Operating as a private business, GPs are free to determine reasonable fees that are reflective of the services they provide. If you are privately or directly billed, you are paying the GP’s fee in full. You will then receive the relevant patient rebate from Medicare for the service you received, subsidising part of the fee you were charged. The Medicare rebate may not cover the total cost of the health service. The Australian Medical Association (AMA) fee structure forms the basis of our billing policy and our doctors charge the fees that reflect the time taken and degree of complexity in each consultation.

Bulk billing is where the service is billed in full to Medicare. Bulk billing means that the doctor is paid directly by Medicare, on behalf of the patient. This means that the amount paid for each medical service is the amount set by the Australian Government. Unfortunately Medicare Benefits Schedule (MBS) patient rebates have not kept pace with inflation and the amount set by the Government for a consultation is insufficient to cover the costs of providing a high quality medical service. In October 2020, the bulk billing incentive for General Practice was halved.

We offer some bulk billed services including:
• Childhood Immunisations
• GP Management / Care Plans
• Government Funded Health Assessments

In today’s environment, it’s not possible to bulk bill every patient. We have given a great deal of consideration to who is eligible to be bulk billed. The fees at Mosman Park Family Practice are less than the AMA recommended rates and costs associated with running a medical practice. It is difficult to ensure business viability as costs continue to rise. Inconsistent and insufficient indexation of the MBS has strained the viability of our practice offering bulk billing to patients.

General practice is the most efficient and cost effective part of the health system. Within the MBS, specialist GP consultations are valued far less than equivalent consultations by other medical specialists, even after adjusting for different consultation structures and training time. Given other medical specialist consultation items are not time-tiered, an initial non-GP consultation item could take less than 10 minutes and still attract a patient rebate more than twice that of the equivalent GP item.

Private billing doctors tend to have a more stable pool of repeat patients, meaning that you can develop good personal relationships during consultation with you doctor and allow them to gain a better idea of your medical history and tailor to your medical and lifestyle needs. Practices that use private billing often have a lower daily patient number. With the pressure to get patients in and out the door quickly alleviated, this allows doctors to spend longer with each patient, work through issues in more depth and provided a higher quality of care.