Although I would gather that the more folks mucking around in the works the more likely it is that someone in the office is gonna eventually make a boo-boo somewhere along the line... So even that is not a sure bet or estimate... Only Jon and his folks would know for sure how those numbers pan out in terms of support needed per doc or license as compared across the size of a give group... They've got the data to support this or not.

But I want to see AC get every last penny that they deserve because it is a wonderful product for all the reason we have all stated here for years... We all do better as Jon and AC do better and now he and his team are busting it big time to try and help us all stay current with all this gov't mandate crap all while still actually improving the darn thing and trying to stay true to the original vision Jon had of reasonably cheap cost with great ease of use, with almost all the features any small office should or would need..... that's a pretty tall order as now they have to attempt to keep the buracrates and some of the baised hi-tech judges of what is CHITT and what is not happy too...

So I say let's all pull together and not defend our own little piece of turf too stronly but instead let's find a good middle ground so we can take good care of the most important thing here, the actual product that is AC and its continued growth and success. With keeping that in mind as our mutually held goal, we can help to make sure that innovators like Jon and AC can and will have to be accommidated and integrated at the table and therefore us too, as all this CHITT comes sliding down the pyke aimed squarely at all our heads, doctors and practices.

To AC and let's find some ammicable way to share these cost fairly and in everyone's mutual best interests.. but that depends on what you view as what is honestly in your own best interests, now doesn't it??? Be well...

Paul

My problem with the pricing is that I am a full time doc with a 30 hr per week NP, a 8 hour per week PA, and a new NP starting at 10 hours per week. The 4 provider pricing should be discounted or tiered since 3 providers are part time. I'm starting to miss "pen and paper" Al

At first I thought the best way would be to do it at a ratio such as full time pays full price and eight hours a week may be 0.2. But, what would probably be more fair to Jon would be anyone over 20 hours is full time and anyone under would be part time and pay like $495. It would just be something one would have to factor in when hiring. Pen and paper? I miss the free pen and paper the drug reps gave us, but I would never go back to the old pen and paper.

Yesterday I was ready to trash all my computers and bring out the charcoal and stone slabs!!

Leslie

I'll be honest, I don't see a darn thing wrong w/ the pricing Jon has mentioned. Not one thing. We are all used to seeing pricing w/ discounts for additional providers. But this is a special case. Current pricing is very low. I've priced others where it was $4K for the first doc, and $2K for each additional one. But we're starting off at 1K for the first, and now just makeing that for each. Would we prefer $3K for the first, and now he can give a discount to $1.5K for each additional? Now you have your discount.

Don't get Discount Delusion--thinking that because there is a discount its a good thing. And that without one, it isn't.

Not to beat a dead horse, but I don't think it's about wanting a discount. I think it's psychological and about fairness.

It seems logical to sell the license for $995 which includes one doctor and then charge $595 for each additional.

If I were a practitioner and it made sense for my practice to hire a PA, NP or another physician for five to ten hours per week, it would be hard to swallow paying the exact same amount as a full time provider. $595 is still a good chunk of change and at least the person who is hiring the five hour provider will feel a little better psychologically.

Of course, another way to do it would be just charge $1895 annually which covers one doctor or 100 doctors. Of course, then you are being unfair to the solo doc.

I think the key is getting that money every year which seems to come back to the whole subscription thing, but I have to err on subscription, because Jon needs cash flow each year and needs to know how much is coming in. I use Up-To-Date and Lexi-Comp, and I have to pay for it each year.

Since I may one day need to finally leave my own MS Access EMR to buy AC, I'll chime in. The fairest policy would be to emulate Microsoft and most other "off the shelf" programming platforms and sell AC licenses with consecutive use limits.

For example, if a provider buys 2 licenses, then a maximum of 2 users would be able to log into the back-end tables at the same time. That way, you can have 40 doctors working consecutive schedules of 1 hour or 1 doctor working 40 hours straight... the overall use of AC would be the same, and the cost should likewise be the same.

