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This page provides you with the complete users' manual for Practice MAGIC for Windows.   (To view a MAC manual click on the words "View MAC Manual" below.)  Included is a table of contents with hyperlinks that allow you to click on a subject item and jump to that portion of the manual. Assuming that you have opened this page with a web-browser like Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator, you can also use the FIND feature that your web-browser provides in the EDIT menu to look in this manual for particular subjects you are interested in. There is also a troubleshooting guide with links to relevant sections of the manual. (The MAC version works very similarly to Windows with most of the same menu items, but without some of the bells and whistles. A manual for the MAC version is available on the NEXT page of this website.)

Click here to View MAC Manual.

Program License Information

File: Save and Quit, Save (w/o quitting), Restore Backupped File(s), Jump

Edit: Client/Insurance Company Info, Client Info on CMS-1500, Client List, User Data, Client Notes, Add New Client or Ins. Co , Edit Holiday List

Display: Ahead 1 Week, Back 1 Week,  Schedule Next Week, Info about Client & Fee, Client $ Status, Jump to new week, Client Phone No., Quick $ Status, Add Client, Electronic Billing Not Yet Sent, Electronic Billing History, Total Month's Billing

CMS-1500: Add Client,  Edit/Display Client Info on CMS-1500,  Print insur. form,  Print insur. form to disk file (Electronic Billing),  Print insur forms for all,  Print insur forms to disk for all, Instructions for Using the CMS-1500 Templates.

Change: Name, Time,  Frequency,  Procedure,  Visit #,  Comment

Print: Client Phone List, Statement, Insurance Forms, Client $ Status, Address Envelopes/labels, Day Sheet, Calendar, Alert Summary, Disable/enable Printer,  Statements for All, Insur. Forms for All, Billing Report, Receivables Report for All,  Receivables Update Only, Printer Setup, Set Print Scaling

Appt: Move (temp), Skip, Cancel/No Show, Cancel/Terminate, Move (perm), Reschedule (temp),  Vacation

Special: Set Alert, Cancel Alert, Alert Summary, Select/Unselect, Select all/Unselect all,  Activate the Palm Hotsync (Palm Pilot/MAGIC Interface) or Change Palm Pilot Settings

Deposit: Deposit Checks, Income Report:

Users (This menu is in Multi-user versions ONLY): Add/Delete User, List of Users

Appendix B: Trouble Shooting Guide:   If you are having a problem with:

Appendix C: Sample Output: Client/Patient Statement (Not included in Web version)

TECHNICAL SUPPORT: Cornucopia Software will, at its sole discretion, supply a "reasonable" amount of technical support TO A SINGLE USER (even if the software is a multi-user version) of each Practice MAGIC software program at no additional charge for a period of three months from the time of original purchase, after which there will be a charge for support.

1. Turn your computer on and if it does not go directly into windows automatically, type WIN to go into WINDOWS.

       START-->Programs-->MAGIC-->Practice MAGIC

When you run MAGIC for the first time: When Practice MAGIC runs for the first time, a file display box will appear on the screen and you will be asked to click on Practice MAGIC in the box and then the OPEN button. (Click on Practice MAGIC demo if you are running the demo.) The next screen you will see after a title screen will give you some instructions about giving MAGIC information about your printer and about you. Click on "OK" to advance, and MAGIC will automatically print a test sheet from your printer, and display a series of screens that allow you to enter precise information about how your printer positions printed matter on a sheet of paper plus a screen that allows you to EDIT the USER DATA file, a file of data that MAGIC maintains about you, the user, including your name and address. The printed sheet and these screens will only appear the first time you run the MAGIC program or until clients have been entered into the program. You can return to the USER DATA editing screen any time, however, by clicking on the EDIT menu of the main MAGIC screen and then dragging down to USER DATA.  

Fill in the information on each line of USER DATA, and then press <ENTER> to proceed to the next line or click on the line you would like to fill out. Several entries may be unclear from the prompt. For instance, leave the line "User code" blank. For "printer type code," (line #25) enter 0 for printers that do not print in landscape mode (envelopes are not fed end first), and 1 for printers that do have the capability of printing in landscape mode (envelopes are fed end first) The information lines asking the minimum top and left margins that your printer is capable of are critical to printing accurately on insurance forms like the HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 and will be filled out automatically by a utility called "SET PRINT SCALE," which was run automatically the first time you ran Practice MAGIC before the current edit screen and can be run any time from the PRINT Menu.   If you received a Windows version of Practice MAGIC on a CD Rom disk after November of 2002, the program can print the entire HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 form on a color printer, rather than just fill one out.  "SET PRINT SCALE," will ask you whether you want to do this; alternatively you can instruct MAGIC to do this by placing an asterisk ("*") at the end of line #25 of USERDATA.  (Note, that it is far more economical to use preprinted forms. ) . [If you later find that these settings are slightly off, you can go back an adjust them. If printing is too high, decrease the minimum top margin (line 20 in User data) in 1/12" increments. If printing is too low, increase the minimum top margin. If it is too far to the right, increase the minimum left margin (line 18). If it is too far to the left, decrease the minimum left margin.  If   the type lines up properly on top part of HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 when it is printed but becomes gradually out of alignment further down the page or if type lines up properly on left part of HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 when it is printed but becomes gradually out of alignment further right on the page, you should remeasure the vertical (up and down) and horizontal (right and left) lines printed by the SET PRINT SCALE option and you will find that it is not EXACTLY 3 inches long. Enter the EXACT distances when prompted by the program.] When you have entered all the information you wish, click on the DONE button. The information you have entered will be saved automatically and SET PRINT SCALE will execute, printing a sheet automatically from your printer. The SET PRINT SCALE utility is also an option in your MAGIC Calendar PRINT menu. You will be asked to make some measurements on the page that has printed, and to enter these from your keyboard. Next you will be informed that MAGIC is loading calendar files and then an instruction notice will appear indicating how to fill out the blank calendar that is about to be displayed.

PRINTER NOTES:
The following paragraphs provide solutions to problems that can occur with certain printers. Practice MAGIC comes to you with "BM1" added to the "printer type code" on line 25 of your MAGIC UserData file (accessed through the calendar EDIT menu). This causes, the bottom line of print to be omitted when filling out a HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 insurance form so that on the HCFA-1500, the date in box #31 and PIN# and GRP# in box #33 of the form are not printed, and on the CMS-1500, box 32a (NPI of Place of Service), box 33a (NPI) and 33b (other provider I.D. number) are not printed. Removing the "BM1" will allow the bottom line to be printed, but certain pinters will print that bottom line by itself on a second sheet of paper. If your printer does this, and it is important to you to print the date or PIN# or NPI#, do the following: BEFORE STARTING MAGIC, you will need to click on PRINTERS AND FAXES in your WINDOWS' CONTROL PANEL, then right-click on your printer, then select SETTINGS or PROPERTIES and then change the page size to "8.5 x 14" or "8.5 x 13" rather than "8.5 x 11".   (Note that for most printers, setting the paper size to longer than 11 inches will cause the printer to print off the bottom of the sheet when printing very long statements, so you will need to use the same procedure to change to 8.5 x 11 inch pages to print two page statements.)    If you received a Windows version of Practice MAGIC on a CD Rom disk after November of 2002, the program can print the entire HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 form on a color printer, rather than just fill one out.  To do this, edit line #25 of USERDATA (which you can edit by selecting USERDATA from the MAGIC calendar screen EDIT menu) and MAGIC will take you through a small wizard which will ask you a few questions including whether you want to fill out the HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 form or print the entire form.  If you request that it print the entire form, you will notice, when the wizard finishes, an asterisk ("*") has been placed at the end of line #25 of the USER DATA ("Printer Type Code"). 

If your printer feeds envelopes end first and you find that envelopes are not being addressed properly, first test your printer by using an 8.5x11 sheet instead of an envelop. If envelopes are fed from the middle of the paper tray or sheet feeder follow the number "1" on line #25 with the letters CF.  If MAGIC is attempting to address envelopes on the opposite side from which they are fed follow the number "1" on line #25 with "LF" (This is usually the case if, as the envelop enters the printer, it is entering on it's right side.) Add an "NF" if you are finding that the return address on envelops is being cut off and "NF14" instead of "NF" if, in addition, you regularly indicate in print setup that you are printing on 8.5 by 14 inch sheets so that the printer will print to the bottom of an HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 form. (see above) Some printers, like the HP Laserjet III or IV allow you to set print parameters from the control panel, and may not automatically reset to a 10 c.p.i. font when turned on; for these printers be sure that the font is set to a 12 point 10 c.p.i. font and that they are set for not more than 60 lines per page.

The MAGIC Calendar Screen: The calendar screen is the first screen that will appear in subsequent uses of Practice MAGIC unless you indicated on line #58 of your userdata information that you wish to be notified what reports are due whenever Magic is run, in which case the first screen will be a list of "alerts.". The first calendar screen will also list the version number at the bottom of the screen and all subsequent fresh calendar screens will display the total for billable services for the week displayed.  From the calendar screen, appointments can be filled in by clicking on the appropriate appointment hour. Type the first ten characters of the last name, the first several letters of the client/patient's last name followed by a period, or the two letter initials of the client/patient ("name code"). (Do not put periods or spaces after the letters in initials.) You will then be asked for additional information about the client/patient. When you are returned to the calendar screen, the appointment time (11:00) followed by the client's first initial and last name, the default procedure code ("C.P.T. 90801" for first visits of clients with a copay of less then 100% and "C.P.T. 90806" for subsequent visits), the word "temp" (the default frequency code which indicates that this client is not seen each week at the same time) and the visit number, which is assumed to be "1" the first time a client name is introduced, will be displayed at the bottom of the screen.

Placing "&" in the name code for couples or families being seen conjointly (i.e. "A&R", "AB&RS" or "A&RS") will cause MAGIC to automatically generate the C.P.T. procedure code for couples therapy. If you are seeing more than two people in a family conjointly, use the initials of only two. The default procedure for non-couples can be set by clicking on the desired procedure line (lines #27 to #37 and #59 to #64) in the userdata file and checking the box that says, "Default procedure code for all visits."  If no other procedure default is defined, individual psychotherapy, 50 min. ("90806" - line #27) is automatically used as the default for visits other than first visits and "C.P.T. 90801" for first visits of clients who's copay is indicated as less then 100%; however, explicitly assigning any procedure as the default, including "90806," as described above, prevents "C.P.T. 90801" from being used as the default for first visits. Also, the default procedure for first visits can be set by clicking on the desired procedure line (lines #27 to #37 and #59 to #64) in the userdata file and checking the box that says, "Default procedure code for first visits."

In the calendar window and all other screens where there is a green pull-down client/insurance company list, the green data entry box can be opened by clicking on the arrow to the right of it to reveal a complete list of clients and insurance companies. Clicking on any one of these will cause the code for that client to be entered in the currently selected appointment slot. If it is difficult to distinguish between insurance companies in this list with the same name but different addresses, you can make the list box wider by holding the SHIFT key down and pressing the right arrow key. Once you have opened the client list box in this wider format, it will open in the wider format each time you open it during that session of MAGIC. The exception is the initial-information screen for client information, which has a pull-down list box for the name of the client's insurance company.  This list box can be expanded by holding the SHIFT key down and pressing the left arrow key rather than the right one.  This will be intuitively clear when you see it.  In this screen, holding the SHIFT key down and pressing the right arrow key causes the list box to contract.

How MAGIC Works with Palm Pilots and other Handhelds with the Palm Operating System (Pre 1.4 only):

MAGIC DOES NOT HOTSYNC WITH NEWER PALM HANDHELDS. If you have a version of Practice MAGIC that contains the optional Palm/MAGIC hotsync interface and your palm is running a Palm Operating System that is PRIOR to Ver. 1.4, MAGIC will hotsync with your Palm Datebook desktop software every time MAGIC is run. (Handhelds that use an operating system other than the Palm operating system will not work with MAGIC) This means that each time you run MAGIC, you should first hotsync your handheld to the desktop computer and then after running MAGIC you should hotsync them again.

Getting started with the palm interface:

     Of particular importance also, is that the PALM Desktop software permits you to give your handheld a name for the purposes of identification, and to change that name when you wish.  An idiosyncrasy of the Palm/MAGIC interface is that the name you give to your handheld should be no more than five characters. If it is longer, you should shorten it by running your Palm Desktop software, opening the pull-down list entitled "USERS" at the top right of your screen (by clicking on the little arrow on its left side), and then selecting EDIT USERS.  Click on the user name you are using, and select RENAME. (Shortening the user name in this way ensures that the name of the PALM subdirectory containing your desktop datebook information is the same as your user name, which is what MAGIC requires.)

Operating MAGIC with the PALM hotsync interface: Each time you run MAGIC, you should first hotsync your handheld to the desktop computer and then after running MAGIC you should hotsync them again.  Your PALM Desktop software maintains an electronic image of your handheld, which you can access and edit using the Palm Desktop software that came with your handheld. Every entry you make in your handheld will be transferred to MAGIC except entries that you designate in the PALM datebook as repeating (i.e. weekly). These will be ignored. (In other words, don't designate appointments to repeat in your handheld if you want them to appear in your MAGIC calendar.)     If you wish, these can be designated as "weekly" from the MAGIC Calendar instead. With that exception, any changes you have made to your PALM datebook calendar will automatically be transferred to your MAGIC calendar each time you run the PALM version of MAGIC. You can cancel appointments by simply removing them from your PALM datebook using DELETE. Accordingly, any entry that is in your MAGIC Calendar when you start MAGIC and is not also present on the handheld will be assumed to have been cancelled on the handheld and therefore will be removed from the MAGIC Calendar. A warning screen will appear to alert you to appointments that are being deleted from the MAGIC calendar and you will have the option of preserving them.  Any changes you make to your MAGIC calendar while running the PALM version of Practice MAGIC will automatically be transferred to your PALM datebook calendar, so you should again hotsync your handheld to the desktop each time exit MAGIC. In addition, for each appointment that is transferred, the visit number, procedure number, alert information, and client phone number(s) will also be transferred into the PALM notes for that appointment. For more information on features of the MAGIC/PALM hotsync see the section "How the PALM/MAGIC Interface Works (with Palm Pilots and other Handhelds using the Palm Operating System) - Features."   For information on setting the various MAGIC parameters that apply to your handheld, see the sections on Activating the PALM/MAGIC Interface and on Initializing the Handheld's Datebook with MAGIC's Calendar Entries and Setting PALM/MAGIC Parameters.

<Pg Up> <Pg Up> Will show the previous week's appointments. <Pg Up> Will show the previous week's appointments. <Pg Up> Will show the previous week's appointments. <Pg Up> Will show the previous week's appointments. <Pg Up> Will show the previous week's appointments.

MAGIC displays a week's calendar of hourly appointment slots.

To schedule a group, type the word GROUP. A code of "GP:" will be assigned to the group and you will be asked to give the client codes of the group members. If the program does not automatically assign GROUP PSYCHOTHERAPY as the procedure code, go the the CHANGE menu and select PROCEDURE and then the appropriate Procedure. The fee for that procedure will be taken from the fee listed for that procedure in each group member's client information file. If GROUP already refers to another group, and you wish to begin a new group, add a number, i.e. "GROUP2" or "GROUP5." A simple way to verify the group you have scheduled is the one you intended is to place the cursor on the group appointment in question and press the fourth option in the DISPLAY menu, and a list of client/patients will appear at the bottom of the screen.

Placing a period before an appointment description in an appointment hour indicates to MAGIC that this is not a clinical appointment. These appointments will not be checked against the client list, and will appear on the screen in a different color.

FILE "File" to Exit program, saving changes, Exit with Backup, Display a different Calendar week.

EDIT "Edit" to edit user information; edit list of clients/patients; or edit information or progress notes for a particular client/patient.

DISPLAY "Display" to move calendar ahead one week, back one week, schedule the following week automatically, see information about a client/patient, run a status on a client or display a different calendar week.

HCFA-1500/CMS-1500  The "HCFA-1500/CMS-1500" menu redundantly provides in one place all the functions that would be required by someone only interested in using Practice MAGIC for filling out and printing HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 forms for clients. The entries are in the order one would use them: add a client, edit the client information on an on-screen HCFA-1500/CMS-1500, and print it. These are exactly the same functions as "Add Client" in the DISPLAY menu, "Client Info on HCFA" in the EDIT menu, and "Print insur. form" in the PRINT menu respectively. There is a fourth menu entry under HCFA-1500/CMS-1500, "Print all insur forms," which is the same as the entry under PRINT with the same name.

CHANGE "Change" to change name, time, frequency, procedure code, visit number, or comment for the appointment identified by the cursor.

PRINT "Print" to print client/patient list, statements, insurance forms, envelopes (or labels), calendar.

APPT "Appt" to cancel, skip, move, reschedule or terminate appointment at cursor location or designate a vacation day for therapist.

SPECIAL "Special" to set a visit number at which you would like Practice MAGIC to alert you when you schedule that appointment. (This function is often important for managed care situations in which reports are due periodically.) Also used to select or unselect clients/patients for print functions.

DEPOSIT "Deposit" to fill out and print check deposit slips and to generate income reports.

FILE

"Save & Exit"  Used to exit the program, save your work, or move to a different part of the calendar. Choosing "Save & Exit" will save any changes you have made automatically.

Backing Up Your data: For the backup process, if you are backing up to your floppy drive, you will need to insert a blank formatted disk into the floppy drive you specified on line #54 of the USER DATA file (The default is drive A.) You can actually specify any path on line #54 other than directly to a CD-RW drive.  For instance you can back up onto a RAM drive (also called flash drive, jump drive, thumb drive, travel drive, memory stick, Data Traveler etc.) by stipulating the letter of the RAM drive on line #54; if the letter is "F" you would put "F:\" on line #54 of the USER DATA.   (Beware, that depending what you have plugged into your USB ports and whether the RAM drive was plugged in before or after you booted your computer, the letter of the RAM drive is likely to change.)  Or choose a path, like "F:\magicbac\" as long that path exits at the time you put it on line #54.  If you want to backup onto a CD or DVD disk, you will need to use a utility that makes it function like a floppy drive, that is "rewritable."  Otherwise you can make a backup independently by using a CD disk utility like Nero or CD Creator (whatever came with your CD drive) to back up your entire MAGIC directory (C:\MAGIC\), however, in this case you will need to restore using a program like "My Computer" because the MAGIC "Restore" function will not work for files backed up in this way. Finally, you can solve the backup problem by creating a directory on your hard disk called "MAGICbak" and specify the path, "C:\MAGICbak" on line #54 so that all of your backup infomation will be stored on your hard disk in that location. Using your hard disk is problematic because then you have only ONE backup location.  IT IS IMPORTANT TO HAVE MORE THAN ONE BACKUP DISK  or RAM DRIVE, WITH WHICH YOU ROTATE, so that if corrupt data is written to your backup disk, overwriting valid data, you will still have another backup disk with valid data. If you are using a secondary location on your hard disk, copy the information in that directory onto a removeable media like a CD-RW. Independenly creating a backup CD disk as just described will complicated the process of restoring files, which is built into MAGIC when the backup is made by MAGIC.  If the reason you do not have a floppy drive is that you have just switched computers to a new one with a XP operating system, note that Cornucopia has a separate version of MAGIC for XP that is ten times the size of the MAGIC you have been using; you can continue to use the old one and it may or may not work properly, or you can switch to the XP version ($39.95 upgrade charge); we do not provide technical support to customers attempting to use the earlier version of MAGIC on a Windows XP system, because the customers' difficulties usually arise from the incompatibility of the two.

