Experian Health's State of Claims survey finds 40% of providers have at least 10% of their claims denied, and only 30% recover most of that lost revenue.
|Articles|April 3, 2009
Q&A: Taking an executor's fee for a relative's will
I recently lost a relative and was appointed executor of her will. My attorney advised me that I am entitled to take an executor's fee and that this is deductible by the estate. Does it make sense to take an executor's fee?
Advertisement
Q: I recently lost a relative and was appointed executor of her will. My attorney advised me that I am entitled to take an executor's fee and that this is deductible by the estate. Does it make sense to take an executor's fee?
A: Unless prohibited by the will, you can take an executor's fee. However, the fee is considered earned income for services provided, which means you will pay income tax on the fee, just like any other earned income. Except on the largest estates, the "tax cost" of paying income tax on the fee far outweighs the benefit of it being deductible by the estate. Therefore, if you are the sole beneficiary of the estate, it generally makes no sense to take an executor's fee, since you would have received the balance of the estate anyway. In this situation, taking the fee would convert a no-tax or low-tax receipt of money into a fully taxable event. However, if you are not the primary beneficiary, it makes good sense to take the fee for your services rendered.
Advertisement
Related to this article
Payer enrollment rarely lines up with a new physician’s first day. A week-by-week plan helps practices avoid a revenue gap, handle pending claims and know when the schedule can safely open.
The top news stories in medicine today: A Tennessee multi-physician practice agrees to pay $2.8 million to resolve allegations it billed nonphysician practitioners' services under physicians' provider numbers; CDC data show an early start to flu season; cannabis use is tied to higher stroke odds in an American Heart Association abstract.
Most physicians face a 2.31% conversion factor cut in January, while CMS pared back its same-day payment reduction and pushed the end of traditional MIPS to 2031.
It appears a record number of doctors won election or re-election in the 2026 mid-terms. Here's who they are.
A pediatrician won a Senate seat in South Carolina, an OB-GYN lost one in Kansas, and South Dakota voters kept Medicaid expansion in their constitution.
Medication bottles, witness accounts and a patient's normal baseline are often lost between the ambulance bay and the hospital bed. Here's what to ask at handoff, how EMS can separate observation from interpretation and why better prehospital record integration matters.
The top news stories in medicine today: A federal order requires every international air passenger bound for the U.S. to attest they haven't recently been in the Democratic Republic of the Congo; an Illinois man pleads guilty in a $227 million Medicare COVID-19 test kit scheme; aspirin alone holds up after left atrial appendage closure in a JAMA trial.
Advertisement
Advertisement
Trending on Medical Economics
1
Medicare's final 2027 fee schedule cuts physician pay more than proposed but softens the same-day visit penalty
2
Who reaches Medicaid patients before they lose coverage? with Colby Takeda of Pear Suite
3