Seems simple enough to me, and results in overall fairness. Licenses can thus be all priced the same since they simply add functionality rather than get caught up on how many physician pockets one can pick, some of who may hardly use the program at all. Oddly enough, I think that this arcane idea of one software to one user is only seen in EMRs and with Dragon Naturally Speaking (which likewise rediculously requires a different license for each dictator, even if they all use the same software on the same machine).

Al

I'd have to think about it, but it sounds like you may have hit upon a good idea.

After more thought, I do see both sides of the equation. For instance, with servers, you must buy licenses for either users or workstations. So, for instance if you have a call center with ten computers but 30 employees, it makes more sense to buy per computer.

However, if you have a doctor's office with 20 computers and eight users, it makes more sense to purchase per user license.

There is other software such as Microsoft Office and Adobe, etc. that requires a license for one or two computers and must be activated. The big difference as Al suggests is they are not accessing a database.

Therefore I tend to like Al's model which look at one database on the server with multiple licenses. An office could make a choice as Microsoft allows. In other words, a clinic with six computers and 12 half time NPs, may wish to license the six computers while an office with 20 computers and five users may wish to license by the user.

My recommendation given this seems to be such a hot topic (and we all appreciate Jon's letting us give input) would be to form a committee of four or five, hopefully with a mixed group of solo practitioners and those like Aldo above who has a completely different need.

I would propose that the committee meet a couple of times via a phone conference and then meet with Jon a couple of times two. This would at leave give Jon information that he would be able to use. I think any decision he makes would be a better one if he has a good idea of what the users are thinking.

For what it's worth, while there are some upgrades that give a user a chance to move to the next version at less cost, I do not think it is a good idea to let "grandfathered" in users continue at a cheaper cost. If the price changes, I think it should apply to all and be done with.

I dont think that the price of a seat for a Receptionist, or Triage nurse who accesses the computer, and doesnt generate revenue as a direct provider of care , should be the same as the price for a seat for the MD, DO, or PNP/ PA. I do agree that the pricing should be fair though. I think that if one raises the cost of the entry point into getting AC, and has say 1 doc, 1 PA, 1 recep, 1 ofc mgr, 1 Triage Nurse, 1 MA, etc, You could be looking at $6,000 for 6 seats, just to get into this thing. Most of us are not going to afford it, especially on a renewing cycle every year. We should look at setting up tiers of licensing that are workable and not too intimidating to the new doc, or the poor doc.

For instance: 1 provider $995, annual support/renewal $500
2 providers $1500, annual support/renewal $750
3-4 providers $3500, annual support/renewal $1625
5-10 providers $8000, annual support/renewal $3750

This give a little price break for the single or 2 doc office vs the office w/ more providers. The bigger practices, (5-10 providers) are generating enough income to handle the increase in overhead. These figures are just suggested breakpoints, that let the purchaser get some decrement in cost for upfront purchase, and then a tiered support fee that spans a number of provider options.

I have another idea somewhere based on Al Borgue's brilliant idea. When you think of a Microsoft OS, you pay per machine. One machine, one license. Now when you use an OS, you can choose machine or user. Users are either dynamic or fixed, e.g. if you have 10 user licenses, then 10 can log on at the same time. Personally, I find user licenses a crock as even if you have 20 users, the chance that all 20 will be using the database at the same time is still nil. And, if it does happen, the secretary is not going to calmly say, "Oh, I must be #21 as it keeps track of who is using in its table. Therefore computers are the only way to go in that scenario.

Adobe gives you two machines per license with the ability to (by yourself) take off a license from a machine -- key feature. Microsoft Office 2003 and 2007 are the same. Why not this. And, I will use myself as an example.

One server, $1,000 + (7 X $125), $875 = $1,875 annually.