 "Save" "Save" Select this option of save work you have done on the calendar and client list without exiting MAGIC.

"Jump to New Week" Type the date (mm/dd/yy) of the calendar page you wish to display, and click on OK. MAGIC will then display the calendar week for whatever date you indicated, provided it is not beyond the expiration date of your copy of Practice MAGIC.

"Restore Backed-up File" To retrieve or "import" backed-up information that was backed up using MAGIC's BACKUP option, simply select the "Restore Backup files" option in the FILE menu and then select the client file (".pat") or calendar file (".cal") you want from your Backup disk and MAGIC will copy it back to the INFO sub-directory in your MAGIC directory. MAGIC will also offer you the option of restoring all files that were backed up at the end of your last MAGIC session or restoring all active files (client and calendar) from your backup disk. The first of these options is especially convenient for people who use two computers, and want to transfer client and calendar information back and forth between the two. MAGIC queries you whether you would like to be warned when a file being restored is older than the file it is replacing. It is a good idea to have more than one BACKUP disk and rotate them. We recommend having three or four.  In this way you avoid the possibility of backing up faulty data over non-faulty data from your previous backup. People who independendly back up their data onto one-write media like CD disks, as described under Backing up Your Data will not be able to easily use this function. Those people will simply need to use MYCOMPUTER to copy the desired file from thier backup disk to the C:\MAGIC\INFO folder of their desktop computer.)

Reinstalling MAGIC: If you purchase a new computer or lose your data due to a crashed hard disk, you can not simply reinstall the last Practice MAGIC update you received.  You must first go to www.practicemagic.com, click on the "Download Demo" button, and  install the Practice MAGIC demo.  Then install your update. Transferring all your data can be a bit more complicated than simply RESTORING from your last backup as described above because because your USERDATA FILE will not be automatically restored, and some of your calendar or patient files may not be present on your last backup disk.   For more detailed information about this process, go to the last paragraphs of the Trouble Shooting section of this manual, entitled Transferring MAGIC to a New Computer.

EDIT

"Client/Insuranc Co. Info" This option on the EDIT menu enables you to edit information about a client/patient's or insurance company including its name and address. If you have clicked on a client/patient appointment in the calendar before selecting this function, that client/patient's information will be accessed. If you have clicked on a blank (unscheduled) slot in the calendar, you will be prompted for the name or code of the client/patient or insurance company for whom you wish to edit information. Insurance company information will also include the company's allowable fees (optional) which can be inserted automatically into the client information of any client having this companies coveage. Note that when you change a client or insurance company name, you will need to also change the name in the client list (see change name). Client/Patient information also includes payments, diagnosis, balance and insurance information. Most of this information need not be filled in unless you need MAGIC to fill out detailed insurance forms like the HCFA-1500/CMS-1500. Any line can be left blank except the name lines. You are given the alternative option in the EDIT menu of selecting CLIENT INFO ON CMS-1500 which displays a CMS-1500-like form on the screen and allows you to enter the client's information by clicking on the appropriate boxes in the form (see next section).

   If you have clicked on a blank (unscheduled) slot in the calendar, you will be prompted for the name or initials of the client/patient or insurance company for whom you wish to edit information. You can open up a pull-down menu at this point and select the name of that client/patient or insurance company. Since INSURANCE COMPANIES' names will not appear in any appointment slots, you must click on a blank (unscheduled) slot in the calendar in order to edit the information (name, address, or allowable fees) for an insurance company.

Adjusted Fees Entered Automatically: If you enter the name of a valid insurance company a the "primanry insurance" (line #29) or "secondary insurance," (line #67) you will be asked if you want the "allowable fees" of that company automatically include in that client's information.  If you answer "Yes" the fees you entered as allowable will automatically become the "adjusted fees" for that client.  Full fees will still be used for filling out CMS-1500 forms; however, adusted fees will appear as a separate column on client statements and be used to calculate the amount owed you from that company.

Default Procedure Codes for First Visits: Some insurance companies pay a higher fee for initial diagnostic visits (CPT 90801) than for normal psychotherapy.  If you have indicated that a client's copay is not 100% (i.e. insurance will pay part of the bill) on the Client Input Screen, MAGIC will automatically make the procedure code for the first visit "90801." You can disable this feature by stipulating the default procedure for first visits; do this by selecting USER DATA from the EDIT menu and then clicking on the fee line for the desired procedure code (lines #27 to #37 and #59 to #64 in the userdata file) and checking the box that says, "Default procedure code for first visits."  That procedure will become the default procedure for first visits. If, for instance, you want 90806 to be the default for all first visits, click on line #27, "Fee for 90806, 50 min. Indiv. Psychotherapy,"  in your USER DATA information and, when the dialog box comes up that allows you to define that fee, click the box next to the caption, "Default procedure code for first visits." 

    Alternatively, since only some insurance companies pay a higher fee for initial diagnostic visits, you can designate these when you input the adjusted fee amounts allowed by each company, by placing a "#" or a "*" at the end of the line on which you input the fee for the procedure that you would like to be the default procedure code for that particular insurance company.  When you input the name of the insurance company for a particular client (using either of the first to menu options in the EDIT menu or the second menu option in the CMS-1500 menu) if the calendar input cursor was located on visit #1 for that client, and you are asked if you want the "allowable fees" of that company automatically included in that client's information, if you answer, "Yes," the procedure for that first visit will be automatically changed to the default you designated for that insurance company (if you designated one).

DSM IV and ICD9 Code Help: When entering DSM IV codes (lines 7, 8, and 9), a green "combo" box will appear on your screen containing a list of DSM IV Categories. Click on a category and press <ENTER> and the box will display the codes in that category. Click on a code and press <ENTER> and that code will be automatically filled in in the DSM IV information box you are editing. You can also find a code by typing a question mark followed by part of the code description and that code and description will be displayed. If the code that is displayed is not the one you are looking for you can continue the same search by entering "??". (If you need an ICD9 code rather than DSM IV, use the CLIENT INFO ON HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 option in the EDIT menu rather than the CLIENT INFO option. Just below the area on the on-screen HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 where diagnostic codes are filled in, there is a check box for DSM IV and one for ICD9.  If you check the ICD9 box, and then click on diagnosis slot 1, 2, or 3, the ICD9 codes rather than the DSM IV codes will be displayed in a drop down box.)

Unlimited Individually-defined procedures, fees, copays: In addition to the User-defined Codes described above, the "change procedure" menu also offers you an unlimited option to type in unique procedure codes and fees for particular visits. The option of entering a fee and an adjusted fee separated by ">" is also available for User-defined Codes as it is for standard procedures (described above). In addition a separate copay can be defined for a particular visit or procedure by following the fee (or adjusted fee) amount with ">>" followed by the copay amount. This is useful if there are certain visits or procedures that are not covered by insurance and must by paid fully by the client. If the copay in this case is defined as the entire (adjusted) fee, this procedure will not be included when insurance forms are printed. For instance, 85>65>>0 would indicate that the normal fee is $85 (Which is the amount that would be printed on insurance forms), the adjusted fee that the insurance company actually pays is $65 and the copay is $0. If this feature is used for a procedure that is one of the basic nine procedures already stipulated in the program, the program may read the fee from the standard fee set in the program for that procedure rather than the special fee stipulated through this process.

Referring Physician: If you fill in this line (#60) it will be automatically printed on client statements, unless you enter the first character as lower-case (not capitalized).

Entering Initial Financial Data:  When first using MAGIC, you will need to transfer existing financial information to MAGIC so that your statements accurately reflect the client/patient's history. MAGIC makes this easy for you on the initial Client Input Screen that appears when you first introduce a new client/patient to MAGIC by scheduling that client/patient on the calendar or by clicking on the ADD NEW CLIENT option in the CMS-1500 menu or the DISPLAY menu. This screen asks you if you want to regularly bill this client/patient, his or her insurance company (if any), both or neither. In addition to basic information like name, address and phone numbers, it also asks for the client/patient's $ balance (money he or she owes you) as of the end of the day before this client/patient's first appointment in MAGIC's calendar. If you indicated that you want to bill this person's insurance, several additional questions will appear allowing you to input the client/patient's copay, the portion of his or her bill that is not covered by insurance, the deductible if any, and the anount currently owed you by the insurance company as of that same date. If there is no insurance involved this number for COPAY is "100%" or "1," which is the default. The copay amount is important to enter at this time, even if you are not sure, because it tells MAGIC that there is an insurance company involved, which triggers an automatic change in the default procedure for the first visit.You can enter the copay portion in any of a variety of forms: a decimal (like ".25"), a fraction (like 1/4"), a percentage (like "25%"), or a dollar amount greater than one (like "$10.00"). An additional line has recently been added to this screen which allows you to check off whether or not this client is being seen at your primary office location.  As of April 15, 2001, many insurance companies including Medicare and Medicaid are requiring box #32 on the HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 form to be filled out; MAGIC now automatically fills out this box with the address of the office at which you have indicated you are seeing this client. These questions supply MAGIC with the information it needs to begin keeping your billing records for this client/patient. They are all optional and can be left blank except the client's last name and at least a first initial. You can always go back and edit any client/patient's client information at a later time, adding this information. 

Note: If you find that the changes you made in the file were not saved, see item number 2 under General Problems in the Trouble Shooting section of this manual.

"Client/Patient Info on CMS-1500"  The EDIT menu also displays the option of displaying the HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 form on the screen so you are able to click on the appropriate boxes and fill them in. Currently, MAGIC comes to you configured to fill out HCFA-1500 forms, but capable also of filling out CMS-1500 forms.  For instructions for switching to CMS-1500 forms, go to Using MAGIC with CMS-1500 Forms. This information will then be automatically transferred to the client information file. NOTE THAT THE FORM ON YOUR SCREEN IS NOT AN EXACT DUPLICATE OF THE PAPER HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 FORM: it will, however, fill out the paper form properly. On-screen DSM IV help and ICD9 help are also available; they work exactly as described under "Edit Client/Patient Info."  If you have clicked on a client/patient appointment in the calendar before selecting this function, that client/patient's information will be accessed. If you have clicked on a blank (unscheduled) slot in the calendar, you will be prompted for the name or initials of the client/patient for whom you wish to edit information. When you finish editing click the DONE button at the bottom of the screen or close the window using the CLOSE box at the top right corner or select one of the PRINT buttons.  If you select a PRINT option, Magic will ask you before filling out any insurance forms, if you want to "update." Answering "yes" will cause the beginning date for the next form you print to be adjusted so that the first date of service will be the one after the last one you are currently printing. If you do not see the DONE and PRINT buttons at the bottom of the on-screen  insurance form or only the tops of them are visible, they are probably covered by the WINDOWS TASK BAR.  If so, place your cursor at the top of the task bar so that the cursor changes to an up and down arrow, and drag the tast bar down off the screen. If this does not work, read the TASK BAR NOTE at the end of the paragraph, "Deposit a check from an insurance company" in the section "Deposit Checks" under the heading "DEPOSITS" in this manual.

After entering information, you will occasionally be querried as to whether you would like the information you just entered to become the default for new clients. If you respond "yes," this change will be reflected in all new clients you introduce to MAGIC from then on.

Reprinting an Insurance Form: When the CMS-1500-like insurance form appears on the screen for client information entering and editing, the client's first six appointment dates after the date in the box labeled "Beginning of billing period" will appear in box 24a of the on-screen form. You will find the box labeled "Beginning of billing period" on the right side of the bottom portion of the on-screen form. By changing the date in that box, you can cause the dates in 24a on the form to automatically change.  So, if you want to reprint an insurance form, be sure that the date in the box labeled "Beginning of billing period" falls just before the first appointment date you would like the form to list. When you print an insurande form, this date will be automatically moved forward to just after the last appointment date printed, if you answer "yes" to the question about whether you want to "update" the client information. Although the dates in box 24a also include a colon followed by the time of the appointment (as a four digit number, military time) the time will not print on the paper insurance form. You can edit these or add additional appointments with or without time designations, and these new appointments will be transferred to the calendar automatically. If no time was designated, the appointment will be written into the earliest empty appointment slot available on the appropriate day on the appointment calendar.

Some CMS-1500 boxes are not displayed on the screen.  For instance, in most states Medicare requires psychologists to place the modifier "AH" and LCSW's to place the modifier "AJ" after the procedure code and Masters Counselors to place a "Z9" in box #24D. If "MEDICARE" is selected in HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 Box #1, MAGIC will automatically place the these codes after the procedure code if the procedure is one of MAGIC's nine standard procedure codes other than "psychological testing," which does not require it. If the code is user-defined or individually-defined, you will need to add those letters yourself when you define the procedure. The preceding does not apply, however, if colon (":") is placed at the end of the data on line number 14 of the USERDATA file (which normally just contains the code for whether you are using your Soc. Sec. # or your Employer ID.#) followed by any two characters; this will cause those two characters to be printed as a modifier after the C.P.T. code on HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 forms that are designated for Medicare. Placing an explanation point ("!") after those two characters on line #14 will cause those characters to be printed as a modifier after the C.P.T. codes on ALL HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 forms.

Another example of how the on-screen HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 is different from the printed paper form is that there is only one Charges ("Fee") box (box #24F) displayed on the MAGIC on-screen HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 form; this one box is used to define the fee for all six procedures listed. To define a procedure's fee, click first on the #24D box containing that procedure, and then click on the "Fee" box to the right of the #24D boxes; a dialogue box will appear that will allow you to define the fee charged for that procedure. Any fee you define here for one of MAGIC's  standard procedure codes will be saved and become the default for this client. To make it the default for all new clients you will need to select USER DATA from the EDIT menu of the MAGIC calendar screen and edit the default fee for that procedure code.  The dialogue box that pops up when you are editing FEES will also allow you to designate an ADJUSTED FEE, a specific COPAY (if different from the standard copay), and the number of  "Days or Units" of that procedure (#24G).  If you indicated a value other than "1" for the number of units, you will be offered the opportunity to define an ending date of service (Box #24A) if that date is other than the beginning date. Note that, due to space considerations, boxes #24B, #24C, and #24K are displayed only once rather than on each of the six visit lines; however, when the HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 is printed, these boxes are filled in on all six lines.  Box  #24E is not displayed at all. All diagnosis lines filled in in Box #21 are automatically filled in in #24E.

Showing Copay in Box #29: If you click on Box #29 of the on-screen HCFA-1500/CMS-1500, you will be asked, "Set Amount Paid to 0 (Y/N)?"  If you click the "Y" box, MAGIC will always put a "0" in this box.  This is strongly recommended.  We have not yet heard of any insurance company that actually wants to see the amount of the copay in this box.  However, if you want the copay to appear in this box, click "N."  With the institution of new HIPPA standards, this box is now considered obsolete (irrelevant).

Electronic Billing (Electronic Data Transmission): At the bottom of the on-screen HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 will be three buttons, a DONE button that will save your edited information and return to the calendar screen, a "PRINT HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500" button that will save your edited information and send it to your printer to be printed out onto an HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 form,  and "PRINT HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 TO DISK FILE" that will save your edited information and send it to a HCFA-1500/CMS-1500-image disk file called E-HCFA.TXT  to be transmitted to an electronic clearing house like www.eclaims.com or www.freeclaims.com.    The first time you print to disk file during a given session of using Practice MAGIC, MAGIC will ask you if you have already submitted the claims previously written to disk file.  If you answer "yes" MAGIC will replace the disk file containing the previous claims with the ones you are currently creating.  If you answer "no," MAGIC will append the current claims to the file containing the previous claims that have not yet been submitted.  For all subsequent submissions during that given session, MAGIC will assume that the claims in the the disk file have not yet been submitted, so subsequent claims in that session will be appended to the previous claims for submission as a large batch.  Most electronic clearing houses will provide you with software to transmit this file or, as in the case of eclaims.com or www.freeclaims.com, upload the file directly for you to their web sites for processing. The process of uploading e-hcfa.txt to eclaims.com or freeclaims.com is straightforward and simple; for directions, go to www.eclaims.com or www.freeclaims.com on the world wide web. For more information about using MAGIC for electronic billing, got to the section entitled "Print Insurance form to disk file" under the "HCFA-1500/CMS-1500" menu.

Primary/Secondary Insurers: To fill out information as it would appear for a SECONDARY insurance carrier, click the box at the top of the screen that says "Primary/Secondary" and then click the box next to "Secondary."

Adjusted Fees Entered Automatically: If you enter the name of a valid insurance company a the "primanry insurance" or "secondary insurance," you will be asked if you want the "allowable fees" of that company automatically include in that client's information.  If you answer "Yes" the fees you entered as allowable will automatically become the "adjusted fees" for that client.  Full fees will still be used for filling out HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 forms; however, adusted fees will appear as a separate column on statements and be used to calculate the amount owed you from that company.

"Edit Client/Patient List" To edit client/patient list or delete clients from the list. The client/patient list begins with a list of the names and phone numbers of all your clients/patients in alphabetical order and then lists all the insurance companies you have entered. When you enter an appointment with a client/patient code that does not already exist on the list you will be asked if you wish to add this name to the client/patient list. If you add a client using the code of a client whose name was orinially on the list, but was deleted, Practice MAGIC will ask you if this client is the one you deleted.   If you answer yes," MAGIC all the information in the file of the deleted client will be transferred to the information file of the client you are adding.   This is especially useful if you have deleted a client by mistake. If you do, you will be prompted for more information which will ultimately appear in this list. This list can be edited at any time. You can also edit information for individual clients by clicking on that client's code and selecting "Client Info" from the EDIT menu.

