In SimplePractice, there is no limit to the number of clients you can create and store in your account. This provides a HIPAA compliant space to store client documents, billing and insurance information, and much more.

In this guide, we'll cover:

• Adding a client
• Sending an intake
• The client Overview page
• Navigating your Clients and contacts list
• Merging duplicate contact profiles
• Removing a duplicate client
• Adding a client's preferred name
• Making a client inactive
• Deleting a client
• FAQs

Note: In December of 2023, we began a phased rollout to customers with a change to our navigation menu to simplify the customer experience. If you don’t see this in your account yet, but would like to use it immediately, please submit a help request for assistance.

Adding a client

There are two ways you can add a new client in your SimplePractice account. 

From the top navigation bar:

• Click the plus icon > + Create client

While scheduling an appointment:

• Navigate to your Calendar
• Click the time slot you’d like to schedule
• Select +New Client

Next, you'll be taken to the calendar flyout where you can select the client type as an Adult, Minor, or Couple.

Adult client

After you select Adult as the Client type, enter the client's information, including:

• Legal first name
• Legal last name
• Email address
• Phone number
• Billing type
• Primary Clinician, if you’re in a group practice 
• Location

If the client would like to receive email appointment and document reminders, check the boxes next to Send appointment reminders by email and Send document reminders by email. 

If the client would like to receive text or voice appointment reminders, check the Send appointment reminders by text or voice box and select either Text or Voice. To send document reminders via text, check the Send document reminders by text box.

Note: To learn more about appointment reminders, see How to set up appointment and time of scheduling reminders. 

Click Continue to save your new client.

Minor client

If you select Minor as the Client type, enter the minor client's information on the tab labeled Client. If the minor has a parent or guardian who’ll be managing their appointments or is responsible for billing, you can add them as a contact from the Contact tab.

To enable appointment and document reminders for the minor, follow the same steps for Adult clients.

Important: If the minor client doesn’t have a personal email or phone number, and the parent/guardian will be receiving appointment reminders, don’t add a designated email or phone number for the minor on the Client tab. 

To enable appointment reminders for the contact:

• Click the Contact tab 
• Enter the contact’s information 
• Check the box for the reminder type(s) you'd like to send

Note: Clients and contacts can receive email reminders, as well as one form of phone-based (voice or text) reminders.

• Click Continue to save your new minor client.

Note: To learn about adding an existing client as a contact and managing minor profiles, see Adding a new minor client.

Couple client

When you select Couple as the Client type, you'll see tabs for Client 1 and Client 2. Enter client information on each tab and check the box next to Responsible for billing for one of the clients.

Note: A couple profile can’t be created until a client is designated as Responsible for billing. To learn more, see What does it mean to choose who is "Responsible for billing"?

To enable appointment and document reminders for either client in the couple, follow the same steps for Adult clients.

Click Continue to save the new couple profile.

Note: For more information about couple client profiles, see Enhanced Client Management for couples.

Sending an intake

If you've entered an email address for your new client, you can grant Client Portal access and send intakes. This process is divided into three steps:

Client Items

Here, you can select which intake forms, consent documents, and questionnaires to send to your client. You can also choose to send the Demographics form and Credit card information form, which will automatically populate information into the client's profile once completed.

Note: The Credit card information form can only be sent if Online Payments is enabled in your account. For more information on using our integrated online payments processor, see Getting started with Online Payments.

After you've made your selection, click Continue to Email.

Note: You can also send or resend documents from the client Overview page if you forget to send them in the initial intake packet. For more on sending intakes and consent documents, see Sharing documents with existing clients.

Compose Email

On this tab, you can customize the message in the email that’ll be sent to the client with your practice documents.

If you’d like to adjust the default text of this email for your entire practice, go to Settings > Client Portal > Emails and click Edit on the Welcome email. For more information, see Customizing the Welcome message.

Note: You can’t view the text of a customized email after it’s been sent. If you'd like to determine if an email was sent, you can view this in your Account Activity and the Sent emails report. To learn more about Account Activity and Reports, see Account Activity: Tracking changes and information access in your account and Understanding your clients and appointments reports.

Review & Send

On the Review & Send tab, you can review the Welcome email by clicking View Message, and confirm which intake and consent documents you’re about to share.

After you've reviewed this information, click Share & Send Now.

The client Overview page

When you click a client’s name in your account, you’ll be brought to their Overview page. Here, you can view, edit, and manage the client’s billing information, documents, and notes. 

You can also expand or reduce your view of the items in the right navigation panel by clicking the arrows.

In the right navigation panel, you can view, edit, and manage the following information:

• Client billing
• Insurance
• Client info
• Contacts
• Upcoming appointments
• Communication settings
• Uploaded files
• Invoices
• Billing documents

Note: To learn more about the client Overview page, see Navigating the client Overview page.