The price for the SQL Server Express Database (whether you use the named instance or not) would be $1,000. (Let's drop the psychological bullshit of the $995.00 sounding cheaper). Each additional machine would cost $125. That may seem cheap, but every office must have at least 2 machines for rooms, one which could be the server, an MA machine and a billing and receptionist. Take away the server, and you have 3 machines = $375 + $1,000 = $1,325 That is one solo practitioner paying $1300 yearly. What would have been one doctor for $995 now is paying $1375, still very fair.

Now, let's look at the 3 doctors and 4 NPs. All four are part time, one 4 hours a week. By definition, the number of computers goes up. You have to have at least one server, 2 computers for each doctor, at least one or two computers for the NPs, one for the receptionist, one or two for the MAs. One or two for the billers/office manager. To be fair, let's go with 7 one of which is the server. So $1,000 plus $600 = $1600. It could easily be 10 or $1,000 + $900 = $1900. If you want to add an NP or MA for four hours a week, go ahead. If he/she doesn't need another license, then your price stays the same. But, every time you increase your staf you will most likely have to purchase another license. And, this has nothing to do with accessing the database. It is just activated per machine.

Now for this, Jon would in return, provide updates along the way which would be downloadable by those who have paid for the new version. When a new UPGRADE comes along, those who are in good stead would be able to download AND activate it. Support would be increased so that Guardian Angel would return calls within 24 hours and be available for chat daily except weekends and holidays. I, personally, would continue to update the AmazingMeds database monthly especially with requests from users and MAY be able to revise the FP database. (MAYBE)

Users would pay on a prorated basis so that all new payments would be due on the same day with a one month grace period. Before anyone shoults subscription service, when Microsoft sells XP Pro, you are entitled to all updated and service packs, but once Vista or Win7 is released try purchasing them for your computers and/or getting support.

Sure, the price is going up, but show me any other EMR that would price an office of 11 users at $1900. Including support. AND support for version 3 is gone after one year.

And, don't tell me about Adobe or other programs. They are run the same way. Adobe is an overpriced, overcomplicated program that can be run on two machines. You can run it forever, but it does come out with new versions which are substantial. The list, as you know from Acronis to Xobni are the same way. Purchase one, then purchase the new versions.

And, I know of no other program where the message boards provide practically free support.

Well, I a for one am not excited about the price increase for tech support. I have paid for tech support. I tried doing the migration myself. I then called in tech support which I have paid for. There seems to be a problem with a corrupt database. This was supposed to be turned over to a programmer. I have called no less than 5 times checking the status without results. Each time I get "we'll call you back" and still no response. Each day my database runs the risk of crashing. This is very poor service and I an not happy with results. I hope no one else has to experience this frustration. I will be very hesitant to renew my subscription for tech support.

Bert, can you think of an EMR that would price 7 "providers" (3MDs,4NPs) at, ooh, $5000? Even without support? One that actually works? No big point here, just curious.

Wayne,

You miss Al's and my point. That's like having a discussion on Netgear firewalls or routers vs a Cisco. So someone suggests that one pay $100 for the first Netgear router and then $50 for the next four and then someone saying can you think of any other company that would charge that little for routers (fogetting other routers in this area). No, I couldn't if I had to think Cisco which would fairly charge $900 or more for each router, because their router/firewall (whether you liked them or not) is a far better overall router/firewall made by a company with much more overhead.

My numbers were just examples and certainly the per machine licenses could be higher. AC, while great, does not cost the same amount of money as eMDs, Praxis, Logician or eCW whether they are good EMRs or not. Some do have PM software linked to them. Now I use AC, because it's faster and I like what it does better, but to be honest, I use it because it is affordable.

This entire thread was started by Jon for ideas on pricing. I agree with Aldo. Is it fair to pay the full amount for someone who works 10 hours per week? Maybe it should be based on FTE.

You stated above that some EMRs you have priced are $4,000 for the first doctor and $2,000 for each additional. So, should I pay $60,000 for a Ford Escort, because Lexus charges $70,000?

I have always thought that AC has been too inexpensive. And, therein lies the rub. It ironically makes it difficult to increase pricing. The price needs to go up. But, how do you do it so it is fair to everyone.