When you select the "Client List" EDIT option, the client combo box will move to the bottom of the calendar screen. You can open it up and click on the name of the client to be edited. Additional information about that client will be displayed at the bottom of the screen including the full name and telephone numbers of this client, the type of billing you have selected for this client, whether the client is an active client and whether you wish to have this client included in the list of client names and telephone numbers that you can print from the PRINT menu. You can make any changes you desire by clicking in the corresponding area. If you change a name, you must separately edit the information file of that client or insurance company and change the name in that file as well. Press <ENTER> to end the edit on that line or click on another line. Scroll for more data. Click on the DONE button to return to the calendar.

Note: If you find that the changes you made in the file were not saved, see item number 2 under General Problems in the Trouble Shooting section of this manual.

"Edit User Data:" User Data (UserData) includes all information that is particular to the individual user including default values that are transferred to each client/patient. information file when it is created. These defaults can of course be modified for each client/patient as described in the above section. Most of the information requested is self-explanitory. Some of the information items (by line number) include:

1 to 9: User Data information includes therapist's name, addresses, phone numbers, bank account number, ID number, fees. When you select on of these lines, you will be asked in a dialogue box to input the relevant data, and the font you would like used to print this data on the "classic-style" statement.

17: Also includes information about the desired size of the calendar you may wish to print (#17), and information about the printer being used (#25). The heights and widths initialized on line #17 of this file are for printing the calendar. It is currently set to print a calendar that will fit in a 5 inch Daytimer wallet, however it may be necessary for you to make some changes in these settings to customize for your particular calendar wallet, printer or other  particular needs.

18 & 20: Minumum left and top margins of which your printer is capable are indicated in lines #18 and #20 respectively. These are set automatically when you run SETPRINTSCALE from the MAGIC Calendar's PRINT menu. For more information, see PRINTER NOTES

19: Statement size.  This setting (line #19) defaults to a standard sheet of paper (8.5 inch by 11 inch). If you use your own stationary or for some other reason choose to make the sheet size smaller, the columns and printing will be condensed, so you will probably need to adjust the font sizes on lines 1 - 9 and line #57 so that there will be room for all the information.

22: Window Envelops: Line #22 allows you to specify the position of the address window in your window envelops if you use them, and it also allows you to specify the number of windows. If you make any change on this line, including simply typing a "?", MAGIC will display a series of dialog boxes questioning you about your envelops, and then MAGIC will set this characteristics automatically. THIS WILL EFFECT WHERE THE ADDRESS OF INSURANCE COMPANIES ARE PRINTED ON THE HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 INSURANCE FORM.

25: When you run MAGIC for the first time, this data will be requested. It can be modified at any time using the EDIT menu and selecting "USER DATA." To edit in this data after selecting "Edit User Data," click on the line to edit and then edit. Complete your edit by pressing <ENTER> or clicking on another line. You can scroll to see other pages of information. Click on the DONE button to return to the calendar. The options for "Printer type code" (line #25) are those explained in the second paragraph of the section, GETTING STARTED, at the beginning of this manual. It comes preset to "1" which is what it should be for almost all printers.

39: HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 Template: On line #39 of the USER DATA file you are asked to name the HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 template you prefer to use. The default is simply named "HCFA1500." The default is determined by what is on line #39 of the Userdata file.  We will soon start shipping Practice MAGIC with line #39 reading "CMS1500" instead.  If you already have Practice MAGIC, you can change it yourself at any time. Whatever you place on this line will be transferred to lines #101 and #102 of every new client file automatically. If certain clients' requirements are different than others you can edit the client's information file and change lines #101 or #102. Changing the default on line 39 of userdata will not effect existing clients' information files, only clients entered in the future.  You will need to EDIT each client file if, for instance, you want them all to have billing on an CMS-1500 form, rather than an HCFA-1500 form, if that is what is currently being used.  If you have a large number of clients, you may want to purchase a utility from Cornucopia that will do this for all your current and past clients automatically. (see "pricing and ordering" page, or go directly to www.practicemagic.com/orders.html) The font MAGIC uses to fill out insurance forms is 10 point courier bold (mandated by many insurance companies) unless you place an asterisk at the end of line 24 of USERDATA, in which case whatever font is designated in  line #57  or USERDATA will become the font that is used to fill out insurance forms. Alternatively, you can place a tilda at the end of the insurance form designation (lines 39, 101 or 102 noted above) i.e. "HCFA1500~", which will cause MAGIC to print in NEW TIMES ROMAN, which is more condensed. All the MAGIC files that end in .FRM are templates for insurance forms. All of those that begin with "HCFA" are templates for filling out the HCFA-1500 form. Those begining with "CMS" are templates for filling out the CMS-1500 form. For most people the template named CMS1500.FRM is satisfactory, but for some clinicians it is not. An appropriate insurance form template will be selected automatically when you are editing client information using the option "Client/Patient Info on CMS-1500" from the MAGIC Calendar EDIT menu top edit client information. If you edit box #29, for instance, ("Set amount paid to 0? [Y/N]") or box #31 (Caption in box 31 is: "Print today's date in the signature box? [Y/N]") the CMS-1500 template will be changed automatically and you will be offered the option of making the newly chosen template the default for new clients. Answering "Yes" to this last query will cause the User Data information on line #39 to be changed.  You can also change the name of the insurance form template yourself.  For instance replacing CMS1500 with CMSALT will cause box #29 on the insurance form to be filled out with the client's copay requirement rather than simply 0. (NOTE that this is NEVER required by insurance companies.) Replacing HCFA1500 with HCFASIGN will cause box #31 on the insurance form to be filled out with the therapist's name. By playing with the different templates provided you may find one that especially suites your needs, but for most people the default CMS-1500 template is satisfactory. Note that CMS-1500 form templates do not offer you the option in box #31 of whether to print the signature, because MAGIC automatically prints in box #31, your name, which is now permissible with the CMS-1500 form.

42: Customize Statements: Editing line #42 initiates a short wizard that permits you to make changes to the way statemetns are printed.  See also Statement Options and the paragraph that follows it entitled More Statement Options. Also for information about the two distinct styles of statements now available though MAGIC, see the section on Statements under the PRINT Menu.

53: Default "Signature on File" Message: Practice MAGIC normally places "Signature on File" automatically in boxes #12 and #13 of the HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 form.  If you would like to change the default, you can do so by editing line #53 of USER DATA. Making any change, including simply adding a question mark, will cause a series of dialog boxes to appear enabling you to indicate three things:  the first character on line #53 indicates (Y or N) whether you would like first appointments for new clients to be designated as "REGULAR WEEKLY" or "IRREGULAR" (also referred to as "TEMPORARY.") If there is a colen that follows the first character, everything after the colen is the information you would liked placed in boxes #12 and #13. (These two elements will be separated by another colen if they are different from each other.)

54: Location (path) for Backup Data: This entry comes to you set as the "A" floppy drive.  You can, however, set it to any legal path other then a CD-RW. See the section Backing Up Your Data under the menu heading FILE in this manual for more information.

57: Select FONTS and font SIZE: To select a printer font, select USER DATA from the EDIT menu and when the user information screen appears, scroll down to line #57. (Each time you click on a line, the line number will appear at the top of the screen.) Type a truetype font name EXACTLY as it is titled. For instance "Arial", "Courier" or "Times New Roman." If you are unsure, type a question mark ("?") and press the <ENTER> key, you will be shown a dialogue box of fonts and font sizes to select form. You can specify the point size of this font (up to 12 pt.) by beginning line #57 of the USER DATA with a the point size you want surrounded by looping brackets. Similarly on lines one through eight or of the USER DATA you can indicate the point size and font that you would like printed on the heading lines of statements by filling in the dialog box that appears when you click on one of these lines.   To make the box go away so that you can see the entire screen, click the close box (the "x" on the top right corner of the dialog box). On line #57 as well as lines one through eight, you can also select "Italic" or "Bold" for the font if you wish.  NOTE that statements will print in the font you selected, however HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 forms will be filled out in 10 point COURIER BOLD (mandated by many insurance companies) unless you place an asterisk at the end of line 24, in which case the font designated in line #57 will be used to fill our insurance forms as well. You can also designate TIMES NEW ROMAN for forms by placing a tilda at the end of the insurance form designation (lines 39, 101 or 102 - See section above about line #39) i.e. "CMS1500~", which will cause MAGIC to print in NEW TIMES ROMAN, which is more condensed.

70 & 71: "First appointment of the day" and "Number of minutes between each calendar appointment slot:" The default for line #71 is 60, which means that at the left side margin of your calendar you will see a list of times, each an hour apart.  Independent of the setting on this line, you will only have 17 appointment time slots each day showing on the calendar.  If many of your appointments are only half hour appointments, you will want to change the standard appointment length of the appointment slots in MAGIC's clalenadar. If you set the number on line 71 to 30, for instance, you will have a list of times each spaced apart by a half hour, but they will only span eight and a half hours, rather than 17 hours, because there will be two appointment slots per hour. You can also use lin 70 to change the first appointment of the day that will be displayed.

Note: If you find that the changes you made in userdata were not saved, see item number 2 under General Problems in the Trouble Shooting section of this manual.

"Client Notes" The Progress Notes Editing Feature is accessed from the EDIT menu and uses all the standard editing functions used in Microsoft WINDOWS applications with the following exceptions: "Insert" should be done from the EDIT menu rather than using <SHIFT>+<INSERT>. This editor is intended only as a convenient way to maintain up-to-date notes about the progress of your clients. It is not by any means a word processor. It will allow you to take current notes and append them to client notes you have already written for a given client. You can view but not edit notes that you have taken in the past for that client. (The viewing capacity is limited to a file of no more than 32,000 characters, approximately 14 pages double spaced.) For each client for which you create client progress notes a file is created with a file name consisting of the client code followed by ".NOT". It is assumed that, when you need the information that they contain, you will load these "NOT" files (contained in the NOTES subdirectory) into your word processor (as TEXT files) and use them to produce other documents, like for instance managed care reports. The viewing function includes a scroll bar that allows you to quickly change the viewing screen to any portion of the note file. The SAVE function in the FILE menu will replace all past notes for this client with the current notes, while the APPEND function will add the current notes to the end of the past notes.

"Add New Client/Insur. Co." adds to your client list, creating new client information files that MAGIC can later access when doing billing for those clients. Magic will assume the date of illness and the "first seen" dates to be the date before the cursor position on the calendar.  This date will appear at the top right of the Client Information Data Entry Screen under "First date seen" and should be corrected on that screen if it is wrong, because that date will be used to fill out a variety of enties. If, for instance that date is after the actual first date seen, the first appointment will not show up in billing statements.

"Edit Holiday List" allows you to add special dates to the list of holidays and yearly events that MAGIC places on the calendar automatically.   This feature was added in April of 2003.  All National U.S. holidays are already programmed in.  Although we have provided you with this utility to allow you to add your own dates as well, we are not providing technical support for it, so we do not recommend you use it unless you are an advanced computer user.

"Edit Other List" allows you to create and edit text lists that can be used for other features of Practice MAGIC like the special SELECT function for selecting lists of client codes that has been added to the in the SPECIAL Menu.  Although we have provided you with this utility for your convenience, we are not providing technical support for it, so we do not recommend you use it unless you are familiar with using your computer.

"Electronic Billing Not Yet Sent" dispays the e-hcfa.txt file which contains copies of all the HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 forms that you have printed to DISK FILE but not necessarily transmitted to insurance companies or a clearing house. Even if these forms have been transmitted, they will remain in this file until you indicate that they have been transmitted, which you do by writing a new form to DISK FILE and answering "File has been transmitted" in response to MAGIC's querry.

"Electronic Billing History" displays the contents of the file, E-RECORD.TXT, which contains a record electronic billings.   The first time during a session of using Practice MAGIC you print a HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 form to file for electonic billing purposes MAGIC asks you if you have already transmitted the forms you have previously printed to file in the previous session of using Practice MAGIC.   If you answer "NO," MAGIC appends the current billing file to the file containing the previous billings that have not yet been transmitted. If you answer "Yes," MAGIC ads the contents of the E-HCFA.TXT file, which is the previous billing, to the record of forms that have been printed to file and then transmitted electronically  (E-RECORD.TXT) and then clears the E-HCFA.TXT file so that it contains only the current billing. The information included in E-RECORD.TXT is the date the billing information was added to E-RECORD.TXT (which is the date that this information was replaced in E-HCFA.TXT by new transmittable information), the name of the patient, the insurance company billed, the dates of service billed and the fees for each date of service billed.

"Total Month's Billing" Displays at the bottom of the screen the total expected return for all services scheduled for the month currently displayed on the MAGIC Calendar screen. Note that whenever a new week is displayed on the calendar screen, the program automatically prints at the bottom of the screen the total expected return for all services scheduled for that week.

CMS-1500   The "CMS-1500" menu ("HCFA menu for older programs) redundantly provides in one place all the functions that would be required by someone only interested in filling out HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 forms. The entries are in the order one would use them: add a client, edit the client information on an on-screen insurance form, and print it. These are exactly the same functions as "Add Client" in the DISPLAY menu, "Client Info on CMS-1500" in the EDIT menu, and "Print insur. form" in the PRINT menu respectively. There is a fourth menu entry under CMS-1500, "Print insur forms for all," which is the same as the entry under PRINT with the same name.  There are also the electronic filing options: Print insur. form to disk file (Electronic Billing), and  Print insur forms to disk for all which create a disk file, e-hcfa.txt" which can than be transmitted to almost any clearing house, like eclaims.com or www.freeclaims.com. The process of uploading e-hcfa.txt to eclaims or freeclaims is straightforward and simple; for directions, go to www.eclaims.com or www.freeclaims.com on the world wide web.

New Practice MAGIC Program for CMS-1500: We have written an upgrade to Practice MAGIC that is specifically designed to have the capability to correctly fill our or print and fill our the new CMS-1500 insurance form.  You will know if you have it because the Calendar Menu that used to read, "HCFA-1500" will now read "CMS-1500."  The cost is $39.95 (free to people who ordered Practice MAGIC after June 1, 2006) and can be ordered only from the order page. Even though the program references "CMS-1500" in many places, it can still be used to fill out either a HCFA-1500 form or a CMS-1500, depending on how lines #101 and #102 are filled out in each client's information file. If you want to change the form that is filled out for a specific client, you can change lines 101 and 102 from HCFA1500 to CMS1500 or you can edit the client's information on the on-screen insurance form (accessed using the second entry in either the EDIT or CMS-1500 menu on the Calendar screen.) On the on-screen insurance form, you will need to scroll down to the bottom and look on the right side for the box that reads, "Insurance Form Template," click on it, and enter the name of the form you would like to fill out.   In addition lines 50, 51 and 109 of each client file should be edited as well as line 40 and 41 or the USERDATA file.  As an alternative to opening each client file and editing it, Cornucopia has developed a utility that will modify all your client files automatically; this utility (Windows only) is available to download for $19.95, and can be ordered only from our order page at www.practicemagic.com/orders.html.

If you do not have the CMS-1500 capability built into your current version of Practice MAGIC (there is no "CMS-1500" menu on the calendar page) you need to purchase and download the upgraded Practice MAGIC for an upgrade fee of $39.95. You can order the upgrade from www.practicemagic.com/orders.html) The following are instructions for it's use:

Instructions for Transitioning to the CMS-1500 Form from the HCFA-1500:

The two templates (see paragraph above) for the CMS-1500 form which will be automatically written to C:\MAGIC\INFO on you hard disk are called "CMS1500.FRM" and "CMSALT.FRM." If you replace "HCFA1500.frm" as your "Insurance Form Template" with either of these forms, they will format your output to conform to the CMS-1500. The "CMS1500.FRM" template will automatically place a zero in box 29, as our HCFA-1500 template has been doing for years. You can alternatively select "CMSALT", which will cause MAGIC to calculate the copay for the visits being billed and place that number in box 29.  In the case of MAC, you will need to copy the two files, "CMS1500.FRM" and "CMSALT.FRM" from the folder created when you unstuff the downloaded file to the INFO subfolder in you MAGIC folder residing on your desktop. (The files will be copied automatically for Windows). 

IMPORTANT: After upgrading to the CMS-1500 version, for each pre-existing client, you will need to replace "HCFA1500.frm" as your "Insurance Form Template" with either CMS1500 or CMSALT; these CMS-1500 templates will format your output to conform to the new CMS-1500 form. NOTE THAT CHANGING THE INSURANCE FORM TEMPLATE TO CMS1500 DOES NOT CHANGE THE ON-SCREEN INSURANCE FORM.  PLEASE DO NOT EMAIL OR CALL US TO TELL US THAT CHANGING THE TEMPLATE DOES NOT CHANGE THE FORM UNTIL YOU HAVE TRIED PRINTING A FORM. In addition lines 50, 51 and 109 of each client file should be edited as well as line 40 and 41 of the USERDATA file.  Line 110 of the client file now fills in box 33b, Line 50 now fills in 24j (top) and line 51 fills in box 19 which is commonly designated for the therapist's taxonomy number.   Line 109 fills in box 32a and 32b and line 61 fills in box 17 a&b. Lines 40 and 41 of the USERDATA file in the NPI number (33a) and the default for the NPI number of the place of service for new clients.

WE HAVE RECEIVED MANY SUPPORT CALLS BY PEOPLE WHO ARE FINDING BOX 24J (lower portion) IS BEING FILLED OUT WITH THE INFORMATION FROM BOX 33A. If the NPI of the Billing Provider(agency) is different from the NPI of the Rendering Provider (therapist), both NPI numbers should be placed on line #40 of userdata AND IN BOX 33A OF THE ON-SCREEN INSURANCE FORM separated by a forward slash ("/"). If you do not want anything to print in lower 24J, just begin Box 33A (AND LINE 40 OF USERDATA) with a forward slash ("/") followed by your NPI#. In general all entries on the on-screen insurance form that ask for two possible pieces of data, as for instance box 17a&b (on line 61) and 32a&b (on line 110), can be filled out with both pieces of data separated by a forward slash. If no forward slash is included, the entire entry will be printed in both places.   If nothing follows the slash, the place on the form that is filled out by that second piece of data will be left blank. If nothing precedes the slash, the place on the form that is filled out by that first piece of data will be left blank. The new form template will place the therapist's name in box 31 one line higher than the therapist name was printed on the old HCFA-1500. This will be important information for you to supply to your clearing house, if you use one and you were previously using the HCFA-1500, and also inform them of the fact that you are switching from HCFA to CMS; unless you let them know of the switch, they will start kicking back your claims. IF YOUR COPY OF MAGIC WAS PURCHASED OR DOWNLOADED PRIOR TO APRIL in 2007, you may need to download an updated copy in order to for the instructions in this paragraph to work (order "CMS upgrade" from the order page of our website.)  NOTE THAT EVEN THOUGH THE SLASH SHOWS ON YOUR SCREEN, IT WILL NOT PRINT ON THE FORM.

