Therapy intake form template
- First-session fees lost a month
- $475.20
- Minutes to fill the form
- 7
- Required fields as % of the form
- 65
- New clients lost to the form a month
- 4
These sheets have no constants. Every number is worked from the figures you enter: the fields on your intake form, the required ones, the seconds a client spends on each, your new clients a month and how many never send it back, your session fee, your clinicians, sessions, working weeks, no-show rate and clinician split, your rent and software, and the minutes a note takes. The defaults are one three-clinician practice's worked example, not a benchmark this site publishes.
The figures are a worked example for a three-clinician practice: $475.20. Put your own caseload in and the answer changes.
Download the Therapy intake form template worked example (CSV)
This is the therapy intake form sheet, and it answers the question a practice never asks about its own paperwork: what is the form costing us? Enter the fields on it, how many are required, the seconds a client spends per field, your new clients a month, the share who never send it back, your session fee, and the staff minutes and hourly cost of chasing an incomplete one. It returns the minutes to fill, the required share, the clients lost to the form each month, the first-session fees that represents a month and a year, the chasing hours and cost, and what each field is costing you a year.
The time to fill, off the fields
34 fields at 12 seconds each is about 7 minutes, and 22 of them required is a 64% required share. A health history takes longer per field than a marketing form, which is why the seconds figure is one to measure on your own form rather than assume from somebody else's.
What the drop-off costs
18 new clients a month with 22% never returning the form is roughly four people who booked and did not start, and at a $120 first session that is $475 a month and $5,702 a year. Spread over 34 fields, each field is costing about $167 a year.
What chasing costs on top
Nine minutes of staff time per incomplete form at $28 an hour is small in isolation and it is the wrong thing to be spending it on. The saving is not in the chasing: it is the four clients a month who would have started if the form had been shorter.
Soapvo Pro
Keep the record, not just this afternoon's figures
The sheets settle the numbers this afternoon. Pro keeps the record: the client, the intake, the sessions and the notes in one place, so the file is complete when somebody asks for it.
- Download the file a client or an insurer has asked for
- Send it without the Soapvo watermark across it
- Come back to this sheet with every figure still in it
- Put your practice name on what a client receives
- Export every client file in one go, not one at a time
- Remind a client of the appointment and the form they have not returned
- Not used by Soapvo: this product takes no payment on your behalf
- Not used by Soapvo: this product does not sync to accounting
$79per month, whole team
Start Soapvo Pro PricingSoapvo Pro is $79 a month. It renews on the same day each month at $79 until you cancel, with no introductory rate, no minimum term, no per-clinician charge and no step up. If the price changes for new subscribers you keep yours.
Practice notes: the questions clinicians ask
How many fields should an intake form have?
As few as the first session needs. Anything the clinician can ask in the room belongs in the room, not on a form somebody fills in on a phone before they have met you.
Where does the drop-off figure come from?
Your own: bookings made against forms returned, over a month. Most practices have never counted it and are surprised by it.
Should the form be a PDF?
A PDF emailed as an attachment is the version with the highest drop-off. A link that works on a phone is the fix.
Where the constants in this tool come from
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services: HIPAA Privacy Rule, individuals' right of access.