FYI We do NOT follow late opening or early closing procedures of Fairfax County.  If Fairfax County schools are open late or close early, the office remains open for appointments as usual for the day.  Your child’s therapist will contact you about keeping or re-scheduling that day’s appointment.

Payment Policy (effective 9/1/2009)

Payment for therapy sessions is required at the completion of each appointment with your child’s therapist.  A superbill will be provided to you at that time, showing the amount due and paid, as well as all necessary coding required by insurance companies. Payments can be made by check, cash or credit card at the Annandale or McLean offices.  Therapy sessions are inclusive of time for writing of treatment notes, parent feedback, billing/payment, clean-up and preparation.  Accordingly, direct treatment time with your child for a one-hour session would be 45-50 minutes, 35-40 minutes for a 45 minute session, and 25 minutes for a half hour session.

If your child is being evaluated for services, we require full payment at the time of the assessment.  The evaluation cost will depend on the amount of testing done and time required for interpretation, scoring, consultation with additional professionals, etc.

We are not participating providers for any insurance company and therefore submission of invoices/claims is the responsibility of the patient’s family.

Two week notice is required to alert your child’s therapist to any unexpected termination of service.  A fee equal to 2 weeks of service will be charged without this notice.

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Cancellation Policy (effective 9/1/2009)

In order to ensure your child gets the most out of his/her therapy program and that our therapist’s available time is maximized, we must adhere to the following strict cancellation policy:

24-hour cancellation is preferred whenever possible; however, you must notify the office/therapist by 8:00am on the day of your appointment to avoid incurring a fee.  Please leave a message in your child’s therapist’s voice mailbox if someone is not personally available to take your call.  The machine will record the day and time of your call.  Email cancellations are not acceptable unless made one week in advance of your scheduled appointment.

All no-show appointments or appointments canceled after 8:00am on the day of your child’s scheduled session will be charged the full therapy fee. This is necessary due to therapists time spent planning and setting up for that particular session and her/his inability to see another child during that time slot, with late notice. Makeup appointments are strongly encouraged but you will still be expected to pay for the missed session as well as the makeup session, unless made-up on the day of your regularly scheduled appointment.

Should you fail to cancel an appointment and/or not show up at your scheduled appointment three times, therapy will be terminated. The same will hold true for frequent cancellations without rescheduling. You will be billed for any outstanding balance.

If you arrive late to an appointment, you are still responsible for the full session fee.

An 85% attendance rate is essential for your child’s progress.  Therefore, during the 10 month school year, only 6 cancelled sessions are allowed for a once/week scheduled session or 12 for a child who is scheduled to receive treatment twice/week.   After your cancellation limit has been reached, you will be charged for ½ of the treatment session rate for each subsequent cancellation, if unable to reschedule within 2 weeks of the cancelled appointment.

Scheduling makeup appointments is strongly encouraged to ensure consistency in your child’s treatment program.  If scheduled within two weeks of an on-time cancel, the missed appointment will not count against your child’s allowed missed sessions. This is, however, dependent on therapist availability and therefore not guaranteed. 

GROUP – This cancellation policy also applies to group therapy sessions, however, make-up appointments are not generally available.  Frequent cancellations will result in a loss of your group treatment spot as one child’s absence affects the entire group dynamic and progress.

 

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Sickness Policy (effective 9/1/2009)

In order to ensure the health of your child, the health of other children that we serve, and the health of our therapists, we request that parents/caregivers cancel therapy sessions for the following communicable illnesses as soon as symptoms appear:

• Fever of 100 degrees or over, within 24 hours of a visit
• Runny or stuffy nose with green mucus
• Influenza (flu)
• Strep Throat, unless child has been on antibiotics for four days
• Child or anyone in household with conjunctivitis (pink eye)
• Child or anyone in household with RSV (Respiratory syncytial virus)
• Vomiting or diarrhea within 24 hours of a visit
• Rotavirus
• Head lice
• Hand, foot, and mouth virus
• Ring worm
• Contagious rashes
• Any other contagious conditions
• Any illness preventing you or your child from participating in normal daily activities
• Any illness preventing your child from attending daycare or school

This policy applies to siblings in the waiting area of our clinic.  If you are unsure if your child’s condition is contagious, please consult your doctor before his/her session.

It is important to cancel for these conditions to protect the health of your child and the numerous other children we serve each day.  Although some illnesses seem less severe than others, they can be detrimental to a medically fragile child. 

If a therapist notices any of the above conditions, your child’s session may be ended early.  Payment for the session will still be expected.

Please help us to protect all of the children at Skill Builders by respecting the Sickness Policy.

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