Either activation or Al's idea on dynamic user licenses makes the most sense.

The only thing I would like to bring up is that with increased price, if you start getting to around the 5 provider range, people start looking around at your more expensive competitors and seeing that they aren't 3 times more expensive anymore. With previous pricing in place Amazing Charts was the hands down best bang for the buck. If people have to pay the new pricing it would be easier to for many to choose a "tried and true" program or suite that has been around longer, and is more well known.

That may be fine. It would appear that even with the conversion to SQL, that large practices may require more hand holding.

Some of this is because with the onesy twosy practices, we tend to figure things out for ourselves, to use the user board more. With larger practices, it is probably the IT person who is being held responsible every time something does not work right. When you do it yourself you are probably more tolerant then when you have assigned someone else to fix it.

So much for our input. But, then, I guess a few on here backed up the new pricing.

Bert, if you look at Jon's initial post, he stated what the price increase was going to be and asked for input. Although we have 6 pages of dialog, much of it was variations on a theme. Given how hot topics generate a lot of response, this one was good but not sizzling.

Overall, I feel we did validate that it was fair, no one actually flamed out stating it was grossly unfair or anti-American or against the first (or 92nd) amendment or such. We came up with other ideas, discussed how it might impact larger practices and such.

I, for one, did not feel in reading it we were likely to make a change unless we all felt it was grossly unfair (which I did not, although it does have a more significant impact on the larger practices.) Some of the price differential with it's competetors is lost on large practices.

Overall, as a solo practitioner, it does not affect my pocketbook, and I do understand why he charges more for larger practices.

I don't know. I guess I would have to disagree. It's certainly fair for me. Maybe not as much as those practices with more providers. But, then again, a provider is a provider after all.


I just found this a bit amusing as it didn't seem as though our comments which were solicited really amounted to much other than to have some interesting and educational and lively debate among users on the subject.

Kind of like my telling the staff I am thinking of painting the walls of the office blue. Please give me your thoughts. Then after they tell me red, green, yellow, orange and brown, I go with blue anyway.

Not right or wrong. Just my perception.

I have to admit, I am my usual suspicious self. Perhaps Jon's initiating the conversation was simply his way of softening the blow. Forewarn your customers of an impending price increase by making them think they will be contributing to the decision-making process. As a solo physician the price increase (this time) does not affect me. I agree with others, however. I think it makes AC a lot less attractive to the multi-user groups. I think there should have been some discount for them. As far as NP's or part-time users, those work-hour decisions are those of the practice and not Jon. A user is a user regardless of whether they work a 60 hour week or a 20 hour one.

Leslie

Leslie,

Very nice post. Once again the voice of reason. Your point abot the mid-levels is an excellent one that I had not thought of.

Has anyone been successful at locking in for the old price?

We have been round and round and still unable to enter a credit card w/o making a new purchase.

Tech support also seems puzzled.

Have you called and talked with SALES - press the button for sales and do not talk with tech support. If you set up your credit card when you paid for yearly support it should still be valid. I talked with Jon and he said that they normally look at the expiration dates before running it.

If anyone has talked with SALES maybe they could chime in.

I upgraded my credit card data and added a nurse practitioner who I had not previously.

This sparked me to send an email to Jon because I noticed that there is a $200 charge to add a provider that is really not spelled out well. The cost per provider goes up by $100.00 in perpetuity in the old system but nowhere else did I see reference to the "add a provider" charge until I went to add it.

Jon stated that it has always been that way, and it was more clearly stated in the NEW pricing but was not spelled out as well in the OLD pricing.

Another question that I raised to him regarded residents, and whether they should be considered providers and should be paid for (which I felt they should not, but...)

His response seemed very reasonable, it was:

"In terms of residents, I don’t feel one needs to purchase a license for them. They, like med students, are still the responsibility of the attending, so one doesn’t need a license for them if they are just rotating through. If they are working in the practice and getting paid by the practice to do so, that is another story and then they are a provider and need a license."

