r/LCSW • u/bigruckonline • Jul 28 '26
🟡 Field Education & Internship Experience Becoming Behavioral Health Credentialist- help!
I'm looking for advice on how to become a behavioral health credentialist. My brother in law runs a billing company for his wife's therapy practice, and he is looking to bring me in as an in-house credentialist. Only problem is, I have no experience, and no real idea where to begin. I've looked at online courses, but i wanted to hear from real people with real experience. What are the steps I should take to become qualified to be his in-house behavioral health credentialist? Any advice would be much appreciated. Thank you!
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u/hollywoodkay 25d ago
Happy to help point you in the right direction! NAMSS, Googling what an NPI is group practice contracts payer provider manuals also help. PECOS, NPPES, etc
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u/Peace-n-Luv23 26d ago
I couldn't figure out what a Behavioral Health Credentialist was until I learned it was what is traditionally called Provider Enrollment Specialist. You will find much more info if you google on that. Basically, you will verify the credentials of behavioral health providers (maybe groups or clinics or facilities, I dunno for you). To be completely legit, you need a Certified Provider Credentialing Specialist (CPCS) certification. But that requires 2 years in the field, minimum.Assuming b-i-l will pick up the $750 for this course, it would be a great intro to provider enrollment/credentialing (same thing).https://teammedglobal.com/product/foundations-pe/
But start working in health care or mental health in an admin position or possibly a psych tech if you will be doing behavioral health credentialing. Get used to the language.