Does X12 SFTP Work?

Day-to-Day Users
#1

In OpenEMR 6.1 (I’m presuming it is the dev version), the Healthcare company I work for now wishes to implement the use of this feature for submitting X12’s so that our billing department doesn’t have to download the X12’s and manually submit them. I was given the SFTP Login Credentials and SFTP Pass Credentials (nothing beyond those, leaving the other 4 SFTP fields empty, I will include a picture at the bottom to showcase what I mean by empty fields). I also found wherein Administration -> Globals -> Billing that I click and save the option to “Automatically SFTP Claims to X12 Partner.”

My main questions regarding this would be:

  1. Do all the fields in the X12 partners for SFTP need to be filled out for this feature to work, or just the login and pass as that’s all we were given.?
  2. Does the billing department need to follow any additional steps after they click on the option to “Generate X12” or is there a different route needed to submit them using SFTP?

I’ve searched for possible answers through the codebase, scoured the community, and tried contacting our clearing house (they would only give the login and password info). So now, I am asking on here with the hopes that someone may be able to explain/ answer my questions.

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Office ALLY Integration
#2

hi @Endelis. You’ll def need the sftp host but the others could be optional, would have to look at the code. This was brought in by @ken and @growlingflea and might need more testing before production use.

#3

You will need all of the fields.
Host will be an IP address, or a domain name.
Your SFTP Local directory will be where the edi files for that x-12 partner are located. This needs to be specified because there may be different paths for different x-12 partners. For example “/var/www/openemr/sites/default/documents/edi/bcbs”
The remote directory is the remote path where you will be uploading the file. If you are putting the file at the root, it could be “/”
The default SFTP port is 22

The claim files can be tracked under Fees -> Claim File Tracker. There you will see an error if you had invalid credentials, for example.

Ken

2 Likes
#4

Thanks @ken that makes a lot more sense. I will see what I am able to do, thanks for the explanation.

The only thing I can’t see is the Claim file Tracker under Fees, but its possible that I am just blind to it as well. Thank you again!

I think the only other question I have is for Host, are we referring to the direct domain name of the clearing House or a specific page of the clearing house if I understand what you are saying properly.

#5

You also need to enable the Global > Billing > Automatically SFTP Claims To X12 Partner then the menu item for Claim File Tracker should appear (need to log out and log back in.)

The clearing-house should provide you with the host name of their SFTP server. Without a host, there’s no way for an SFTP client to know how to connect.

You can download Filezilla or any other SFTP client, and you should be able to connect to the clearing house’s SFTP server using the credentials they provide. That will be a good way to help you figure out if your credentials are correct.

Ken

2 Likes
#6

Alright, That gives me a lot of direction on how to get started. This will also let me update my company on the progress of the submissions directly from OpenEMR. Thank you again.

#7

@ken @stephenwaite Hi! Where are you seeing “Global > Billing > Automatically SFTP Claims To X12 Partner”. We are in 5.0.2 and 6.0 and do not see this option there to set up sftp automation for x12. many thanks in advance.

#8

hi @topnoch, it’s in the dev version, 6.1

#9

@stephenwaite ahh okay (we missed that, reading really is fundamental), do you know when that is to be released? where do we find out more info on the dev?

#10

It’s going to be a few months. You can install a dev version in the traditional manner or get docker going.

#11

@stephenwaite
Thank you so much! We really appreciate your consistency and helpful advice. We will check back in a few months.