We have also received a half dozen support calls from clinicians whose local medicare manager has rejected claims because the year-length of the dates on the claims are inconsistent. They can no longer require service years to be consistent to other date years. The service dates MUST by two digit years by CMS stipulation.  The rest of the dates should have four digit years, because the date in box 31 automatically has a four digit year.  If any claims in this format are rejected by Medicare, the company is in violation of federal guidelines; you should ask to talk to a supervisor at Medicare if necessary to get them to straighten out their misunderstanding.

As an alternative to opening each client file and editing it, Cornucopia has developed a utility that will modify all your client files automatically; this utility (Windows only) is available to download for $29.95, and can be ordered only from the order page.The MAGIC on-Screen insurance form will look the same. The "CMS1500.FRM" template will automatically place a zero in box 29, as our HCFA-1500 template has been doing for years. You can alternatively select "CMSALT", which will cause MAGIC to calculate the copay for the visits being billed and place that number in box 29.  In the case of MAC, you will need to copy the two files, "CMS1500.FRM" and "CMSALT.FRM" from the folder created when you unstuff the downloaded file to the INFO subfolder in your MAGIC folder residing on your desktop. (The files will be copied automatically for Windows,  although NO PROMPT WILL BE DISPLAYED THAT THE TEMPLATES ARE NOW SUCCESSFULLY INSTALLED). 

NPI: Before using the CMS-1500 forms, you will need to enter your and National Provider Identification ("NPI") number. Do this by selecting "User data" from the EDIT menu. Scroll down and click on line 40 and enter your NPI on that line (see above if your Billing NPI is not the same as your Rendering NPI). If you have a separate National Provider Identificationspace for your place of service, you can enter that on line 41.

PINs: If an insurance company requires that you use a specific provider number, like a PIN, authorized by that company and distinct from the NPI, input that number on line 50 and line 110 of the CLIENT information file for that particular client (also accessed from the edit menu). (see above if your Billing PIN is not the same as your Rendering PIN) Information for both Primary and Secondary insurance can be entered on line 50, separated by a backslash. Line 51 should be empty unless you want something to print into box 19 (some insurance companies are asking for the taxonomy number to go there) The "ID Qualifier" number that is required for non-NPI identification numbers should come before the actual identification number, and be followed by several spaces.   Some examples of "ID Qualifier" numbers can be found in the user manual connected to this website.  Simply click on "online manuals" on the left side of this web-page, and then utilize the "find" or "search" function of your web browser to locate the first instance of "ID Qualifier" in the manual. The "find" or "search" function is usually accessed by control-F or control-S. On line #109 of the client information file, if required, you should enter the NPI of the Place of Service; this is not the same as the Provider NPI! 109 can also handle the other I.D. of the place of service by putting both on line 109 separated by a forward slash. If you want 32a and 32b to be blank, you will need to delete the information on line 109. If you do not want 32b filled out, be sure that line 109 ends with a forward slash.

Switching from HCFA-1500 to CMS-1500: Then to utilize the CMS templates, for any given client, highlight an appointment of that client on the MAGIC calendar, or click on an open appointment slot, and select "Client Info on HCFA" (or "Client Info on CMS-1500" if you have a later version of MAGIC) from the Edit Menu, scroll to the bottom of the on-screen insurance form, and then change the letters "HCFA" in the box labeled "MAGIC Insurance Form Template" to "CMS" so that instead of reading "HCFA1500," for instance, it would read "CMS1500". NOTE THAT CHANGING THE INSURANCE FORM TEMPLATE TO CMS1500 DOES NOT CHANGE THE ON-SCREEN INSURANCE FORM.  PLEASE DO NOT EMAIL OR CALL US COMPLAINING THAT CHANGING THE TEMPLATE DOES NOT CHANGE THE FORM UNTIL YOU HAVE TRIED PRINTING A FORM.

PINs: If an insurance company requires that you use a specific provider number, like a PIN, authorized by that company and distinct from the NPI, input that number on line 50 of the CLIENT information file for that particular client (also accessed from the edit menu). The "ID Qualifier" number that is required for non-NPI identification numbers should precede the actual identification number, and be followed by several spaces and then the ID number itself.  Here are examples of "ID Qualifier" numbers you may need to use:

Box 29: With the old HCFA-1500, box 29 was obsolete and unused for years.  With the CMS-1500, for reasons beyond our abilities to comprehend, this box has been reactivated.  Since Practice MAGIC keeps a running balance of charges and payments, and does not associate each payment with a specific service, the program can not calculate box 29 accurately.  Those practitioners who feel compelled to place an accurate number in box 29, will need to settle for the calculated copay on the relevant visits to be placed in box #29 as "amount paid."  For newer versions of Practice Magic, by clicking "no" to the question in box 29 on the on-screen cms-1500, you will instruct MAGIC to change the insurance template from "CMS1500" to "CMSALT" which will calculate the copay for the visits being billed and place that number in box 29. For older versions, you will need to change the name of the insurance form template yourself. Note that neither we nor any of our customers have ever encountered an insurance company that had any interest in knowing how much of the client's copay had been collected to date. 

Diagnosis Designators: 2007 versions of practice magic will handle diagnosis designators in box 24E as required by the CMS-1500 directions; namely, the numbers, must have no punctuation or spaces between them. Older versions of Practice MAGIC not updated for the CMS-1500, however, will continue to place, as between the diagnosis designator numbers, even when using the CMS-1500 templates.

One too many PINs: In most cases you will not be using a separate, insurance company assigned PIN number; your NPI will be the only ID# required. If you do, however, assign a PIN number for a particular client, that PIN number will print above the NPI number on each visit line in which there is a visit. Unfortunately, unless you are running a version of Practice MAGIC that is customized to the CMS form, an extra PIN# will also print on the first visit line that is blank. This probably won't be a problem, and it will not occur if no PIN# is assigned or if there are six visits being billed on the particular form.

Please note: The old form required three lines of printing in a one-inch space. The new form requires printing accurately six lines in a 1 inch area in order to accommodate the national provider identifier, which appears redundantly in many places throughout the form.  We anticipate that some of our users will experience difficulty aligning the software and their printer to this form.  Other than for new owners of practice magic, we will charge for assistance in aligning your printer a minimum of $39.95. See instructions in this manual for the first time you print on a form or  PRINTER NOTES in this manual if you would like to do it yourself.

CHANGE     This menu allows you to change information you have entered for a client/patient. Click on the client/patient whose data you would like to change and access the CHANGE menu or click on a time when no one is scheduled and access the CHANGE menu. If no one is scheduled, you will be asked the name or client/patient code of the client/patient whose information you would like to change.

"Name" To change the name of the client/patient, click on the "Name" option. You will be prompted to enter the correct initials and press <ENTER>. You may enter any initials. WARNING: This function will not check to make sure that the initials you give are in your client/patient list. The change will not be made in the client/patient list. Previous appointments and deposits will not be recognized when you do billings.

"Time" To change the time, use the "Time" option. This would not be used to move the appointment to a different day on the calendar, but would be used to change the time from 1:00 to 1:30 or 7:00 to 9:00 on the same day, for example.

"Irreg appt"  To change the frequency with which the client/patient is seen, click on the "Frequency" option. Click on the number of times per week the client/patient will be seen or Click on BIWEEKLY or TEMP, if it is a temporary appointment, one which does not reoccur regularly at the same time each week. Another way to change an appointment to temporary is to drag the mouse to "Irreg Appt" on the CHANGE menu. An alternate way to switch from temporary to "regular weekly" is to drag the mouse to "Reg weekly appt" on the CHANGE menu.  

"Procedure" To change the client/patient's procedure code, click on "Procedure". You will be given a submenu of 17 different possibilities for the type of procedure including the six procedures you defined on lines 59 through 64 of your USER DATA file. Click on the correct procedure or on "Other" if you want to use a procedure that is not listed. If you select "individually user-defined," you will be selecting the user-defined procedure designated on line #47 of the client information file.

"Visit #" To change the visit number, click on "Visit #". Visit numbers are normally handled automatically so that this function is rarely used.

"Comment (all sess.)" To change or add to the comment, use either "Comment (1x)" or "Comment (all sess.)" depending on whether you want the comment for the current session only or whether you want it to appear for all subsequent sessions for this client. 

PRINT

"Client/Patient List." This will print all your clients/patients in alphabetical order with the phone numbers that appear in the client/patient list.

"Statement(s)." to print statements for clients:

Two Statement Formats: Magic offers you two distinct styles of statement formats. The "classic" style, the one MAGIC provided for the two decades preceding 2004, lists the dates of service, description and charges, then a summary of current charges with balance forward and aging, and a summary of payments (deposits). The new style that was added in 2004, the "chron" style, looks more attractive, but has somewhat less detail. It draws lines and boxes to separates sections of the statement, and lists items in chronological order starting with the balance forward on the first day of the statement period, and continuing with each service date and payment (deposit)  in chronological order with a "balance due" at the bottom. The default style is the "classic" style.  When you are printing a statement, you will have the opportunity to click on a button labelled "Use Chrono syle" in one of the dialog boxes you are presented with.  If you click that button, the default style for that MAGIC session will become "chrono" and the button will change to "Use Classic Style." The program will also ask you at that time if you would like "Chrono" to always be your default statement style.  [You can also set the default to always be the "chrono" style by editing your USERDATA list and placing an asterisk on the end of line #19 or if you have indicated on line #42 that you want classic statements printed without the payment list at the end (by placing the word "PAY" at the end of line #42) Similarly you can set the default to always be the "classic" style by editing your USERDATA list and placing an asterisk on the end of line #19.]

For Multiple Clients: If you have selected a number of clients using the SELECT function in the SPECIAL menu a batch of statements for all of these will be printed when "Statement(s)" is selected. Otherwise, a single statement will be printed for the client whose appointment is presently highlighted. If no one is selected and you have clicked on a blank appointment slot, the program will ask for whom the statement is to be printed. This is particularly useful if you are reprinting a statement of a client who has not been scheduled on your calendar recently. The default ending date for a statement is the date the cursor is on. For each client, the default beginning date for a statement is the first date after the last statement was printed and saved. If you select a PRINT option, Magic will ask you before printing any statements, if you want to "update." Answering "yes" will cause the beginning date for the next statement you print to be adjusted so that the first date of service will be the one after the last one you are currently printing. Updating will also cause the program to only consider deposits after the last deposit date considered in the present statement, and to memorize the financial conditions related to the current statement.

Select FONTS and font SIZE:  To select a printer font, select USER DATA from the EDIT menu and when the user information screen appears, scroll down to line #57. (Each time you click on a line, the line number will appear at the top of the screen.) Type a truetype font name EXACTLY as it is titled. For instance "Arial", "Courier" or "Times New Roman." Statements will print in the font you selected, but HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 forms will not. You can specify the point size of this font (up to 12 pt.) or of the font that you would like printed on the heading lines of statements by beginning line #57 or lines one through six of the USER DATA with a the point size you want surrounded by looping brackets. For instance: {18} would produce an 18 point font. You can also follow the number inside the brackets on line numbers 1 through 6 with a font name. For instance: {18Courier}. On line #57 as well as these lines, you can follow the font name by "Italic" or "Bold" if you wish.  NOTE that statements will print in the font you selected, however HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 forms will be filled out in 10 point COURIER BOLD (mandated by many insurance companies) unless you place an asterisk at the end of line 24, in which case the font designated in line #57 will be used to fill our insurance forms as well. You can also designate TIMES NEW ROMAN for forms by placing a tilda at the end of the insurance form designation (lines 39, 101 or 102 - See section above about line #39) i.e. "CMS1500~", which will cause MAGIC to print in NEW TIMES ROMAN, which is more condensed.

Statement Format Options:  One of the option prompts MAGIC offers you before you indicate the beginning and ending dates of a statement is to "omit payment list." If you choose this option, the list of checks you have received and deposited for this client will not be printed on the current statement or batch of statements.  To OMIT both Payment List and Financial Summary, including balance forward information, see the paragraph above entitled, "Beginning and Ending Dates for single and multiple Statements."   Another way to omit the Financial Summary from all statements you print is to edit line #42 of USERDATA, "Customize Statements."  A dialog box will appear that enables you to allow space at the top for a preprinted letterhead, suppress the part of the statement heading that indicates "STATEMENT FOR THE PERIOD OF ..." followed by the beginning and end dates, eliiminate the financial summary including balance forward and total payments, or omit the payment list from the end of statments. These changes will apply to all statements printed for all clients and will also force the default statement style to be "classic."

More Statement Format Options: Statements normally print with the therapist's name, two lines of professional information, address and phone number at the top center of the page followed some lines later by the client/patient information at the left of the page. If the therapist opts to use preprinted stationery and so indicates on line #42 of the USER DATA file (by selecting USER DATA on the EDIT menu), the therapist's information will not be printed at the top of the page and instead the indicated amount of space is skipped to allow for the preprinted letterhead. (see previous paragraph)  The user is also asked on line #22 of the USER DATA to indicate if he or she intends to send out statements in window envelopes. If so, indicate the number of inches from the left edge of the paper that you want the client/patient name and address to be printed so that it will fit in the addressee window of the envelope. This number will be used as well to position the insurance company address that is printed at the top of all insurance forms. If any non-zero number is typed in response to this question, Practice MAGIC will assume that the statement is to be sent in a window envelope and will alter the position of the addressee accordingly. In addition, the therapist's name, professional information, and phone number will be omitted. Only his or her address will be printed, and this will appear at the left margin of the page (about an inch from the edge of the page). In this case, the therapist's name and professional information will appear instead at the bottom of the statement.

Print a Batch of Statements or Correct a Batch of Statements: If you wish to correct a batch of statements that have been printed and updated or print a specific batch of statements, you can do this in one of two ways.   You can select "Print Statements for All" from the PRINT menu or you can select the various clients you wish to correct by placing the cursor on one of their appointments and then pressing the <F9> key (equivalent to selecting "Select" from the SPECIAL menu.) If you select clients in this way, a list of the selected clients will appear at the bottom of the calendar, and when it is complete you can run their statements using the "Statement" option under the PRINT menu.  

Whichever method of selecting clients that you chose, you will be offered a pull-down menu, as usual, to select or input a beginning date. In the cases of multiple statements, you will be offered dates and they will be preceded by one of the following: "Begin with Last ending date," "Regenerate Last statements,"  "Regenerate Previous statements," or ""Regenerate 2 statements back." Normally, you would select "Begin with Last ending date," which would start the statement for each client where the last statement for that client left off, even if those dates were different for each client. To regenerate the last statement printed for each of these clients, you would select "Regenerate Last statements," and the program would automatically begin the statement for each client in the batch with the beginning date of that client's last statement and end with the ending date of that statement (if you accept the default ending date) for each client statement, even if those dates were different for each client slected. Select "Regenerate Previous statements" if you wish to regernerate the statement previous to the last one for each client.   When printing a batch of statements you MUST select one of the beginning date offered in the pull-down menu, or your balance forward will be lost resulting in inaccurate statements.

MAGIC also allows you to batch process all the clients listed in a list file: First, create the list by selecting the "other list" option from the MAGIC Calendar EDIT menu, and then making a list of the codes of the clients you wish to include in the batch. Then, click on a blank appointment and press <F9>.  MAGIC will display a dialog box stating that the appointment slot was empty and no client has been selected, then asking you which client you want to select; instead of typing the code of a client you wish to select, you can type in the name of the list of client codes, and all the codes on that list will be selected. THIS IS NOT A SUPPORTED FEATURE; if you have difficulty using it, we suggest that you not use this feature. Will not provide tech support for this list-select feature.

Update Client $ Information: You will be asked before MAGIC begins printing if you want to update the financial information for this client. If you answer positively to this question the program will record the financial information resulting from the present billing, including the fee structure involved, as well as the last appointment and deposit dates considered in the present billing; future billings will begin automatically where the present billing leaves off. If you answer negatively, none of the above information will be altered. When you print a statement for more than one statement period, you will not be given the option of saving (updating) any changes.  

"Fill out insur. form."  Statements will print in the font you selected on line 57 oif USERDATA, however HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 forms will be filled out in 10 point COURIER BOLD (mandated by many insurance companies) unless you place an asterisk at the end of line 24, in which case the font designated in line #57 will be used to fill our insurance forms as well. You can also designate TIMES NEW ROMAN for forms by placing a tilda at the end of the insurance form designation (lines 39, 101 or 102 - See section above about line #39) i.e. "CMS1500~", which will cause MAGIC to print in NEW TIMES ROMAN, which is more condensed.  If you are printing on a HCFA-1500 form, the bottom six lines  will be printed in a reduced size font so that there will be room for names and addresses without writing over the red lettering on the form. Normally, when you print the HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 form the red ink of the form does not print; only the black text that fills it out is printed. You can buy preprinted HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 forms from a stationary or business supply store like Office Depot or purchase them from us (Cornucopia Software) at a premium in smaller quantities.   Alternatively, if you received a Windows version of Practice MAGIC on a CD Rom disk after November of 2002, the program can print the entire form on a color printer.  To do this, place an asterisk ("*") at the end of line #25 of the USER DATA ("Printer Type Code") which you can edit by selecting it from the MAGIC calendar screen EDIT menu or run SETPRINTSCALE from the PRINT menu, and a wizard will run which, among other things, will ask you whether you want to fill out a CMS-1500 (or HCFA-1500) form or print the whole form; it will configure your USER DATA appropriately for you.  Note, that it is far more economical to use preprinted forms. Some users will still find it necessary to set the page size on their printer setup information to "Legal" (8.5 x 14 inches) so that the bottom line of print on the form can be printed. Before using the Fill Out Insurance Form command, select a client by clicking on one of his or her appointments, or by using the SELECT function in the SPECIAL menu to select a number of clients whose appointments you click on. If the currently selected appointment slot is blank MAGIC will ask you to designate a client/patient. If instead you designate an insurance company, forms will be filled out for all clients with that company.  Before filling out a HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 form, Magic will ask you if you want to "update." Answering "yes" will cause the beginning date for the next form you print to be adjusted so that the first date of service on the next form you print for that client will be the one after the last one you are currently printing. Note that if you would like to automatically change all your client files so that they no longer indicate the insurance form, HCFA-1500, and indicate instead "CMS-1500," you can purchase a utility that will do this from our order page at www.practicemagic.com/orders.html

To interrupt the printing process before it is completed ( abort printing), press the <ESC> key. This feature will not prevent information that has already been sent to the print spooler from continuing to print. In order to stop the print spooler from printing, you must go to the WINDOWS system printmanager and delete all pending print jobs for that printer. On any Windows operating system other than 3.x, this is done by clicking on START, then SETTINGS or CONTROL PANEL, then PRINTERS and then double-clicking on your particular printer. Finally when you see your print jobs listed, select PURGE ALL PRINT JOBS from the FILE menu. In addition, you will want to turn the printer’s power off in order to stop it from printing and to purge it’s memory.