I had seen the old 200.00 charge in the past for each provider past 1 with 100 per year for tech support. The difference is after July 1st it will be 995 per provider to add and then 500 per year.

I also added a provider under the old fee structure.

Whatever the current pricing, I am sure glad that the fees are reasonable. It's not like we are paying $30,000 base fee for Centricity/Logician and then adding licenses for EVERY SINGLE USER. Rather Jon and AC differentiate user from provider and only providers require a license to use AC.

I know that under the prior versions of AC, additional providers could be added and not paid for. It was solely based upon the honor system. Does anyone know if V4 will allow you to create a user account who is set up as provider, but not actually register and hence pay for this change? I have not tried this as I'm a solo doc. Just curious though if anyone else has tried.

That is interesting. The honor system was nice in part because some of the defiencies especially in areas where provider sign off was necessary, made the addition of "dummy providers" helpful.

Going to bed Bert, we'll watch that movie tomorrow. Call when you get up.

I'm think the honor system is still active, since med students and residents don't have to be registered, but I was covering the slot I was using for the future. I think for now the dummy provider slot is OK, but I'm not sure about the future.

I agree, but as long as there are problems with workarounds. And, do you really think when the mothership checks in to see if you have the latest version, it can check what your settings are?

I don't know.

Sure it does, when you restart the program at the bottom it states you are licenced for x number of providers.

Jon has been on the honor system and I appreciate that. I think he and we will need to come up with a workaround for dummy providers and students if he ever decides to get serious.

Sure it doesn't. That number is directly related to how many licenses you purchased. Mine say one. I have "two" providers.

I misunderstood you. I suspect it would not be difficult to check how many active providers are in your database. It can, for example, tell how many patients you have.

The problem would come, for example, that I have 5 providers: 2 are residents, one is an NP, one is a dummy provider, and myself. I have no intention of paying for the residents, and fortunately Jon agrees with this. I also have no intention of paying for Dr. Referral Labs (dummy provider). There currently is no way to differentiate from a Live producing provider. I wonder if it excluded those requiring cosigns???

Good question. I suppose you either go on the honor system or you go with activation. Which reminds me. One of the experts on Experts-Exchange showed me this really cool program which allows you to customize your ribbon. I hated having to click on the Review tab to get to the Spell checker and then have it on the opposite side than Outlook.

That came out of nowhere because it has to be activated. Which is kinda lame for just customizing Word. But, with activation it solves the whole problem for the most part.

Moved thread on ePrescribing to General Discussion:

http://www.amazingcharts.com/ub/ubbthreads.php/topics/14876

Please post there if you have any comments on that topic.

Thanks.

There is Unicharts which is priced a little below AC for the software and way below AC on support. They are still in the fetal or toddler stage though, and not CCHIT, so they also may find it difficult to keep up with that pricing.

I run a VERY small practice. It's like a "Peter Pan" practice--never wants to grow up. In other words, I want to keep it small indefinitely by keeping a tiny overhead. This has succeeded since 2003 so far.

My concern would be that AC would grow and grow, and along with that would eventually be priced out of my ballpark (which is like the neighbor's backyard -- not Comiskey Park).

I agree with what one of the "regulars" posted in another thread. It would benefit me to keep the PM module separate and optional. I have no interest in it, and would rather not bear the burden of helping to pay for it.

In some sort of way, make Amazing Charts "Small practice Edition", and Amazing Charts "Super Size Edition" or "Enterprise" or whatever. That way you can keep Amazing charts at its low-priced niche, while serving those who want to grow and increase to bigger things. That scheme works for the other software firms.

Gee, I hope this gets read.

It was read, and I can't agree more.

As an aside, I use this website forum called Experts-Exchange, which I consider the best site for help with any computer question or even quantum physics or cell phones for that matter. They recently started this practice where experts or users can choose other experts for "Follow-me." In that capacity, when one of those users post in a thread the expert who chose to follow the other expert is notified. Why did I write all this? It just seems as though I keep following Peter around and commenting on his posts, lol.