Physician Contract Review: Financial Records

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Don’t sign physician contracts without access to financial records

In order to determine the financial strength of the practice you may join, it is important to review certain financial records beforehand. If you don’t, you could be subject to poor business management causing you to be forced to take pay cuts, an excessive work load, early termination, or a bad partnership deal, just to name a few. The right time to review financial records is before, during and after employment.
As an employee you may find the employer unwilling to share certain information while as a partner, you must have access. Some of the key financial documents to review are the following:

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Physician Contract Review: Non-compete Clauses

Watch out for disguised or indirect non-compete clauses in physician contracts

One of the biggest issues new hires of medical groups deal with is misunderstanding the enforceability of restrictive covenants and non-compete clauses. Add to this the trickiness of employers telling them “we do not have restrictive covenants” when other provisions exist that essentially act as restrictive covenants. For example, an employer may offer a position with “no restrictive covenants” but the physician contract has a termination fee that acts as an indirect “restrictive covenant buyout.”

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Physician Contract Review: Professional Counsel

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Make an investment in your career with professional counsel to avoid future pitfalls and negotiate better terms Before you sign on the dotted line, protect the foundation of your career with a physician contract review by a physician contract expert. Signing physician contracts for employment relationships, partnership agreements, business formation documents and lease contracts is … Read more

Physician Employment and Partnerships: Evaluating Options

Don’t run out of time!

Begin interviewing and evaluating employment and/or partnership opportunities one to two years before finishing training or at least six months before the initial term of your current contract.

Residents and fellows have often told us that they receive very little training in the business and financial areas that are critical to beginning their career after completing training. Many find their last year and especially the final months to be a sprint, having to cram many very important things in all at once. Such as…

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Physician Contract Negotiation: Letters of Intent

Be careful not to “tie your negotiation hands” when signing an offer letter.

Many employers use a Letter of Intent, also known as an Offer Letter, to get new physicians to agree to certain terms before they draft the actual employment contract. This is a routine part of the negotiation process, but it should not be treated as such.

Sometimes the Offer Letter is written in such a way that it is binding and other times it is not. The key point here is to make sure that when signing an Offer Letter, the employer knows that you are signing it without settling on the final terms until you have reviewed the entire contract. It is advisable to consult with an experienced contract attorney early in the process, even before a letter of intent is on the table, so you can address key terms up front. The longer you wait to bring up concerns and areas of negotiation, the harder it will become to get the employer to consider alternate terms.

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Physician Contract Negotiation: Value of Multiple Offers

Using Multiple Offers for Contract Negotiation

Having multiple employment offers provides additional leverage during contract negotiations

When physicians are considering more than one employment offer, they often have additional leverage during negotiations. The reason for this is that the physician can utilize the strengths of each offer as a way to request changes in the competing offer(s).

For a very simplified example, all else being equal, Employer A offers a compensation package of $200,000 with a signing bonus of $20,000 while Employer B offers $215,000 and no signing bonus.

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