Print Insur. Form to Disk File (Electronic Billing): This option operates exactly as the one described above (Fill Out Insurance Form) except that instead of sending the information to you printer to be printed on paper, it will send your HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 information to a HCFA-1500/CMS-1500-image disk-file called E-HCFA.TXT  to be transmitted to an electronic clearing house like eclaims.com or www.freeclaims.com. The first time you print to disk file during a given session of using Practice MAGIC, MAGIC will ask you if you have already submitted the claims previously written to disk file.  If you answer "yes" MAGIC will replace the disk file containing the previous claims with the ones you are currently creating.  If you answer "no," MAGIC will append the current claims to the file containing the previous claims that have not yet been submitted.   For all subsequent submissions during that given session, MAGIC will assume that the claims in the the disk file have not yet been submitted, so subsequent claims in that session will be appended to the previous claims for submission as a large batch.  Most electronic clearing houses will provide you with software to transmit this file or, as in the case of eclaims.com or www.freeclaims.com, upload the file directly for you to their web sites for processing. The process of uploading e-hcfa.txt to e-claims or freeclaims is straightforward and simple; for directions, go to www.eclaims.com or www.freeclaims.com on the world wide web. For more information about using MAGIC for electronic billing, got to the Electronic Billing section under "Edit Client Info on HCFA-1500/CMS-1500" under the "EDIT" menu.

Print Insur. to Disk for All:  This option is exactly like "Print Insur. Form to Disk File," (above) except that it prints the forms for all clients designated for insurance billing to disk.   See  Print insur forms for all  to understand how to set the beginning date for this billing.

"Check Receivables" Checks the status of all payments by the clients/patients previously selected. It will check their previous balance, see how many appointments they have been seen, and see what payments have been made by them. Those clients who have a balance owing will be printed. The paragraph entitled "Beginning and Ending Dates for multiple Statements" under the heading "Statements" a few pages back applies equally to this command.

"Calendar: 1 Sheet." Prints out the week displayed on the screen on a single sheet of paper.

"Calendar: 1 Week." The format of single or multiple week calendars is designed so that by stapling along the middle line and cutting along the outside dotted lines you can create a multi-page calendar of a size of your choice that can be used as a substitute insert for the calendar you have been using in the past (for instance, DAYTIMER).

"Calendar: 4 Week." Same format as above. Prints out the week before the current week displayed on the screen, the current week, and the following two weeks.

"Day Sheet"  Click on a calendar appointment and select "Day Sheet" from the PRINT menu; MAGIC will print a list of all the appointments for the day containing the selected appointment with telephone numbers and a summary of charges, payments and balances as of that day for each client to be seen.  

"Address Envelopes/Labels." To print envelopes or labels for clients/patients previously selected. If your envelopes do not have preprinted return addresses, you can indicate in the user file that you want return addresses printed (question #11). MAGIC allows you to print addresses onto envelopes directly or onto one inch labels, either one or three across, depending how you've filled out the twenty-first item in the user data file. ("3x11" indicates "11 rows, 3 across." "3x10" means 10 rows per sheet.) These can be printed by selecting the "Address Envelopes" option from the PRINT menu or from the dialog box that appears after printing a statement or insurance form. To print a complete address list of all current clients, first "select all" from the SPECIAL menu and then use this "Print labels" option, using plain paper instead of label paper.

While most laser printers take envelopes lengthwise from the right side of the paper tray, some laser printers take them lengthwise from the center of the tray; for these it is necessary to place the letters CF after the 1 on line #25 of the USER DATA information so that the line will read 1CF. If your printer takes envelopes from the right side of the tray or all your envelopes are printing blank, use "LF" instead of "CF." If the return address is not properly positioned (printing off the side of the envelope) add NF to the line or see the section in this manual entitled PRINTER NOTES..

"Alert Summary" Prints to the printer a list of the Alerts scheduled for all clients seen within the past four weeks of the selected appointment.  

"Statements for all." To print statements for all clients. A statement will be generated for only those clients/patients you have seen, who have a balance owing, or whose payments need to be updated. To interrupt this process (abort printing) before it is completed, press the <ESC> key. The paragraph entitled "Beginning and Ending Dates for multiple Statements" under the heading "Statements" a few pages back applies equally to this command.

Answering "yes" to the question about whether you want to "update" will cause the beginning date for the next statement you print to be adjusted so that the first date of service will be the one after the last one you are currently printing. Updating will also cause the program to only consider deposits after the last deposit date considered in the present statement, and to memorize the financial conditions related to the current statement.  Also, if you answer "yes" to this question, MAGIC will ask you, "After this billing, do you wish to automatically change the standard fees for all of these client's to the default fees in your current USERDATA file? (Y/N) [Default = N]" See Automatically Updating Fees under "Receivable Report for All" for more details.

Changing Fees: If you are changing the fees you are charging for a client, you need to run a statement with a billing period ending on the day before the new fee takes effect, and answer affirmatively to the question about whether you want to update client information from this statement. Then change the fees defined in the client's information file using the first or second option in the EDIT menu.  The new fees will be used for the next billing period.

"Fill out insur. form for all." To fill out insurance forms for all clients/patients. You will be prompted for the beginning date of  the period to be billed on these insurance forms. There are two options: by pressing ENTER or clicking OK to the prompt "begin with last date billed (xxxxx)" [here "xxxxx" will be the last date billed to the first client on your client list.]  MAGIC will begin the billing for each client with the last date billed TO THAT CLIENT. With this option, if you do not respond "YES" to the question about whether you want to update, the beginning date for each client will remain the same and the next time you fill out insurance forms the same service dates will be repeated.  The second of the two options is to delete "begin with last date billed" and input a date; in this case MAGIC will set that same date as the biginning date for the billing period of ALL THE CLIENTS on your list. If you regularly use this second option, it is irrelevant what you respond to the question about whether you wish to update. To interrupt the printing process (abort printing) before it is completed, press the <ESC> key. (Note, however, that if you try to abort printing, MAGIC will stop sending forms to the printer, but the printer buffer is already full of forms already sent but not yet printed, and these will continue to print unless you go to the PRINTERS option under SETTINGS in the WINDOWS START menu and double click on your printer's icon and select "purge all print jobs" under the FILE menu for that printer.)   Before filling out the first HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 form, Magic will ask you if you want to "update." Answering "yes" will cause the beginning date for the next form you print to be adjusted so that the first date of service will be the one after the last one you are currently printing.

"Billing Report" To tabulate total value of all services rendered for all clients/patients for any given period of time broken down by "insurance" and "non-insurance."  It will also report the amount deposited for the same period of time. This report appears on screen, and you are given the option of also printing it using your printer. This function is very similar to Receivables Report (for all) below except that only the summary at the end is printed.

"Receivables Report (for all)." Prints a summary of the financial situation and activity for a particular period for all active clients/patients or just those whose payments are not current. Amounts due from Insurance companies are also indicated and you are given the option of listing each date of service for which insurance has not reimbursed. The paragraph entitled "Beginning and Ending Dates for multiple Statements" under the heading "Statements" a few pages back applies equally to this command.

"Receivables Update Only" Has exactly the same effect as the "Receivables Report for All" function when the question about whether to "update" is answered affirmatively, except that when you select Receivables Update Only nothing is printed. "Updating" causes the default beginning date for the next statement to be set to the ending date of the present statement being generated. and all financial information for that period is updated and stored, including Balance Forward, Fees, Copays, and Deductibles. After updating, the statement can be regenerated at any time and MAGIC will offer you the option of regenerating the statement with the same fees and copays that were used when the statement was originally generated, even if those amounts have subsequently changed. If you wish to update information for one client or a few select clients only, use the Check Receivables option under the PRINT menu. Answering "yes" to the "update" question also offers you the option of automatically updating the full fee you charge clients.

"Disable Printer" or "Enable Printer"  Enables you to specify if your computer is or is not attached to a printer.

"Printer Setup" Enables you to change selected printer, page size, page orientation, etc.

"Set Print Scaling" Adjusts the print size of printers so that printing on forms will be accurate. Your printer will print  a solid black box and two lines of text. Then, your printer will print a horizontal and a vertical line on the paper, each approximately 3 inches long. Wait until this sheet is completely printed. If Magic is placing text correctly near the top of your HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 forms when Magic fills out insurance forms, disregard the first question (about the distance between the top of the black box and the top of the sheet) and simply click "OK." If not, measure (in inches) from the top of this box to the top edge of the sheet just printed (EXACTLY!) and place that amount as a fraction of inches (i.e. "1/8" to represent one eighth inch) or a decimal expression (i.e. ".12" to represent   one eighth inch) in the response box on your screen and the click "OK."  You will be asked by MAGIC to measure the length of the two lines and report their lengths in inches as a fraction or a decimal. If either of these lines is not EXACTLY three inches, there is probably something wrong with your printer, although the problem may be minor and easily corrected by telling MAGIC the exact length of the lines.  For example, either "47/16"  or "2.92"  would both represent two and fifteen sixteenths of an inch. MAGIC will then use that information to adjust the print positions. If the print position is still slightly off, simply repeat this process until the printer output it is exactly how you want it. When it is right the horizontal and vertical line measurements should be EXACTLY THREE INCHES. Now MAGIC will print several more sheets of paper and ask you another question to determine the printable area allowed by your printer and how your printer handles envelopes.   Finally, if you are running the version of MAGIC that is larger than two megabytes or comes on a CD rather than a floppy, MAGIC will ask if you want to use preprinted HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 forms or to have MAGIC print them. We recommend that you purchase preprinted forms, which you can buy from us or any office/stationery supply house (in larger quantities), because the cost of color ink cartridges required to print the red form makes it relatively expensive to have your printer print them.

Note: Although not the easiest method, print position can also be adjusted by changing the minumum left and top margin data in the USERDATA option of your EDIT menu. If printing is too high, decrease the minimum top margin (line 20 in User data) in 1/12" increments. If printing is too low, increase the minimum top margin. (This may seem counter-intuitive.) If it is too far to the right, increase the minimum left margin (line 18). If it is too far to the left, decrease the minimum left margin.  If  the type lines up properly on top part of HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 when it is printed but becomes gradually out of alignment further down the page or if type lines up properly on left part of HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 when it is printed but becomes gradually out of alignment further right on the page, you should remeasure the vertical (up and down) and horizontal (right and left) lines respectively printed by the SET PRINT SCALE option and you will find that it is not EXACTLY 3 inches long. Enter the EXACT distances when prompted by the SET PRINT SCALE utility in the PRINT menu.

APPT

"Canc/No Show" To cancel an appointment and charge the client/patient, click on "Canc/No Show." After using this option, you will be asked whether there is a charge associated with the cancellation. Click "no charge," "normal charge," or "reduced charge." If you click "reduced charge", you will be asked the amount of the charge. As with the "Skip" option, this appointment will automatically be rescheduled for the following week if it is a weekly appointment and not that client's first appointment. See "Skip" (above) for methods of canceling an appointment without automatically rescheduling it for the following week.

"Skip" To cancel an appointment without charging, click on "Skip." When this option is chosen, a client/patient who is seen weekly will automatically be rescheduled for the customary time the following week unless the skipped session was that client's first appointment. If you do not want this appointment scheduled for the following week, change it to "Irreg" (from the CHANGE menu) before "Skipping" it or "Move Perm" or "Cancel/Terminate" it (see below). Clicking on an appointment that is already scheduled and pressing <SHIFT>+<DEL> has the same effect as the SKIP function. Clicking on an appointment that is already scheduled and overwriting it with another appointment will also cause the original appointment to be eliminated, and if it was WEEKLY it will be automatically rescheduled for the following week unless it is the client's first visit. The newly written appointment will replace the appointment that it overwrites.

"Cancel/Terminate" This option is used when you will no longer be seeing this client/patient in this time slot. If the client's time slot is simply being changed, use the "move" option. If the client/patient is entered at a date following the date on which you terminate him, you will receive a warning. If your intention is to cancel rather than terminate him there is not problem; otherwise you will need to terminate him at this later date also.

"Vacat day" To schedule a day of vacation for the therapist, place the cursor on the day and time where the vacation begins. Click "Vacat Day" in the APPT menu. "VACATION" will appear in the appointment slots for the rest of that day. To schedule a vacation for a week, do the same thing for each day of that week. All appointments will be canceled during that day from the selected appointment time until the end of the day. Selecting "Canc Vacat" when an appointment time that reads "Vacation" has been selected will cancel the vacation hours scheduled for that day from the selected appointment time until the end of the day.

"Move (perm)" and "Resched (temp)" These options are used to change an appointment time. To move or reschedule an appointment, click on the appointment you wish to move. Use "move" if the change is permanent or "resched" if the client/patient's appointment will be changed only for the current week. Move the cursor to the new location for that appointment and click. The appointment will be placed in that time period. When MAGIC makes a temporary reschedule, it simultaneously schedules the client/patient for the following week at his customary time.

SPECIAL

"Set alert" This function can be used to notify the therapist when a final appointment is scheduled for a specific client/patient or when the therapist needs to prepare a report for the client/patient's insurance company. To set an alert, place the cursor on the last scheduled appointment in the MAGIC calendar of the client/patient you wish to be alerted for and click. Then select SET ALERT from the SPECIAL menu. If it is not the last scheduled appointment for this client/patient, you will get a message at the bottom of the screen saying you must set the alert at the last scheduled appointment. If it is the last scheduled appointment, you will need to input the session number (preceded by "#") or date (mm/dd/yy) for which you want to be alerted. If you want to indicate both a session number and a date so that you will be alerted whichever one comes first, do so by typing in the session number and date separated by a space or backslash (\). You will also be prompted to add a note explaining the alert. When the designated session number is scheduled or an appointment is scheduled past the designated date, the computer will beep and provide you with a reminder message. Clicking <CANC> on the "Alert" dialog box will take you back to the calendar and no action will have been taken. Any other option automatically cancels any ALERT that may have been previously scheduled for that client/patient.

"Select/Unselect Patient/Client" Use this function to select one or more clients/patients for whom you wish to print statements, check on payments, or print envelopes. Place the cursor on an appointment of the client/patient you wish to select and click "select." The code(s) for the client/patient(s) selected will appear in a list at the bottom of the screen. If this client has already been selected, selecting it again will cause it to be unselected. You can then go into the PRINT menu and use any of the options offered. All clients/patients selected will be processed by the PRINT menu function you select.

LIST SELECT: Recently added to this function is a "list-select" function: if you click on "select" when a blank appointment slot is highlighted, you will have the opportunity to type in the name of a text file containing a list of client codes, for instance "BillList.txt", and all clients on that list will be selected. You can create and edit such a list using the "other list" option that has been added to the edit menu. Although we have provided you with this utility for your convenience, we are not providing technical support for it, so we do not recommend you use it unless you are familiar with using your computer.

"Unselect all/Select all" Unselects all clients/patients who have been previously selected by using "select." If none have been selected, this option selects all clients who, at your option, are on your client list or have active accounts.

"Cancel alert" To cancel an alert, place the cursor on the client/patient the alert is scheduled for and click "cancel alert" in the SPECIAL menu.

"List all Alerts"  Displays a list of the Alerts scheduled for all clients seen within the past four weeks of the selected appointment.

"Activate the Palm Hotsync": If you have a version of Practice MAGIC that contains the optional Palm/MAGIC hotsync interface and you have not already read the section on preparing your PALM OS handheld to interface with MAGIC, you should do so now.  The version of MAGIC designed to hotsync with the PALM PILOT or other handheld with Palm OS can be run with or without the PALM/MAGIC Hotsync. When it is furst run it will ask you if you want to activate the PALM/MAGIC Hotsync feature. If you respond "No," the program will remember that you are not using the PALM/MAGIC Hotsync feature and will not ask you this question again when you run Practice MAGIC. If, at a future time, you wish to activate the PALM/MAGIC Hotsync feature, you can do this using this last option of the SPECIAL menu, which will read "Activate PALM/MAGIC Interface". (If you use this menu option you will need to exit and reenter MAGIC before using the PALM interface.)  If you respond "Yes" , the program will display a screen which offers you the opportunity to upload your MAGIC Calendar appointment entries to your handheld. This is of great importance because in the future MAGIC will assume that any appointment that is not on the handheld datebook calendar but is on the MAGIC Calendar must have been deleted from the handheld and should therefore be deleted from MAGIC’s calendar.  This screen will also allow you to define or change other settings related to the PALM/MAGIC Hotsync interface.  NOTE: Before activating the PALM/MAGIC Hotsync feature be sure that you have entered at least one current appointment in your PALM datebook, and that your PALM user name is no more than five characters long.  Also, note that any appointment designated as "Weekely" on the PALM will not be transferred to MAGIC!

"Change Palm Pilot Settings": The last entry in the MAGIC calendar screen SPECIAL menu, which reads "Activate the Palm Hotsync" when the  MAGIC/PALM hotsync feature has not yet been enabled, becomes "Change Palm Settings" after it is enabled.  This menu option displays a screen which permits you to define or change the parameters of the MAGIC/PALM Hotsink operation and to initialize your handheld for use with MAGIC by transfering the entries of your MAGIC Calendar to your handheld datebook.  From this screen, you can change the name MAGIC expects to be assigned to the handheld, change the number of months of appointments that will be stored in your handheld, indicate the portion of the client list that will be transferred to your handheld, and the location MAGIC can expect to find the PALM software.  The larger the portion of your client list that you transfer the longer will be the hesitation in loading and quitting Practice MAGIC. Another option in the pull-down menu that permits you to select the portion of your client list that will be transferred to the handheld, also permits you to disable the PALM/MAGIC interface.

