Budget Relief Aids Major Hospital

One of the largest hospitals in upstate New York, this client serves six primarily rural counties over 3,300 square miles of service area. The not-for-profit hospital offers a comprehensive healthcare system through its main hospital campus and 28 additional regional healthcare facilities.

The Challenge

Energy and telecommunications costs are a large component of any hospital’s operating expenses, especially for one with an extensive network of facilities. In addition, care for the uninsured that is not reimbursed and reduced insurance payments for others take a multi-million dollar bite out of revenues. These high operating costs and reduced revenues led the hospital to seek new ways to cut costs.

“When completed, Cost Control Associates’ review produced refunds and annual cost savings totaling more than $90,000.”

The Solution

Cost Control Associates’ Cost Recovery and Reduction and Cellular Cost Review and Optimization programs were the perfect solutions to help the hospital reduce energy, telecom and cellular phone costs. Cost Control would perform an extensive review of all the accounts, looking for overcharges and evaluating rates and services.

The hospital had no funds in the budget to pay for an extensive review, but Cost Control Associates required no upfront costs. They performed the entire review on a contingency basis, and their fees would come out of any refunds and savings produced. If nothing was found, the hospital would pay nothing.

The results were significant. Cost Control Associates realized annual energy cost savings of $4,086 and one-time refunds of $11,447. The telecom review produced annual savings of $55,585 with an additional $19,696 resulting from cellular rate plan changes.

“While the savings proved to be significant, we also valued the time saved by our staff. Bringing in an outside resource allowed the work to get done without taking staff away from our overall operations.”