A billing supervisor presides over a team of clerks who are responsible for sending invoices to clients, and for collecting payments. The supervisor must assign duties in the billing office and oversee the day-to-day activities of the clerks. In some instances, the supervisor may have the authority to recruit and terminate clerks while supervisors are almost always responsible for providing on-the-job training and advice.
Insurance firms, hospitals, satellite television companies and other service providers usually employ in-house billing teams, and these teams are managed by a billing supervisor. Some employers require supervisors to have obtained college degrees in business administration, accounting, management or a similar field. Other firms simply employ experienced and skilled billing clerks into supervisor roles. Major insurance firms may employ several billing supervisors to preside over teams of clerks that handle payments for different types of policies.
On a daily basis, the billing supervisor usually must provide clerks with lists of clients that need to be invoiced for recent services. In many instances, the supervisor has to complete daily, weekly or monthly reports to keep track of the number of clients that have been invoiced and the number of bills that have been paid. The supervisor may assist clerks with locating clients that cannot be easily reached. Additionally, the billing supervisor normally has some knowledge of local collections practices and laws and can therefore advise clerks on the best legal manner in which to collect a past due debt.
Clients sometimes dispute invoices either because the listed services were not provided or because the invoice total deviates from the estimated cost of services. In many countries, insurance firms pay medical premiums on behalf of the insured, but insurance policies usually only cover certain costs. In this case the billing clerks must invoice the insured for the remainder of the bill. Charges involving co-payments often result in disputes between clerks and consumers. Such disputes are usually escalated to the billing supervisor who has the authority to waive charges or to affirm the information provided by the clerk if the invoice was correct.
Aside from attempting to resolve disputes involving clients, the billing supervisor also has to deal with inter-personal disputes involving clerks. The billing supervisor normally has the responsibility for writing the staff schedule and usually has the authority to discipline staff who are tardy, fail to show up for work or who perform poorly at work. In some countries, employees are required to submit time cards that detail their worked hours and the billing supervisor has to sign these cards to authorize payroll payments.