Initializing the Handheld's Datebook with MAGIC's Calendar Entries: This screen also allows you to initialize the Handheld's Datebook calendar by transferring the appointments in your MAGIC Calendar to your Handheld.  This is a one-time operation that is done when the handheld is first introduced to the MAGIC Calendar and the MAGIC Calendar may already have appointment entries that are not on the handheld.  After this, the transfer of appointment information to the handheld is automatic and occurs every time you make a change in the MAGIC Calendar.  After exiting the MAGIC Calendar, hotsyncing the handheld to the desktop transfers all of this new appointment information to the handheld.  Each time you run MAGIC, of course, you will want to run the Handheld/Desktop hotsync operation to transfer to MAGIC any changes in the calendar that you have made using the handheld. NOTE THAT WHILE MAGIC IS IN THE PROCESS OF RUNNING, THE HANDHELD/DESKTOP HOTSYNC WILL BE TEMPORARILY DISABLED so that you will not be able to transfer information from you handheld to the desktop until you exit MAGIC.

PALM Datebook Appointment Notes:  Even if you choose not to transfer any of your client list to your PALM, Practice MAGIC will place the client's telephone information in a note attached to each scheduled appointment.    The note will also contain the procedure information, visit number, and any comments or alerts related to that appointment. Be aware that the more months of datebook information you chose to hotsync to MAGIC and the more client information you transfer, the longer the delay in initialization and closing of MAGIC.

How the PALM/MAGIC Interface Works (with Palm Pilots and other Handhelds using the Palm Operating System) - Features:  If you have a version of Practice MAGIC that contains the optional Palm/MAGIC hotsync interface and you have not already read the section on preparing your PALM OS handheld to interface with MAGIC, you should do so now.  If you have the palm-hotsync version of Practice MAGIC that contains the optional Palm/MAGIC hotsync interface, MAGIC will hotsync with your Palm Datebook desktop software every time MAGIC is run.  This means that each time you run MAGIC, you should first hotsync your handheld to the desktop computer and then after running MAGIC you should hotsync them again.  Your desktop PALM software maintains an image of your handheld, which you can access and edit using the Palm Desktop software that came with your handheld.

Palm User Name: Of particular importance, is that this Desktop software permits you to give your handheld a name for the purposes of identification, and to change that name when you wish.  An idiosyncracy of the Palm/MAGIC interface is that the name you give to your handheld should be no more than five characters. If it is longer, you should shorten it by running your Palm Desktop software, opening the pulldown list entitled "USERS" at the top right of your screen (by clicking on the little arrow on its left side), and then selecting EDIT USERS. (Shorting the user name in this way ensures that the name of the PALM subdirectory containing your desktop datebook information is the same as your user name, which is what MAGIC requires.)

    Every entry you make in your handheld will be transferred to MAGIC except entries that you designate in the PALM datebook as repeating (i.e. weekly). These will be ignored. (In other words, do NOT designate appointments to repeat in your handheld.)    If you wish, these can be designated as "weekly" from the MAGIC Calendar instead. With that exception, any changes you have made to your PALM datebook calendar will automatically be transferred to your MAGIC calendar each time you run the PALM version of MAGIC. You can cancel appointments by simply removing them from your PALM datebook by going to DETAILS and then DELETE. (Simply backing the client code off of the PALM will leave the NOTE in place and will cause confusion for MAGIC, especially if you then put another name in that slot, so that the new name now nas the incorrect NOTE information.  Accordingly, any entry that is in your MAGIC Calendar when you start-up MAGIC and is not also present on the handheld will be assumed to have been cancelled on the handheld and therefore will be removed from the MAGIC Calendar. A warning screen will appear to alert you to appointments that are being deleted from the MAGIC calendar and you will have the option of preserving them.  Any changes you make to your MAGIC calendar while running the PALM version of Practice MAGIC will automatically be transferred to your PALM datebook calendar, so you should again hotsync your handheld to the desktop after exiting MAGIC.

Client List Transfer:  As indicated above, you can specify what portion of you client list you wish to transfer to your handheld. (The list is transferred to the ADDRESSBOOK function of the handheld under the category "MAGIC.")  You can select whether or not to restrict the transfer to active clients and whether you wish to include insurance companies and their telephone numbers in the transfer. You can also chose to transfer no part of your client list, or to disable the PALM/MAGIC hotsync feature completely.  Unlike the appointment calendar, the transfer of information about the client list goes mostly one way, from MAGIC to your handheld.   If you wish to modify your MAGIC client list using your handheld, you can do this to a limited degree by editing selected entries on your handheld. Since the client list is held in the PALM address book, editing an entry will present you with two NAME fields, a TITLE field which MAGIC uses for the MAGIC client code, a HOME telephone number field, a WORK telephone number field and an OTHER telephone number field. You should modify only the telephone number fields; if you do, then place an asterisk at the beginning of the first name field for that client (to alert MAGIC that you have a made a change. You can also transfer miscellaneous information to MAGIC by putting it in the OTHER information field (located right after home and office telephone numbers.)

Depositing a check from an insurance company:   If the check is from an insurance company, begin the code of the company with "@" or click on <INSUR. CHECK> at the bottom of the screen and MAGIC will then prompt you to indicate how many clients/patients the payment is for. It will then provide you with input boxes at the bottome of the page that will allow you to indicate the codes for each of the clients, the amount you are being reimbursed for that client, and, the dates of service for which you are being reimbursed.   (multiple dates may be entered as a range, or as a list of individual dates: mm/dd/yy-mm/dd/yy or mm/dd/yy, mm/dd/yy, mm/dd/yy).  After entering the information for each client press the <ENTER> key or the <DOWN ARROW> key or click the NEXT button on the left side of the screen to go on to the next client to be credited. After entering information for some, you can go back and edit these by pressing the <UP ARROW> key or <PgUp> key or clicking on the BACK button on the left side of the screen. The <DOWN ARROW> key or <PgDn>  key will perfom the opposite (NEXT) function.   After you enter the information for a client to be credited, the program will display a dialogue box asking you to confirm that the proper amount is being credited to the right client. If the client has more than one insurance and the credit is for payment from the primary insurance, this dialog box will contain a note to this effect, and a separate dialogue box will appear as well notifying you that this client has a second insurance carrier which will need to be billed.

NOTE: The dates of service you enter, although optional, allow MAGIC to determine which visits have been paid for. (When later running a receivables report ["Receivables report for all" in PRINT menu], you will be asked if you want MAGIC to also report all dates of service for which no insurance payment has been received (for clients for whom a primary insurance carrier has been designated.) For individual clients, after running a statement or financial status report, the "FIND INSUR." button on screen marks the unpaid visit dates on screen with an "X". Clicking on a single visit date in the pull-down list box at the top of your screen will cause MAGIC to find the deposit in the list box at the bottom of the screen which covers that date.)

To complete the deposit, enter zero as the amount of the next check or click the DONE or OK buttons. You will be returned to the deposit menu.

"Print Deposit Slip"  to fill out a deposit slip. Pressing this button prints the deposit information including your name and account number, followed by a listing and total of the checks. Unless indicated otherwise in the USER DATA information file, cash receipts will be skipped on this listing.  If you wish to print a deposit slip for more than one days of deposits, and you have saved each day's deposits separately under distinct dates, you must first retrieve these deposits as a group and then use the PRINT DEPOSIT SLIP option to print the slip. (Click here to see section on retrieving multiple deposits.)

If you use Quicken,  QuickBooks, or one of many other money management programs that can import information from Quicken or QuickBooks, you can indicate at the appropriate prompt in your USER DATA file the path of the subdirectory containing your Quicken,  QuickBooks or money manager files, and Practice MAGIC will automatically write a file called MAGICDEP.QIF  or MAGICDEP.IIF to that directory every time you save checking deposit information in Practice MAGIC. This file will of course be overwritten with new information the next time a MAGIC deposit is saved. If the path you have inputted in line #48 of your User Data (which you access from the Magic EDIT menu.) contains the letters "QUICKBOOKS", Magic will know that you want a file written to disk that is in the "iif" format that QuickBooks reads and imports.   When Magic realizes this, it will ask you the name of the account within QuickBooks that you want your MAGIC deposits transferred to.  It will then place this name after a colen at the end of  line #10 of your User Data, so that it will not need to ask you this question again.  If you are using a financial program other than QuickBooks that uses the QuickBooks information exchange format (rather than the Quicken Information Format), you will need to enter this information yourself by placing a colen at the end of the account number you give on line #10 of your User Data and then inputing after the colen the name of the account as entered in the financial program. Quicken imports up to 30 deposit entries per transfer. If your deposit is larger and you want it fully imported into Quicken, you will need to divide it into two deposits. NOTE THAT BEGINNING WITH THE 2005 VERSION, INTUIT HAS DISABLED THE IMPORT FEATURE NECESSARY FOR QUICKEN TO WORK WITH PRACTICE MAGIC.

To import this deposit information into Quicken(pre-2005) or QuickBooks:  For Quicken, use the IMPORT function in Quicken's Print/Acct menu or FILE menu from the register. This feature, however, is not available in Quicken version after 2004.  If you have not instructed MAGIC to place the MAGICDEP.QIF file onto the Quicken subdirectory, you will need to indicate to Quicken where to find the MAGICDEP file.  The procedure for QuickBooks is almost the same. NOTE that, unlike Quicken, Quickbooks will not accept any deposits to any customer (client) account that has not already been established in Quickbooks; if it finds such an account reference in the the deposit transfer, it will reject the entire deposit.  (After creating the necessary account in Quickbooks, you can attempt to import the deposit again.) 

"Recall or Void Deposit(s)" to retrieve or remove a file from disk. If you want to edit or delete a deposit file that has already been created, click "Recall or Void Deposit(s)" and then type in the date of the deposit you wish to remove and click the "VOID" button in the dialogue box at the bottom of the screen. Alternatively you can click the date of the deposit you wish to void when it appears at the top of the screen.  Clicking on the date will bring you back to the main deposit menu, and you will need to click "Recall or Void Deposit(s)" again, after which you will click the "VOID" button in the dialogue box at the bottom of the screen.  "Recall or Void Deposit(s)" is also used to retrieve a deposit file.  At the top of the screen, you will be given a directory of a month's deposits. The current date is the default date. Select the date of the deposit you want from the top of the screen or type in the desired date and press the "Retrieve" button.  If you want to print a deposit slip for multiple days of deposits, use this screen to load a range of deposit records (i.e. "04/06/02-04/10/02"). Then PRINT from the main deposit menu.

USERS ( This Menu is present in Multi-user Versions ONLY)

"Add/Delete User" This option will only appear when the MAGIC is logged onto the main user (the first user in the list of users) as is the case when MAGIC loaded..  When you click on it, it asks you whether you want to add a user or delete one. You can  add as many users as you are contracted for.  For instance, you may have a 3 user program or a 16 user program. (If you have added your limit of users, you will not be presented with the option of adding another user.) After you have added a user, that user will appear in the list at the bottom of  the USERS menu.  When you add a user, the program will ask you for a two or three letter code for that user and it will use that code to setup a new INFO subdirectory. If the user code is PM for instance, MAGIC will set up the subdirectory INFOPM within MAGIC to hold all calendar and client information for the user, PM.   It will also establish a USERDATA.PM file in the MAGIC directory to hold all user information for that user. Initially all entries in USERDATA.PM will be taken from USERDATA.MAG except for the user's name.  If you indicate that you would like to delete a user name, you will be presented with a dialog box containing a button for each of the current users other than the main user.  To delete a user, click on the button containing that user's name.

List of Users Under Add/Remove User in the USERS menu, will be listed the name of each active user that has been entered into the system.   When you load and run the MAGIC, the active user will be the first one on the list, immediately under "Add/Delete User." This user is the "Main User," and can not ever be deleted.  By clicking on another user name, that user will become the active user, meaning that user's calendar will appear on the screen and that user's client list and financial information will become the only one accessible.

The program requires that your computer have a minimum of just over a million bytes available in internal memory (RAM) after the operating system and WINDOWS are loaded in order to operate. For practical purposes, this means that the computer must have at least two million bytes of internal memory in order to accommodate the WINDOWS operating system and Practice MAGIC together. Practice MAGIC can be customized to fill out nearly any insurance form. It allows up to 3000 deposit items per billing period; the length of billing period is determined by user. With the exception of the unlimited versions, the program will not work past a preset date without an update. The standard version accepts 1300 active clients/patients, although custom versions are available which will accept many more active clients/patients. To include more than 1300 clients, you need to delete some inactive clients from your client/patient list using the "Edit Client List" item on the EDIT menu. You will not lose the information on deleted clients. Client information files for inactive clients are maintained in the MAGIC INFO subdirectory under the name of the client's code followed by ".pat" until you reuse that client code. If you reuse the code, the information file is renamed to the first initial of the first name followed by a "-" and then the first five letters of the client's last name and a numeral and ".pbk". For instance, "S-Freud0.pbk"  The program is capable of generating an electronic file (e-hcfa.txt) for the purpose of electronic billing through a clearing house.  We have many clients currently using eclaims.com and freeclaims.com, which appears to be easy to use.  The process of uploading e-hcfa.txt to eclaims.com or www.freeclaims.com is straightforward and simple; for directions, go to www.eclaims.com or www.freeclaims.com on the world wide web.

There are two more screens of USER DATA information that you can access by moving the scroll box at the right of the screen or clicking in the scroll bar, or pulling down the "Search" menu, however most of these need not be answered during this tutorial. Line #25 will not need to be filled out for this tutorial but will need to be filled out before you print envelops. (If you want to fill out line #25 now, see page #3 of this manual for instructions.) Now select the line #27 by clicking on it, and enter your fee for 50 minutes of individual psychotherapy (C.P.T.90844). This fee information will be automatically transferred to the information file that MAGIC creates for each client/patient you schedule an appointment for at the time that the first appointment is scheduled.. More advanced users may want to indicate an adjusted fee for a particular client/patient if for instance that client/patient's managed care company will allow only a portion of your full fee. This process is explained in this tutorial under the heading Printing a Statement, as well as under the heading, Stipulating Fee for Clinical Procedures which appears in the "Client Info" section of the portion of the manual explaining the EDIT menu.

The next screen you will see is the calendar screen, which will be the first screen to appear when you run Practice MAGIC in the future. It contains appointment times for the current week. For this tutorial session, click on the box under today's date at 11:00 am. To enter a client, use a two digit abbreviation ("client code") for that client. For the purpose of this tutorial, move the mouse pointer to 11:00 under Fri and type JD for "John Doe." ( will be used in this tutorial to denote the ENTER key. Pressing is equivalent to clicking on "OK" after you have typed a response in a dialog box.) Instead of pressing the ENTER key you could just click on a new appointment box. You will hear a beep and at the bottom of the screen you will see a message indicating that no current clients' names match JD. Click on "OK" to indicate that "JD" is in fact the client code that you intended to type. Add this client's name to your client list now by giving the requested information: Doe as last name, John as first name, followed by home and office telephone number(s). The telephone numbers are optional, as is the first name, but you must type at least the first letter of the client's first name in that edit field. For the purpose of this tutorial respond that you would like to bill John’s insurance only by clicking on the box, "Insurance Only" Leave all the balances as 0. If John were an ongoing client that you were now entering into MAGIC, you would need to calculate John's balance as of that date so that MAGIC could accurately continue his billing. (Be sure to count all payments John has made up until that date, and record all payments for John after that date in MAGIC by using the deposit function in the DEPOSIT menu.) If you indicated, as we did, that you want to bill this person's insurance, you will also be asked John's copay, the portion of his bill that is not covered by insurance. If there is no insurance involved this number is "1" which is the default. Otherwise, you can enter the portion in any of a variety of forms: a decimal (like ".25"), a fraction (like 1/4"), a percentage (like "25%"), or a dollar amount greater than one (like "$10.00"). If the copay is anything but "1" you will be asked the balance owed by John's primary insurance carrier as of the above date. Note that you are also asked for John's street address and city, state, and zip. These questions supply MAGIC with the information it needs to begin keeping your billing records for John. They are all optional and can be skipped. When you have entered the information you wish, click on DONE. You can always go back and edit John's client information at a later time by selecting his name after activating EDIT CLIENT LIST from the EDIT menu of MAGIC’s calendar screen. John Doe is now the first client entered into the program's client list. At the bottom of the screen you will now see the appointment time (11:00) followed by the client's first initial and last name, the default procedure code ("C.P.T. 90801" for first visits of clients who's copay is indicated as less then 100% and "C.P.T. 90806" for all other visits), the word "TEMP" (the default frequency code which indicates that this client is not seen each week at the same time) and the visit number which is assumed to be "1." The default of "TEMP" for new clients can be changed to "WEEKLY" by editing the USER DATA file. Note that if JD's appointment were weekly it would appear on the calendar in BOLD and in a different color than it does as non-weekly.

Assuming for the purposes of this tutorial, your clients have paid you today, we will now fill out a check deposit slip. To do this, click on menu heading DEPOSIT and drag to "Deposit checks." At the CHECK DEPOSIT menu, click on the "Input checks" button. John has paid you a check for $180.00 so type 180 . Now type JD . Mary has paid $85 in cash so type 85 . Since she paid cash we now type typing MD2 and press the "Cash" button. The "$" that now appears before MD2 indicates that the payment was cash. (You could have equivalently typed $MD2 ) Whether or not cash payments should be listed in deposit slips is determined by the answer on line #49 in the USER DATA file accessed from the EDIT menu. The default is "NO," and since we did not change that line you will notice that the $85 cash payment is not reflected in the deposit total. Now suppose that you have received a dividend check for $850.25 from IBM for some stock you hold. Type 850.25 followed by IBM dividend and then press the button for non-professional checks. Notice that a period is automatically placed at the beginning of that entry. (You could alternately have entered ..IBM dividend .) The period that begins the payor notation this check indicates that the check represents non-clinical income. Now suppose your last check to deposit is an insurance check for $400 from a company called "Insurance Company," which we now refer to as "@INS." Type 400 and then for payor type INS followed by pressing the button titled "Insur. Check." The "@" that is automatically inserted indicates that this check is from an insurance company. MAGIC will ask about this company if it does not recognize it, including the name and address of the company and the maximun allowable (adjusted) fees the company allows. Now MAGIC will ask you how many client/patients the check is for. Answer 2 . MAGIC will now present you with three text boxes at the bottom right of the screen in which you are asked the portion of this check that covers the services rendered to the first client/patient, the name or code of the client/patient, and the dates of service being reimbused.. Type 150 in the amount box, 2/3/2-2/25/2 in the dates of service box, JD in the client name box, and then press the <DOWN ARROW> key or <ENTER> key. Rather than press those keys, clicking the NEXT button on the left of your screen will accomplish the same thing. (When you run a statement or financial status report on a client, if you have supplied these dates for insurance payments, you will have the option of reporting all dates of service for which insurance payment has not been received (see Receivable Report for All) or clicking on a visit date and then clicking a button that automatically locates the insurance check covering this visit.) MAGIC will now verify that $150 of this check is for services provided to John Doe. Respond affirmatively by clicking on "OK." MAGIC assumes that the remaining $250 is for services to the second client/patient and asks you who that is and the dates of service. Answer MD2 and 9/10-10/30 respectively, press the <ENTER> key, and answer "OK" to the next prompt verifying that $250 is for services provided to Mary Doe. Now click on the DONE button to indicate that there are no further checks to deposit. Click on the <Print by Category> button to print a deposit summary which subtotals clinical income (checks), cash, and non-clinical income. Click on <Print Deposit Slip> to print a deposit slip. If you want you can cut this sheet so that it is narrower and conforms more closely to the slips the bank gives you, but banks will generally accept this sheet as a deposit slip whether it is a narrow slip or a full sheet. Now click on <Review/Edit Deposit> to review the deposit followed by the DONE button to return to the deposit menu, and then <Save Deposit Info> followed by "OK" to save the deposit under today's date. To return to the MAGIC calendar now, click on the <Return to Calendar> button.

