MBS consent for hospitals
Compliant consent for every bulk-billed claim
Solstice is a digital consent platform that automates the collection of patient consent for MBS bulk billing, before or after the appointment. Be ready for 1 July 2027, with no claimable revenue left behind.
- Co-designed with a leading Australian hospital
- ISO 27001 certified
- Australian-only data hosting
- Microsoft Entra ID SSO
The 1 July 2027 deadline
Verbal consent is ending. Is your hospital ready?
Under the new Medicare Assignment of Benefit rules, verbal consent is only permitted during the transition period. From 1 July 2027, every bulk-billed service needs a signed agreement from the patient, captured on paper or electronically, retained for two years and available to the patient on request.
New rules commence
Signed agreements, captured before or after the service, become the new standard. A 12-month transition begins.
Transition period ends
The last day verbal assignment of benefit can be used to support a bulk-billed claim.
Signed consent required
Every bulk-billed claim must be backed by a signed agreement, retained for two years.
For a GP clinic, that's a new step at reception. For a hospital, it's thousands of occasions of care each week, across dozens of clinics, multiple sites and several clinical systems.
The real cost
Missing consent means missing revenue
Without a reliable way to capture and evidence consent, hospitals face two costs at once: revenue they can't claim, and the admin burden of proving the claims they do lodge.
$1.2M
Estimated annual revenue lost and compliance cost for a large metropolitan health service relying on paper-based consent.
*Based on ~110,000 MBS-billed outpatient services a year at 2026 MBS benefit rates, with 10% of services lacking valid consent and 3 minutes of admin per paper form.
Lost revenue
If consent is missing, incomplete or no longer valid, the claim can't be lodged. Across a busy outpatient service, unclaimed services add up quickly.
Compliance cost
Paper forms need to be printed, chased, scanned, indexed and retrieved at audit. That's clerical time, clinic delays and ongoing exposure.
Invalid consent
When a patient sees a different clinician, or the service differs from what was booked, earlier consent may no longer apply. Manual processes rarely catch this.
Patient friction
Clipboards and queues at check-in slow clinics down and frustrate patients who just want to be seen.
How Solstice works
Consent, handled end to end
Solstice connects to your existing systems, invites patients to consent on their own device and delivers a complete, compliant record back to the places your team already works.
Connect
Solstice receives appointment and patient details from your PAS, EMR or practice management system. No double entry.
Invite
Patients receive a secure consent link by SMS or email, sent before or after their appointment to suit your clinic's workflow.
Consent
Patients review their details and sign in about a minute, on a simple, accessible screen designed for every patient.
Record
The completed agreement is filed to the EMR or scanned medical record, and your billing system knows the claim is ready to lodge.
One consent journey
One consent journey, from booking to billing
Solstice starts before the appointment and automatically follows up afterwards if consent is still outstanding. There's no choosing between workflows, and no patient falls through the gaps.
Before the appointment
Appointment booked
Solstice receives the appointment from your PAS or EMR.
Request sent
A secure consent link goes to the patient by SMS or email ahead of the visit.
Reminder
Patients who haven't responded receive automatic reminders, and staff can resend at any time.
At the clinic
Staff can see who has consented and who still needs to.
After the appointment
After the visit
If consent is still outstanding, Solstice follows up automatically with the details of the service provided.
Consent resolved
The signed agreement is filed and the claim is ready for billing.
Proprietary accuracy checks
Consent captured before the visit is checked against the service delivered and the treating clinician. Anything that no longer matches is flagged for recapture, so the record your billing team relies on is accurate, current and valid.
Designed to work alongside paper-based fallback
Where a patient signs a paper form at the clinic, it can be recorded against their appointment, so the digital request closes early and the patient isn't followed up twice.
The patient experience
Simple for patients. No app, no login, no clipboard.
Patients open a secure link, confirm their details and sign. It's quick, clear and works on any smartphone.
- Works on any device, nothing to download
- Plain-language explanation of what they're agreeing to
- Takes about a minute to complete
- A copy of the agreement available on request
The Solstice portal
Complete visibility for your admin and revenue teams
Track consent status across every clinic in real time. See what's complete, what's outstanding and what needs attention before claims are lodged.
Live consent status
By clinic, site and date, updated as patients sign.
Exception alerts
Missing, declined or invalid consent surfaced before billing, with one-click resend.
Instant retrieval
Search by URN and retrieve any agreement in seconds.
Audit-ready reporting
Evidence for compliance, finance and Medicare audit.
Integrations
Fits into the systems you already use
Every hospital's environment is different. Our team designs and builds the integrations that get patient, appointment and consent data where it needs to go, using the standards and integration engines you already run.
