Cleanbill Blue Report 2023 – Historical Comparison

In January 2023, Cleanbill released the 2023 Blue Report, which aggregated billing data from its listing of every GP clinic across Australia’s capital cities, the Northern Territory, the Australian Capital Territory and Tasmania.

Cleanbill also has access to some clinic-level bulk billing data from GP clinics in certain suburbs and localities across Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide, dating from 2018.

These datasets were begging for a comparison.

So, that’s exactly what we’ve done.

Cleanbill was able to compare billing data between 2018 and 2022 for 416 clinics spanning Australia’s 5 largest cities. Of the clinics surveyed, 63 fewer bulk bill today than did in 2018, taking the effective bulk billing rate from 46% to 31%.

Average out-of-pocket costs across all clinics surveyed increased by $3.58 for a standard, 15-minute consultation. This represents a 9.1% increase over and above the increases to the Medicare rebate rate over the 4-year period.

The changes in billing practices were not reflected uniformly, however, with some areas seeing collapses of 50% or more in bulk billing rates and average out-of-pocket costs increasing by over 10%.

You can read the full Historical Comparison Report and access the data behind it below.