Understanding lost revenue and patient retention
- Owner
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Two sections of Insights deal with money you didn’t make and patients you might not see again: Money left on the table and Do patients come back. This article explains how each figure is worked out, so you can act on it with confidence. Like the rest of Insights, they’re for owners only.
Money left on the table
These figures cover appointments due to start in the period you’ve chosen (30 days, 90 days or 12 months).
| Figure | What it means |
|---|---|
| Cancellations | Appointments in the period that were cancelled, by you or the patient |
| No-shows | Appointments in the period marked as a no-show |
| List value of lost slots | What the cancelled and no-show appointments were priced at, using each appointment type’s price |
| Recovered | Booking fees you kept after a late cancellation, plus no-show fees charged, in the period |
| Refunded | Money paid back to patients on payments taken in the period |
The percentage under Cancellations and No-shows is the share of bookings. Bookings here means cancelled, no-show, confirmed and completed appointments added together.
List value of lost slots is the price of the diary time you lost, not money you were owed. Comparing it with Recovered shows how much of that loss your booking fees and no-show fees are covering.
Suggestions you may see
- If no-shows are 5% of bookings or more, What to look at flags it, and says how many lost bookings were for treatments that take no booking fee.
- If no-shows are lower but three or more lost bookings were for treatments with no booking fee, it suggests adding one.
To protect those slots, see Take booking fees and Charge no-show fees. Marking appointments correctly matters here: an appointment that was missed but never marked as a no-show won’t be counted. See Appointment statuses.
Do patients come back
Whether a patient returns depends on their whole history, not one month, so some of these figures cover all time rather than the period you’ve chosen.
| Figure | What it means |
|---|---|
| Patients seen | Different patients with an appointment in the period. The note shows how many of them had been before. |
| Returning rate | Of the patients seen in the period, the percentage whose first appointment was before the period started |
| Patients who book more than once | Across all time, the percentage of patients with more than one appointment. The note shows the numbers behind it. |
| Visits per patient | Across all time, the average number of appointments per patient |
Cancelled appointments never count as a visit. All-time figures include appointments already booked for the future.
Suggestions you may see
Once you have at least 10 patients with appointments:
- If fewer than 40% have booked more than once, What to look at points out how many have only booked once, and suggests prompting a second booking after a first visit.
- If 60% or more come back, it tells you so, and that growth is mostly about reaching new patients.
Good to know
- A short period makes almost everyone look new, which is why the returning rate compares against each patient’s full history.
- Money figures come from payments recorded in Clinicify. Fees you collect outside Clinicify aren’t included in Recovered.
- Appointments with no appointment type still count as cancellations or no-shows, but add nothing to List value of lost slots.
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Related articles
- Clinic insights See what your clinic earns, which treatments and practitioners bring it in, your busiest days, and suggestions on what to change. Owners only.
- Take booking fees Ask patients to pay a booking fee when they book online. It secures the slot, comes off the treatment price and saves their card.
- Charge no-show fees Set a no-show fee that's charged automatically to the patient's saved card when you mark an appointment as a no-show.
- Appointment statuses: completed, no-show and cancelled What each appointment status means, what Clinicify does when you mark an appointment complete, a no-show or cancelled, and how to undo a mistake.