Inputs
- PASPatient Administration System
- EMRElectronic Medical Record
- PMSPractice Management System
- Consent capture
- Accuracy matching
- Rules-based routing
Outputs
- EMRDigital consent record
- SMRScanned Medical Record
- Billing systemClaim ready to lodge
Integration methods we work with
- HL7 / FHIR
- Rhapsody
- MuleSoft
- REST API
- SFTP / flat file
- Site-to-site VPN
Built for hospitals
Everything your hospital needs to stay compliant
Purpose-built for the scale and complexity of Australian hospitals, from a single outpatient clinic to a multi-site health network.
Co-designed with a leading Australian hospital
Shaped with the clinicians, administrators and revenue teams who manage consent every day.
Configured to fit your hospital
Your clinics, your sites, your workflows. Solstice adapts to how your hospital runs, so you go live quickly without redesigning your processes.
Before and after appointments
Support both pre and post assignment consent workflows in one platform, with automatic checks that every consent remains valid.
Automatic record routing
Completed agreements are digitally filed without manual scanning or indexing.
Built for scale
Multi-site, multi-clinic and high volume from day one.
Two-year retention, built in
Every agreement stored securely and retrievable instantly for audits and patient requests.
Security and trust
Secure by design. Ready for procurement.
Solstice handles personal and health information, so security is built into every layer, and the assessment process is easy for your IT and procurement teams.
Certified
ISO 27001
Our information security management system is independently certified.
Tested
Independent penetration testing
Independent penetration testing as part of our security program.
Sovereign
Australian-only data hosting
All data is hosted in Australia. Data sovereignty by design.
Integrated
SSO with Microsoft Entra ID
Staff sign in with existing hospital credentials, managed centrally by your IT team.
Documented
Assessment-ready documentation
Architecture diagrams and cyber assessment artefacts ready for your IT security and procurement reviews, so evaluation doesn't hold up go-live.
Build or buy
Compliance-ready from day one, not another build project
A custom consent solution needs the same security, privacy and assurance work before it can go live. Solstice has already done it, so your team can focus on what only they can do.
| What you need | Solstice | Building your own |
|---|---|---|
| ISO 27001 certified information security management | Solstice: Already in place | Building your own: Established or extended for the new system |
| Architecture and cyber assessment documentation | Solstice: Ready for your review | Building your own: Written and assessed from scratch |
| Independent penetration testing | Solstice: Part of our security program | Building your own: Scoped, procured and funded separately |
| Privacy and health information documentation | Solstice: Prepared | Building your own: Prepared, including a privacy impact assessment |
| Patient consent experience | Solstice: Co-designed with a leading Australian hospital | Building your own: Designed and tested in-house |
| Updates as MBS rules change | Solstice: Included | Building your own: Ongoing internal effort |
| Ongoing support | Solstice: Included | Building your own: Internal team or contractor |
| Time to compliance | Solstice: Staged rollout, live well before 1 July 2027 | Building your own: Scope, procure, build and assess before the deadline |
Who we support
Designed for hospitals and health services
- Public health services with bulk-billed specialist outpatient clinics
- Private hospitals and day procedure centres
- Hospital-based specialist and allied health clinics
- Multi-site health networks
Getting started
Live well before the deadline
Hospital implementations need time for integration, security review and staff readiness. We work alongside your team through a staged rollout.
Discover
Map your clinics, workflows and systems.
Configure
Set up consent rules, routing and integrations.
Pilot
Go live in selected clinics and refine.
Scale
Roll out across your hospital.
FAQ
Common questions
What is Medicare Assignment of Benefit consent?
It's the patient's agreement to assign their Medicare benefit to the provider so a service can be bulk billed. From 1 July 2027, it must be signed, on paper or electronically, for every bulk-billed service.
What changes on 1 July 2027?
The transition period ends and verbal consent is no longer accepted. Hospitals need a signed agreement for every bulk-billed claim, retained for two years.
Can consent be captured before the appointment?
Yes. Solstice supports consent before and after appointments, and checks that consent captured beforehand still matches the service delivered.
Does Solstice integrate with our systems?
Solstice connects with PAS, EMR and PMS systems for inputs, and files records to your EMR, SMR and billing system. Talk to us about your specific environment.
Where is our data stored?
In Australia only. Solstice is ISO 27001 certified, with independent penetration testing as part of our security program.
Can't find what you need? Talk to our team.
Book a 30-minute demo
See how Solstice can make your hospital compliant before 1 July 2027, without adding to your team's workload.
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Built by Solara Health
Solstice is part of the Solara Health product suite. Solara Health is a Melbourne-based digital health company that partners with leading Australian hospitals to build secure, interoperable software, including Skye, our hospital-integrated patient engagement platform.
Visit solarahealth.com.au