Are MBS billing hints billing advice?

No. They are a read-only suggestion of likely item numbers from the consult, shown with the reasoning behind them. A suggestion, never a claim — what you bill remains your decision.

Does Akoua submit a claim?

No. Akoua does not lodge claims, and it never sends a billing hint anywhere — a hint is read-only and is not part of what a practice-software integration writes back. Notes and letters export as clean text and PDF/A you paste or attach.

What are MBS billing hints?

MBS billing hints are Australian-only: they draw on the Medicare Benefits Schedule, so they are shown to Australian organisations and switched off everywhere else — a New Zealand or United Kingdom clinician simply won’t see them.

Akoua suggests the item numbers a consult looks likely to attract, shows you the reasoning behind each one, and stops there. It is read-only: Akoua never saves, exports or submits a hint. You read it and enter the item in your own billing system.

These hints are not billing advice. Whether an item applies to a particular consult is your decision, made against the current MBS and your own obligations.

It shows its reasoning

Each hint arrives with why it was drafted — an attendance item, for instance, is shown as suggested from the consult’s length and content, with any additional item marked as possible rather than assumed.

That matters more than the suggestion itself. A hint you can see the basis for is a hint you can disagree with.

What it can’t see

A hint is drawn from what was said and how long the consult ran. Plenty of things that change which item applies aren’t in the transcript at all:

Whether the consult was face to face, by telephone, or by video.
Whether it was a home visit, a residential aged care visit, or an after-hours attendance.
Whether the patient’s circumstances attract a different item from the one length and content suggest.

Check every hint against the consult you actually had. Item numbers also change: this hint set reflects the MBS as at 1 July 2026, and the current MBS is the authority, not the hint.

Deterministic, not a guess

The draft is deterministic: the same consult produces the same hints rather than a different suggestion each time you look.

It is drawn from what was said and how long the consult ran. Akoua makes no clinical inferences — it is a documentation aid, not a diagnostic device, and which item you bill is a decision it never makes for you.

Nothing is billed by Akoua

Unlike a note, a letter or a task, a hint has no confirm step — there is nothing to accept, because nothing is stored or sent. Akoua doesn’t lodge anything, and a hint is never written back through a practice-software integration, so whatever you bill is still entered where you enter it today. Exporting the note covers what comes out of Akoua.

MBS hints are one of the Australian-only parts of the product — the product walkthrough sets out the rest.