1. Program says I need a new CODE: Practice MAGIC does a mathematical calculation based on your name (the first lin of USERDATA) and then generates a unique code to correspond to your name.  If you change that line in any way, even adding a space, a period or capitolizing a letter, MAGIC will tell you that your CODE is wrong, and will not let you into the program until you type in a code that corresponds to the number that is displayed in the edit line of the message box that tells you you need a new code. WE CANNOT PROVIDE YOU WITH A CODE UNTIL YOU TELL US WHAT THAT NUMBER IS. If you inadvertently are locked out of your program, simply copy the file USERDATA.MAG from your backup disk (we hope you are periodically backing up your MAGIC data files) to the folder C:\MAGIC. Doing this will restore your original name and code.

To correct the problem, you will need to uncheck the "read only" box in the file property dialog.To do this, use MY COMPUTER to modify the PROPERTIES of these files by unchecking the READ ONLY box. Start MY COMPUTER, find the file or files you transfered, single click it WITH THE RIGHT MOUSE BUTTON, and uncheck the READ ONLY box at the bottom of the window.  If you select all the files at once by sweeping the mouse over them while the button is down and then releasing the button when all have been darkened, you can then right-click and modify this attribute on all the files at once. (There is also an option under EDIT to SELECT All)  If you are unsure which files are the culprits, select all the files in the INFO folder located in your MAGIC folder (that is on your C drive) and remove the "read only" property attribute. Also, the USERDATA.MAG file in your MAGIC folder should have its read-only property removed.

3.Backups: My computer does not have a floppy drive.  I can not get MAGIC to backup onto a CD-ROM. Magic will not backup onto a CD-ROM drive because CD-ROM drives do not act like floppy drives, zip drives, or RAM drives, unless you set up the disk to be "rewritable" in a special format that allows you to read and write to it just like you would to a floppy.  Barring that, our suggestion is that you periodically copy your entire INFO subfolder of your MAGIC folder onto a cd-rom for backup purposes. See the section on making backups under use of the FILE menu for more information.

4. Idiosyncratic or Spontaneous Problems: I have had a problem suddenly start happening with my program that did not begin after I had made a change in my computer or the software. First check the usual suspects. Try reinstalling the latest version of Practice MAGIC. If that doesn't help and the problem is related to printing, go to the website of the manufacturer of you printer and download the very latest printer driver for your printer (even if it prints perfectly with all your other software). If you've tried all the simple solutions and nothing solves your problem, you need to go on to a more radical solution. Start by backing up your entire MAGIC folder. Begin by renaming any file that looks like USERDATA in your "c:\magic" directory to USERDATA.OLD or a similar variation of that name. This will cause MAGIC to not find USERDATA and assume this is your first time running PracticeMAGIC, so it will provide you with a screen to reenter your personal/professional information, and it will create a new USERDATA file. Try the program and see if you still have your problem. If so, reinstall a fresh version of magic, which you can download if you like from the internet (obtain a download address from Cornucopia), and see if you still have your problem. If not, great! If so, rename your "c:\magic\info" folder to "c:\magic\infobac" and reinstall the program one more time, which will create a new C:\MAGIC\INFO folder containing none of your client, deposit or appointment information; again see if you still have your problem. Assuming you do not, start moving data from INFOBAC into the new INFO folder until the problem occurs; this will identify the file that is the source of the problem, or (preferably) the problem may never occur. The offending file will need to be replaced.  If you need help with these steps or with replacing or repairing the culprit file, get some help from a friend, a tech consultant, or hire us. (For problems that do not relate to an initial Practice MAGIC installation, Cornucopia charges $20 for each fifteen minutes or part thereof of technical support.)

5. Unique and "Sticky problems: I have had a problem just start happening that Cornucopia says nobody else has been reporting. See answer to #4 above.

6. Program is TOO SLOW: Unless you have a very slow machine, unacceptably slow execution is caused by other programs that have been loaded automatically during power up and are running in the background or have been loaded by you and left in memory before you ran MAGIC. To find out what programs are currently loaded, exit MAGIC, open Program Manager and while holding down the <CTRL> key press the <ESC> key.  We have not had a customer complain of execution speed problems in 8 years.

1. My NPI fails to print in box 33a of the CMS-1500 form (instead it prints on the top of the following page) or my PIN# and GRP# in box 33 on the HCFA-1500 does not print even though I can see it on the on-screen insurance form (these problems may also be accompanied by a problem printing the date in box 31 on the HCFA-1500/CMS-1500.)  See section on "printer notes" in GETTING STARTED. See also page 4. If you are changing page size, be sure to do it before you run MAGIC. In addition this problem may be caused by the printing on the page being too wide on a particular line so that the tail end of that line is finished on the next line; then, all subsequent printing is one line too low and the final line prints on the next page.  If this is the case run SETPRINTSCALE or find and change the entry that is overflowing on the right into the line.)

2. Type prints in strange places on statements but correctly on the HCFA-1500/CMS-1500. Check to make sure the Statement size (line #19 in User Data) is set appropriately to the font sizes (lines 1 to 10 and 57) you have selected. This problem can occur if the fonts are set large and the sheet size is too small.

3. Type prints too high or low on on the HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 forms: See page 4 or "Set Print Scale"

4. Type prints too far to right or left on on the HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 forms: See page 4 or "Set Print Scale"

5. Type lines up properly on top part of HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 when it is printed but becomes gradually out of alignment further down the page: See page 4 or select "Set Print Scale" from MAGIC's PRINT menu.

7. "Set Print Scale" does not print a sheet as described in the "Set Print Scale" section of this manual.  In particular, the horizontal or vertical line will either not print or be nowhere near three inches in length:  First be sure that your printer is working correctly with other software.  Recently, someone using Practice MAGIC could not get the program to print properly; since he had no other software on his computer, he could not test the printer.  When he downloaded a new driver for his HP printer, the program began printing perfectly.  If the problem is not your printer or your printer driver, you have almost certainly entered a grossly wrong number the last time you ran the "Set Print Scale" utility.   For instance "47\16" has the wrong direction slash and will be interpretted as 47 or leaving out the decimal point in ".25" would cause severe consequences to the printer output. If this happens you need to go to the USERDATA option of the EDIT menu and edit lines #44 and #45 making them "1:1." Then change lines 18 and 20 to "0."  (When you click on a line, the line number appears at the top of the screen.)   Then rerun SET PRINT SCALE.

8. Printer output bunches up at the left side of the sheet: Run "Set Print Scale" and make sure you have not made any of the errors described in the above paragraph.

9. Sheets of address labels do not line up properly. The default for 3 across labels is a sheet with 10 one inch rows of labels and 1/2 inch margin on top and bottom. If your sheets have no top margin and 11 one inch rows, indicate this on line #21 of the user data file by "3x11" (see page 43)

10. Envelopes are not being addressed properly: Test your printer by using an 8.5x11 sheet instead of an envelope. For those printers with landscape capability, follow the number "1" with the letters CF if envelopes are fed from the middle of the paper tray or sheet feeder and LF if MAGIC is attempting to address envelopes on the opposite side from which they are fed (usually means that as the envelops are being fed to the printer, they are on their own right side of the paper tray). Add an NF if you are finding that the return address on envelops is being cut off and NF14 instead of NF if, in addition, you regularly indicate in print setup that you are printing on 8.5 by 14 inch sheets so that the printer will print to the bottom of an HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 form. See page 44.

1. I want to customize what is included on my statements and how things are positioned: See statement formatting section.

2. Appointment doesn't show up on a statement or form: Be sure the code in the calendar appointment is exactly the same as that of the client for whom you are printing a statement. Be sure the appointment falls between the beginning date of the statement and the ending date.   Also the date of first visit may have been filled in incorrectly when the client was first added to the client list. (Click for more information) If your operating system is Windows XP and dates of service are not printing, you may need the version of MAGIC compiled with Microsoft's new compiler. 

3. "Balance Due" in client file does not reflect most recent appointments: See page 23. "Balance due" reflects only those appointments taking place through the date on line 11 of the client's information file and only those deposits dated after the date on line 16. To obtain the correct balance  on that line run a status report (fourth item on PRINT menu) or print a statement (second item on PRINT menu) and respond "Yes" to the question about whether you want to update the client info file.

4. A deposit or many deposits do not appear on a statement when they should: Before printing statement, be sure line 16 of the client info file (last deposit considered) is set to a day prior to the date of the first deposit you wish Magic to consider but not more than a year prior. Then be sure the date of the deposit is within the period for which the statement is being printed. Alternatively, if you are REGENERATING (See pp.36-37) a statement previously printed, MAGIC will use the date that was on line 16 at the time that statement was originally generated. If that date was wrong, regenerating an even earlier statement and selecting UPDATE at the end will reset line 16; then regenerate the desired statement. Also, you can check the deposit record of the missing deposit by selecting DEPOSIT from the DEPOSIT menu; then select RETRIEVE and give the date under which that the missing deposit was saved. Then select the EDIT button and make sure the missing deposit appears. You can check that it is the correct client code for the client you intended by clicking on the client code and pressing <ENTER>; the full name of the client should then appear at the top of the screen.

5. "Bill to:" appears on only some statements: See page 36.

6. "0.00" prints as the fee for an appointment: Be sure the procedure for that appointment has a fee amount assigned to it in the client's information file.

7. Problem installing existing clients into MAGIC and maintaining financial continuity in statements for initial billing using MAGIC: See page 22.

8. Statement correction problems: See page 34-39.

9. When printing long statements, the printer prints off the bottom of the sheet. This can happen on some printers if you have indicated a sheet length of 14 inches and you are printing on 11 inch paper. Use PRINTER SETUP to change to 11 inches.

10. Misc #3 and Misc #4 print as client's address: See page 36.

11. "Client:" or "Patient:" does not print on a particular client's statement: See page 20.

12. When I attempt to DEPOSIT INSURANCE CHECKS, the Windows Task Bar at the bottom of the screen prevents me from inputing the dates of service and access some of the buttons. If the task bar at the bottom of your Windows screen blocks your view of part of part of the insurance deposit input lines and buttons, you can move it off the screen temporarily by placing the cursor on the top edge of the task bar and, when the cursor changes in to a two headed arrow, click and drag the task bar off the bottom of the screen. If the cursor does not change, preventing you from dragging the Task Bar, you need to modify your Windows settings for the Task Bar. For Instance, for Windows XP, click on the "START" button, and then "Control Panel," and then "Task Bar & Start Menu." Check or Uncheck the appropriate boxes to make the task bar behave the way you want. We recommend unchecking "Lock the task bar" and checking "Autohide the task bar" and "Keep task bar on top." This will prevent the task bar from obscuring other applications, but you willl be able to access the taskbar at any time by placing the cursor at the very bottom of the screen for a moment until the task bar appears.

13. Old statements are reflecting the wrong fees: When I change fees and look at past statements, the old fees are no longer reflected; instead the new fees are reflected in the old statements.  Or, when I change fees and then reprint a statement, the new fees are not reflected.  The problem is that when you print a statement and UPDATE, MAGIC remembers the fees that were used in that statement. If you do not select UPDATE the fees will NOT be remembered and whatever fees are the current fees will be reflected in any statement printed. (see See Update Client $ Information) If you selected UPDATE and want to change the fees for that statement, see Statement correction problems, also page 34-39.

1. Print does not line up properly: See Printer Output Problems under Trouble Shooting

2. An insurance company requires that forms be filled out in a different font than MAGIC is printing: See   line #57 under "EDIT Userdata"

3. When I print the HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 form the red ink of the form does not print, only the black text that fills it out: We suggest that you use preprinted HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 forms that MAGIC fills out; you can buy them from a stationary or business supply store like Office Depot or purchase them from us in smaller quantities.  Alternatively, if you received Practice MAGIC on a CD Rom disk, the program can print the entire form in red ink on a color printer as described in the section, Fill Out Insurance Forms. To do this, place an asterisk ("*") at the end of line #25 of the USER DATA ("Printer Type Code") which you can edit by selecting it from the MAGIC calendar screen EDIT menu or run Setprintscale from the PRINT menu and, if you have the XP/VISTA versio of MAGIC, you will be asked if you want to fill the form out or print the whole form.

5. "Misc #" prints in a box on an insurance form: Click Here for Information on this Problem.

6. An appointment on the calendar does not print on the insurance form or "0.00" prints as the fee for that appointment: Be sure the procedure for that appointment has a fee amount assigned to it in the client's information file that is greater than zero.  Be sure that the client's copy does not equal or exceed the fee. If there is no money owed from the insurance company for a particular appointment, that appointment will not be printed on the form.

7. Box #29 on the HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 is filled out with 0 rather than the client's copay responsibility: Click Here for Information about this Problem.

8. How do I print a BATCH of forms or statements: See page 34a, page 34b, 39-41, & page 44.

9. Insurance Co. address prints in wrong place at top of a form: See page 40. (If USER DATA line #22 is blank, indent is 4")

10. When printing on an HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 form an "AH" or "AJ" prints after the procedure code for some clients in box #24d. This is required by Medicare in most staes, but may be eliminated by unchecking "Medicare" in box #1 on the on-screen HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 and checking it by hand afterwards. If you want to print a different pair of letters after the procedure code, see section about these codes in Client/Patient Info on HCFA section.

11. When printing on an HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 form, my printer is printing extra pages after I have properly lined up the type on the form. See PRINTER NOTES on page 4 - 5 and page 40.

12. I want my ID# to print in the top of box #24j on the CMS-1500.  This box is filled in with the therapist information that is on line #50 in the client information file or the box marked #24j near the bottom of the on-screen HCFA-1500 or CMS-1500 form.  The 24j information is initially filled in for each new client from the default, which is contained on line #55 in your USERDATA file. You can edit this file by selecting USER DATA in the calendar EDIT menu. 32b is filled out from line 110 of the client information file.  It should normally be the same as the top of 24j but may not be if the billing provider (group or agency) is not the same as the rendering provider (therapist).

13. Boxes #33a and #33b (as well as #32a and #32b) do not print even though I can see them on the on-screen insurance form.  Also, the billing provider's NPI# does not print on the CMS-1500.  Your printer is probably not printing to the bottom of the form because the printer's printable area is too small to fit the entire form or line 25 of Userdata includes "BM1" which tells Practice MAGIC not to print the bottom line of information on the form. Practice MAGIC comes to you with "BM1" added to the "printer type code" on line 25 of your MAGIC UserData file (accessed through the calendar EDIT menu). This causes, the bottom line of print to be omitted when filling out an insurance form so that on the CMS-1500, box 32a (NPI of Place of Service), box 33a (NPI) and 33b (other provider I.D. number) are not printed, and on the HCFA-1500, the date in box #31 and PIN# and GRP# in box #33 of the form are not printed. Removing the "BM1" will allow the bottom line to be printed, but certain pinters will print that bottom line by itself on a second sheet of paper because the maximum paper area that they print on a sheet is too small to include the entire form. If your printer does this, and it is important to you to print the PIN# or NPI#, do the following: BEFORE STARTING MAGIC, you will need to click on PRINTERS in your computers CONTROL PANEL, then select your printer and then SETTINGS or PROPERTIES and then change the "page size" to "8.5 x 14" or "8.5 x 13" rather than "8.5 x 11".   (Note that for most printers, setting the paper size to longer than 11 inches will cause the printer to print off the bottom of the sheet when printing very long statements, so you will want to follow the same procedure to change back to 8.5 x 11 inch pages. (Note that setting the page size after starting MAGIC will have no benificial effect. In that case, you would need to exit MAGIC and then reset the page size.)  See section on "printer notes" in GETTING STARTED. If the NPI of the Billing Provider(agency) is different from the NPI of the Rendering Provider (therapist), both NPI numbers should be placed on line #40 of userdata AND IN BOX 33A OF THE ON-SCREEN INSURANCE FORM separated by a forward slash ("/"). If you do not want anything to print in lower 24J, just begin Box 33A (AND LINE 40 OF USERDATA) with a forward slash ("/") followed by your NPI#.

14. Appointment doesn't show up on a form or statement: Be sure the code in the calendar appointment is exactly the same as that of the client for whom you are printing a statement. Be sure the appointment falls between the beginning date of the period and the ending date. If your operating system is Windows XP and the dates of service that are displayed on the on-screen HCFA-1500/CMS-1500 are not printing, you may need the version of MAGIC compiled with Microsoft's new compiler.  Also, at the beginning of 2002 some Versions of Practice MAGIC could omit some appointments if the forms were printed in a batch. Also the date of first visit may have been filled in incorrectly when the client was first added to the client list. (Click for more information)

15. An insurance company name prints incorrectly. Make sure it is written correctly in the client list. Also, make sure there are no commas in the name; if so edit the name and remove the commas. Then EDIT the information file for that company and make sure the name on the first line in the file is the name you want to be printed at the top of the insurance forms. For information about how to edit the information file for an insurance company, go to the paragraph in this manual entitled "Client/Insurance Info" in the EDIT section.

16. The NPI of the Place of service prints in both 32a and 32b. 32a is filled out from line 109 of the client information file.  If you don't want that number to also print in 32b, terminate the number on line 109 with a forward slash (also see #18 below). NOTE THAT THE POS NPI NUMBER THAT GOES IN LINE 32A IS USUALLY OPTIONAL AND IS NOT THE SAME AS THE PROVIDER NPI NUMBER!