Navigating your Clients and contacts list

Your Clients and contacts list allows you to access your clients’ basic information and navigate to their client Overview page. 

You can filter by:

• Clinician (for group practices)
• Clients, Contacts, Clients and contacts, Recently viewed clients, Inactive clients, or Waitlist clients
• Insurance payer

Note: Insurance payers will only populate in this view if they're saved in a client's Insurance Information.

The list can also be sorted by first name or last name. 

You can manage each client directly from your Clients and contacts list. To the right of each client’s name, click Manage to:

Merging duplicate contact profiles

Duplicate contact profiles for the same individual can cause confusion and difficulty accessing the Client Portal. 

Important: Merging profile information cannot be undone.

To merge contact profiles from the Clients and contacts list:

• Navigate to Clients from your Calendar 
• Toggle on Show X possible duplicate clients or contacts in the banner:

• Click Manage  > Merge with duplicate next to the contact profile you’d like to merge

• Check the boxes for the files you want to merge

• Click Preview merge
• Select Confirm merge

Removing a duplicate client

Duplicate client profiles cannot be merged together. If you have duplicate client profiles, you can make one of the profiles inactive and keep the other profile active. Doing this will allow you to retain the client’s information, but you'll be able to use one file for future documentation. To make a client inactive, see Making a client inactive.

Adding a client's preferred nickname

You can enter a client's preferred name in the What name do they go by? field of the client’s file.

The client’s first name will be displayed as their legal first name or the name entered in the What name do they go by? field, depending on the specific location:

• When Privacy mode is On, the calendar will display the initials from the name entered in the What name do they go by? field and their last name
• Invoices and statements will display the name entered in the What name do they go by? field
• Superbills and claim forms will display the client's legal name since insurance companies require that the client's name matches what they have on file
• The Default email sent to your clients for invoices, statements, and superbills will display the name you’ve set using the macro in the template

To display the name entered in the What name do they go by? field in these emails:

• Navigate to Settings > Documents
• Click Edit to the right of the applicable email template
• Highlight the macro {client_legally_admissible_first_name}
• Select Client First Name from the Client dropdown menu

• Click Save

Making a client inactive

The inactive status for a client is an option to denote clients that you aren’t actively seeing or have been discharged. Making a client inactive allows you to keep the client data in your account and reactivate the client in the future. Inactive clients won’t show up in your client list unless you filter by Inactive clients.

Note: If a client is marked as inactive, superbills and statements won’t be created for them automatically, even if they had appointments while they were inactive. A client must be marked as Active for the system to automatically create superbills and statements for them.

To make a client inactive:

• Navigate to the client’s Overview page
• Click Edit below their name
• Under Client Status, select Inactive

• Click Save Client

You can also mark clients inactive on the Clients and contacts page by clicking Manage > Make inactive.

Note: Inactive clients can still access their Client Portal unless you disable this access when you make them inactive. You can also disable their Client Portal access from the Client Portal tab. For more information, see Disabling the Client Portal for individual clients.

To access your inactive clients list, select Clients in the navigation bar and filter Clients to Inactive clients.

To reactivate a client:

• Navigate to the Clients tab
• Filter Clients by Inactive clients
• Select the inactive client in question
• From the client’s Overview page, click Edit
• Under Client Status, choose Active
• Click Save Client

Deleting a client

Deleting a client permanently removes them from our database and removes all of their information from your account. Only Account Owners, practice managers, or clinicians with entire practice access are able to delete a client.. To learn more, see Team member roles and access levels.

Important: Deleting a client is a permanent action and cannot be undone. Another option is to make a client inactive.

To delete a client:

• Navigate to the client's Overview page
• Click Edit 
• At the bottom of the page, click Delete this Client

• Choose Continue to Delete
• Type the client's First name and Last name exactly as seen at the top of the Permanently delete client? window
  • This is case-sensitive
• Check the box next to I understand this will delete the client's history and records forever. SimplePractice cannot recover this deleted information.
• Click Delete

Important: Once you click Delete, the client's file will be removed immediately. This action is irreversible.

FAQs

• Can I remove the Jamie Appleseed demo client?
• The clients or contacts that are marked as duplicates aren't actual duplicates. What should I do?

Can I remove the Jamie Appleseed demo client?

Jamie Appleseed is a demo client that’s automatically enabled in every SimplePractice account. To enable or disable Jamie Appleseed and all of their demo data from your account:

• Navigate to Settings > Demo Data

• Choose to either Disable or Enable Jamie Appleseed

The clients or contacts that are marked as duplicates aren't actual duplicates. What should I do?

To turn off the duplicate client notification for clients that aren't actually duplicates in your SimplePractice account:

• Navigate to Clients
• Toggle Show X possible duplicate clients or contacts to On 
  
• Next to the client or contact in question, select Manage > This is not a duplicate