What Is AR in ABA Billing? A Simple Guide for BCBAs
In this guide · 4 sections
If you've ever asked your billing team "how much are we owed?" and gotten a vague answer, you've already met your AR problem.
AR — accounts receivable — is the total dollar amount of submitted claims that haven't been paid yet. It's money you've already earned (the sessions happened) but haven't collected.
- 1Session deliveredyou've earned it
- 2Claim sentbilled to the payer
- 3Waiting on the payerthis is your AR
- 4Paidcollected, finally
AR aging buckets
Most billing systems group AR into buckets by how long the claim has been outstanding:
- 0–30 days: normal, in process
- 31–60 days: payer is slow but recoverable
- 61–90 days: needs active follow-up
- 90+ days: at risk of becoming uncollectible
A healthy ABA practice keeps most AR under 60 days. When you see a lot of money sitting in 90+, it usually means claims are being submitted but no one is following up when payers stall.
What "good" looks like
There's no perfect number, but rough benchmarks for ABA:
- 60%+ of AR under 30 days
- Less than 15% over 90 days
- Average days in AR under 40
If you don't know your numbers, that's the first sign something is off. A weekly AR report is a basic deliverable — not an upgrade.
When AR balloons
AR usually grows for one of three reasons: claims aren't being submitted on time, denials aren't being worked, or follow-up calls aren't happening. Each one has a different fix, but they all start the same way: pull the aging report and look at what's stuck and why.
Growth can also create aging claims when a new BCBA or RBT is scheduled before payer readiness is confirmed.
Read your aging report in 30 seconds
- 1Look at the total. Is it bigger or smaller than last week?
- 2Look at the 90+ bucket. What share of the total is sitting there?
- 3Find the payer with the most money in 61–90 days. That's this week's first phone call.
- 4For anything over 90 days, ask one question: who is working it, and what's the next step?
That's what stable billing looks like: a report you can read between sessions, and a name next to every old claim.
Visibility also means checking whether paid Medicaid ABA claims are supported by the chart.
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