19. I do not see the DONE and PRINT buttons at the bottom of the on-screen   insurance form or only the tops of them are visible: They are probably covered by the WINDOWS TASK BAR.  If so, place your cursor at the top of the task bar so that the cursor changes to an up and down arrow, and drag the task bar down off the screen as described in in Client/Patient Info on CMS.

1. The bottom of the MAGIC screen is cut off: In any Windows operating system other than 3.x, a WINDOWS status bar may appear at the bottom of the screen, covering some of the MAGIC screen. If so, by placing the cursor at the top of that bar you can click and drag the bar down and out of view, revealing the full MAGIC screen. Optionally, the MAGIC calendar screen can be similarly moved up. (Moving the MAGIC Calendar screen a second time will restore it to its original position.)

2. Procedure or visit # for newly scheduled appointment is not the default: Change it using the "Procedure" option or the "Visit #" option in the CHANGE menu. Magic goes back to the beginning of the month or sometimes the previous month to find the previous appointment for this client. If a previous appointment is found the procedure for the current appointment is set the same as the previous one and the visit number is one more than the previous one.

3. A cancelled appointment reappears spontaneously in the following week: See page 46-47.

4. Client is charged more than one fee for different appointments with same procedure: The procedure may be defined as "user defined" or individually defined with a different fee in another place in the client info file.

5. Clicking on a client appointment often causes it to be moved in error: Under normal operation appointments can be moved by clicking and dragging on them. On a few computers this process occurs when it is not wanted. The drag feature can be disabled by placing an asterisk at the end of line #46 in the User Data file accessed from the calendar EDIT menu. This is the default state.

6. I deleted a client accidentally and want to restore that client without reentering all his or her data. See the section on adding new clients for information on restoring a deleted client.

2. When I hotsync my desktop calendar with my Palm Pilot or other handheld, I get an error message indicating that some appointments are not transferring: See number (2) in the section above.

3. I tried to hotsync MAGIC with my Palm Pilot or other handheld and now I can't run MAGIC at all: Use MYCOMPUTER or WINDOWS EXPLORER to edit the MAGIC folder on your C: drive. Rename USERDATA.MAG to USERDATA.BAK and then try running Practice MAGIC again. You will need to re-enter the information about yourself, but the program should run. (Also see answer to question #4 below)

4. I have never succeeded in getting the Palm Hotsync to work. If you have a Palm you purchased after 1/1/05, it probably has the Palm 4.1 Operating System (or later) and will not work with the current version of MAGIC.   Palm changed the stucture of the Palm DATEBOOK, and MAGIC can only read the old format.  We are working on a fix for this but it may take a few more months. Otherwise, if you are not succeeding in setting up your handheld to work with MAGIC,  follow these steps: 1) Make sure your username on the handheld is four or five characters.  2) Consult your Palm/handheld  manual and follow the instructions to make an archive copy of your current datebook, and THEN purge all previous datebook entries EXCEPT ONE. Purging can be accomplished from your handheld by going to the datebook and then clicking on the darkened date in the upper left corner of the handheld screen. When the drop-down manu opens, select PURGE. You will then be offered the option of deleting all entries older than a week, 2 weeks, 3 weeks or a month. Ther eis also a box to click, "Save archive copy on PC."  3) Use MY COMPUTER to remove any PALMDATE or PALMDATX files from the INFO subdirectory of your MAGIC directory. (There may or may not be any.)  4) Rename the USERDATA.MAG file in your MAGIC directory to USERDATA.BAK. 5) Run MAGIC, saying "NO" to the question about whether you want to hotsync with your handheld.  6)Exit MAGIC.  7) Run The PALMTEST Utility that came with MAGIC or that we e-mailed to you.  Be sure it is in the MAGIC directory when you run it.  8) If the PALMTEST program indicates that you are accessing your palm files correctly, you can run MAGIC and use the "Activate hotsync" option under the SPECIAL menu.

5. My MAGIC-Palm hotsyncing was working for a while and then suddenly stopped working: If you have changed Handhelds or you have updated the Palm Desktop software that you are running, see the answer in the previous paragraph. Short of that, there are several things to try: (1) The simplest is to use MyComputer to open the C:\MAGIC\INFO directory. Then delete the file, PALMDATE.MDB, and again run Practice MAGIC and see if the problem has been corrected.  (2) Occasionally the Palm Datebook file on you desktop can get fouled while hotsyncing with your handheld (no fault of MAGIC’s). (WARNING: if this step is not done correctly, it could result in loss of important data.) To correct this problem, begin by again deleting PALMDATE.MDB, which will have been recreated; then close your Palm Desktop software and again using MyComputer, in the datebook folder within your username folder in the PALM folder on your desktop computer, rename datebook.dat to datebook.bad and datebook.bak to datebook.ba2 (removing all calendar information from your Palm desktop) Then start your Palm Desktop software, select the hotsync menu, select "custom," select "datebook," and select "Handheld Overrides Desktop." Do the same for Address Book. Then use your handheld to begin a hotsync of your handheld to your desktop. This should restore all the calendar information on your handheld to your desktop, and hopefully correct any formatting errors in the file. Run MAGIC.  MAGIC should then again be able to read your datebook files. If you just puchased a new palm handheld, see paragraph #4 aboveand #6 below:

6. Problem: I purchased a new Palm Handheld and it will no longer hotsync with my Practice MAGIC. Several years ago the Palm operating system was changed (beginning with Palm OS 1.4) so that the files of the Palm Calendar residing on the desktop computer could no longer be read by a Practice MAGIC program that had the optional Palm Hotsync feature. Practice MAGIC users who had come to rely on this extremely handy feature, have held on to aging handheld Palm devices in order to continue to use this feature. They had grown accustomed to the convenience of scheduling all their appointments on their Palm Handheld devices which they could carry with them everywhere. As each year passes, it becomes increasingly more difficult to maintain these devices in useable condition. Recently an enterprising customer whose Palm battery completely died figured out how to continue to use the MAGIC Palm Hotsync feature with a new PALM HANDHELD.   He leaves his older Palm on his desk continuously wired to his desktop computer. This old palm hotsyncs perfectly with Practice MAGIC, as always and does not rely on its battery when it is wired to the desktop computer, which is fortunate, because the batteries on old Palm Handhelds rarely continue to hold a charge. Then he carries to his office a new palm (with infrared communication capability - not all of them have this feature), upon which he schedules all his appointments. This newer Palm also hotsyncs directly to his laptop computer with the most modern Palm desktop software, which he also carries with him. Once a month, when he is ready to do billing, he uses the infrared ports of the two palms to send the appointments on the calendar of the new palm to the calendar of his old palm, which then hotsyncs them to MAGIC.  This solution is not perfect, but, for most of our MAGIC-Palm Hotsync users, it addresses the primary need. The only drawback to this plan is that appointments scheduled on the desktop are transmitted to the old palm but then are not transmitted from the old palm to the new palm, so that all appointments and changes must be made on the new Palm Handheld.

1. I want to move my appointment and client information back and forth between my computer at work and my computer at home: You can find information about doing this in the section of this manual called Restore Backed-up File

Reinstalling MAGIC: If you purchase a new computer or lose your data due to a crashed hard disk, you can not simply reinstall the last Practice MAGIC update you received.  You must first go to www.practicemagic.com, click on the "Download Demo" button, and  install the Practice MAGIC demo.  Then install your update. Transferring all your data can be a bit more complicated than simply RESTORING from your last backup as described above because because your USERDATA FILE will not be automatically restored, and some of your calendar or patient files may not be present on your last backup disk.   For more detailed information about this process, go to the last paragraphs of the Trouble Shooting section of this manual, entitled Transferring MAGIC to a New Computer.

Instructions for transferring data to a new computer or drive are located in the on-line manual (on our website at www.practicemagic.com) at the end of the troubleshooting section. The program's performance on Vista AND WINDOWS 7 is identical to XP (However if your new computer is 64 bit rather than 32 bit, you will need to "alert" Windows that MAGIC is 32 bit by saving the Magic program in the Program Files (x86) folder.) Begin transferring MAGIC by downloading and installing from www.practicemagic.com/magiccms.html

2. New Computer or Crashed Hard Disk! I want to install MAGIC onto my new computer or disk drive and transfer all the data files from my old one to the new one: People often need to do this after a hard disk crash or after buying a new computer. The first step, of course, is to install MAGIC onto your new computer.  If you have received updates from Cornucopia, you must first install Practice MAGIC from your original Practice MAGIC installation disk to your new computer/diskdrive. If you can no longer find your original disk, download and install the appropriate demo from our website, www.practicemagic.com.   Then install the most recent update of MAGIC you received/downloaded or simply copy the MAGIC application file from the C:\MAGIC directory of your old computer/diskdrive to the newly created (by the original installation disk or downloaded demo) C:\MAGIC directory on your new computer/diskdrive. You will probably be asked if you want to replace a newer magicwin.exe file that already exists on your computer/drive with an older one, and you will want to answer "yes." (These instructions apply to the MAC as well as to windows, except that the MAGIC file you will transfer will be called Practice MAGIC Classic or Practice MAGIC OSX and you will find it in the MAGIC folder on your desktop, rather than in C:\MAGIC.) Updates do NOT necessarily contain all of the essential files for MAGIC to run, so you must first install the original MAGIC or a demo copy of MAGIC downloaded from the internet.) If you need to download an update again, and the update represents an upgrade that you have not already purchased (for instance, an upgrade to the CMS version of MAGIC) you will be charged $39.95 for the upgrade.  (Do not try to run MAGIC until you have followed the instructions for transferring you userdata.mag file from your C:\MAGIC folder, or you will have a problem with lacking a code needed to get into the program.)

Because transferring your data files can be a lengthy process and it is expensive for Cornucopia software to provide support, customers who have been successfully using Practice MAGIC but, for reasons unrelated to the quality of our software, find themselves needing to transfer their MAGIC data to a new hard drive, will be charged for customer support for this process. For those customers who wish to save money by attempting to accomplish this process without telephoning or emailing us for support, we have included the following detailed description. If you choose to enlist the help of a local professional, or someone local who is more computer knowledgeable than you, BE SURE THAT THEY READ THESE INSTRUCTIONS. The bulk of the support problems we encounter in this area result form computer-knowledgeable people who attempt to do this transfer without understanding exactly what is necessary. If your consultants put your files in the wrong place because they have not read these instructions, you will end up paying them for their time and then you will end up paying us to help you undo what they have done!

The most common mistake made by even experienced computer users occurs when a CD-ROM disk is used to transfer files between two computers. For this reason we recommend that instead you transfer your files using a flash drive, alternately referred to as a jump drive, memory stick, RAM drive, USB drive, traveling drive, Data Traveler, or thumb drive. Unlike these, a CD-ROM disk is NOT considered a re-writeable media, even if you are using it in re-write mode; whenever a file is transferred to a CD-ROM using a pre-XP version of Windows, it is automatically converted to a READ ONLY file which can cause problems for you. When it is transferred to the new computer, it retains the READ ONLY property attribute, and this will cause MAGIC to malfunction or crash when it tries to write to one of these files. If Magic does not crash, you will find that the changes you make to these files are not retained. To correct this problem if you insist on using a CD-ROM for transferring files, you should use MY COMPUTER on your new computer to modify the PROPERTIES of these files by unchecking the READ ONLY box. Start MY COMPUTER, find the file or files you transferred, single click it WITH THE RIGHT MOUSE BUTTON, and uncheck the READ ONLY box at the bottom of the window.  If you select all the files at once using that option in the EDIT menu or by sweeping the mouse over them while the button is down and then releasing the button when all have been darkened, you can then right-click and modify this attribute on all the files at once.

NEXT, you will need to restore your USERDATA.MAG file and your data files. The USERDATA.MAG is located in the C:\MAGIC directory on your "C" hard drive, the same directory in which the program file MAGICWIN.EXE is located. If your newly installed MAGIC locks you out and tells you that you need a new code when you try to run MAGIC, it is because you did not properly transfer USERDATA.MAG! When windows shows a directory, it usually does not include the dot (".") or the three characters (referred to as the file "extension") that come after the dot in the file name. Instead the extension appears without the dot in a column off to the right of the file names. For some reason the file, USERDATA.MAG, however, looks like USERDATA without any extension at all when you look at it in a directory, because Windows (XP and later) think the MAG extension makes it a "Microsoft Access Diagram Shortcut" file or some other kind of Microsoft Access file, and then Windows leaves off the extension, making it sometimes difficult for you to copy (see #3 below if you are unable to copy USERDATA.MAG)   Even if it says USERDATA is a Microsoft Access file, it isn’t; it is USERDATA.MAG masquerading as a Microsoft Access file. When transferring to a new computer or hard drive, it is essential that you first install MAGIC on your new computer as described above and then copy the USERDATA.MAG file from the C\MAGIC directory of you old computer or hard drive to the C:\MAGIC directory of your new computer or hard drive. (Note that you will also find a file called USERDATA.ORG which is NOT the USERDATA.MAG file that you need to transfer.) Then transfer the rest of your data files. All your other data files are located in the INFO subdirectory of your MAGIC directory except for any client NOTES you have written, which are located in the NOTES subdirectory. It is essential that the names and locations of the MAGIC files and directories on your new drive remain exactly as on your old drive, or else MAGIC will not be able to find your old data. (A common mistake professionals make is to put all your old files and folders in a separate folder or drive designation which they might label something like "old folders" or "old computer" or "windows 98.") If you are not facile at copying files from one computer to another, the following paragraphs will give you detailed instructions for transferring these files:

If you have a relatively small number of clients and have been selecting "Backup ALL" when exiting MAGIC, all these data files will be located on the backup disk you made, and you can RESTORE them onto the new computer by using the RESTORE feature in the FILE menu of Practice MAGIC (see   Restore Backed-up File for instructions) If you have been selecting "Backup and EXIT" when exiting MAGIC, only the files modified during that session of using MAGIC will have been backed up, so you may be missing backups of some of your files, or your backup files may be spread between a number of different backup disks. If you are familiar with the process of copying files (described below for your convenience), you can simply copy the whole C:\MAGIC\INFO folder from your old computer and place it into the C:\MAGIC\INFO file folder of your new computer. If you do not have a floppy drive on your new computer, we recommend using a RAM drive (also called flash drive, jump drive, memory stick, thumb drive, travel drive, Data Traveler etc. See Backing Up Your Data for more information.) The userdata file will not restore automatically with the other files; it must be individually selected and restored. It is found in your MAGIC directory, not the MAGIC\INFO folder, and is put in the new computer's MAGIC directory. This will complete the restoration.  If you use a different letter designation for the hard drive on your new computer on which MAGIC is located from the one you used for the hard drive that contained MAGIC on your old computer, you SHOULD NOT COPY THE OLD USERDATA FILE TO YOUR NEW COMPUTER or Magic will be unable to locate your patient and calendar files.

FILE COPYING INSTRUCTIONS (for people unable to follow the previous instructions): IF YOU ARE UNABLE TO START Practice MAGIC without your data files, you will NOT BE ABLE TO USE MAGIC’S BUILT-IN RETORE ROUTINE (accessed from the MAGIC calendar FILE menu), so you will need to transfer the files first, as follows:  Put a blank floppy disk into the A: drive of your old computer. If you don't have a floppy drive, use a RAM drive, also known as USP-drive, or Flash Drive.   Now you will need to use MY COMPUTER, a utility that you will find on your WINDOWS desktop. On both your old and new comuter: (1).Double click on the MY COMPUTER icon.  (2).Double Click on the icon for your C: Drive.    (3).Double click on the icon for the MAGIC folder.  Now on your old computer single click on the USERDATA.MAG file and then under the EDIT menu click COPY. By single clicking on the bar at the top of the MY COMPUTER window on your old computer, you can darken it and then drag it a little bit to the right, even if part of it goes off the right side of the screen.  Now on your old desktop screen double click on the MY COMPUTER icon as you did before to open a second copy of MY COMPUTER.  Double click on the A: drive icon and then select PASTE from the EDIT menu.  This will transfer USERDATA.MAG to your floppy disk. Now take the floppy disk out and insert it in your new computer.  On the new computer click on the bar at the top of the MY COMUTER window; then drag it a little bit to the right and open a second copy of MY COMPUTER as you did on your old computer.   Double click on the A: drive icon on this second copy of MY COMPUTER, single click on USERDATA.MAG to darken it, and select COPY from the the EDIT menu.   Click on some visible portion of the MY COMPUTER that you opened originally on the new computer to bring it to the front, and then select PASTE from it's EDIT menu. The File USERDATA.MAG should now have been transferred to the MAGIC directory of your new computer.  Now, on your old computer, click on some visible portion of the original copy of  MY COMPUTER  to bring it to the front,  single click on the INFO folder icon to darken it, and and then select COPY from the EDIT menu.   Put the floppy disk back into the A: drive on your old computer and PASTE the INFO folder onto it just as you did before with the USERDATA.MAG file. Now put the floppy disk into your New computer and COPY and PASTE it into the MAGIC directory just as you did before with the USERDATA.MAG file. You will see a dialog box asking you whether you want to replace files that are already on the hard disk of your new computer and you should answer "Yes." If you use the Process Notes feature of MAGIC you will need to transfer the NOTES folder just as you did with the INFO folder. When the program finishes copying you are done.

This is a bit of an involved process. If you follow these instructions carefully, you should have no difficulty.    If you would like one of our support people to walk you through the process over the telephone, we would be happy to do this; however there is a twenty dollar charge for each fifteen minutes (or part thereof) for this service, depending upon how much support time is involved.  

4. CODE NOT VALID: I followed these instructions to transfer my files and now get a message that my user code is no longer valid or that the user name has changed. The problem is probably that you did not transfer the USERDATA.MAG file from your original MAGIC directory (or you backup disk) to your new MAGIC directory.  This file contains both your name and information (addresss, license etc) but also your code.  If you transfer it properly, you should not need to reenter your code or call us for a new one. Sometimes, however, when you display the directory of files, using "My Computer," for instance, you will not see "userdata.mag"  Instead, you may see "userdata" and under file "type" you will see "Microsoft Access Diagram Shortcut" or some other reference to "Microsoft Access." This file is actually userdata.mag, and you should copy and paste it to your new MAGIC directory, where it will again be displayed as "Microsoft Access Diagram Shortcut. (NOTE: Do not confuse "userdata.mag" with "userdata.org," which is listed by name with the file type .org file.")