Playbook, dental clinic
Somebody wants a price in writing before they have been seen
Dentistry has an unusual advantage here: the quote already exists as a defined document. After an examination the dentist writes a treatment plan setting out the options and what each costs, and the patient keeps a copy. The job is to explain how somebody gets one, not to approximate what it might say.
Why this is not the general answer
The handling pattern for quotes and estimates holds across every trade. What follows is the part that does not.
- The estimate here is a formal document rather than a figure: a written plan produced after an examination, listing the proposed work and its cost, which the patient takes away. Explaining that is more useful than any number could be.
- A plan is usually written as options, because there is often a repair, a replacement and a leave it alone route at different costs, and a single figure hides the choice the patient is actually being offered.
- What is found under a filling can change the treatment, so a plan is issued knowing it may be revised, and honest material says what happens when it is rather than implying the first figure is final.
- Photographs sent through a chat window are not an examination, and a number produced from one is a number the dentist who has to do the work cannot stand behind.
How it arrives
- can you give me a price in writing
- do i get a written treatment plan
- can you price this from a photo of my tooth
- how long is the estimate valid for
- does the estimate include the lab work
- what happens if the treatment changes half way through
What has to be indexed for this to work
| What your treatment plan document contains | How the options are set out, whether costs are itemised, whether the examination fee appears separately, and when the patient receives it. Describing the document is what makes waiting for it acceptable. |
|---|---|
| How long an estimate stands | Your validity period and what happens once it passes. Asked constantly by people saving up for work, and it protects you when laboratory and material costs move. |
| What triggers a revised plan | Decay deeper than expected, a tooth that turns out not to be restorable, root canal treatment becoming necessary. Say who tells the patient and when, because the surprise is what produces the complaint rather than the money. |
| What sits inside the figure and what sits outside it | Laboratory fees, radiographs, review appointments, and any choice of material that moves the cost. Arguments about dental bills nearly all begin here. |
The reply
We do put estimates in writing, but the plan is written after an examination, because the cost depends on what the dentist finds and on which option you choose [1]. The plan lists the treatment and the cost of each option, and you get a copy to take away [2]. I cannot price a tooth from a description or a photograph, and neither would the practice. If you would like an examination booked so that you get a plan, leave me your name and an email.
It says yes to the real request, which is a price in writing, then explains what has to happen first. Naming the plan as a document containing options tells the patient they will be offered a choice rather than handed a bill. The refusal on photographs is framed as practice policy rather than as a limitation of the software, which is both true and more persuasive.
Where it stops
The trigger. The visitor describes their own tooth, offers a photograph, or asks what their particular course of treatment will come to.
I cannot put a figure on treatment nobody has examined. Leave me your name, an email and a short description, and reception will arrange an examination so you get a written plan with the costs on it.
It stops answering before it guesses, says who will pick it up, and asks for the one thing that makes a reply possible. Nothing about it reads as a dead end.
Never say this here
Out of bounds
- Never produce a total for a described set of treatment, even by adding up figures that are published.
- Never say an estimate is fixed, because a plan can be revised once the dentist sees what is there.
- Never state what a plan includes beyond what your own material lists, particularly laboratory fees and radiographs.
- Never assess a photograph of a tooth in any way, including saying that it looks minor.
Questions
- Can it add prices up from our fee list?
- It should not, and you should configure it not to. Arithmetic across a list produces a total that reads as a quotation, and the patient will bring it with them to the appointment.
- Do we have to publish how long an estimate lasts?
- You do not have to, and it removes a whole category of awkward conversation with patients who come back months later expecting the old figure. It is one line and it is a fact about your process.
- People send photos anyway. What then?
- Give it one clear line in the material: photographs are not an examination and the practice does not price from them. Then offer the examination. A hedged answer here simply invites another photo.
Keep reading
- Everything for a dental clinicThe questions a dental practice actually gets, the ones that must reach a clinician, and the documents worth indexing first.
- Handling quotes and estimates in generalWhat has to be known before a number is possible, how the scoping step works, and how to answer without stonewalling or inventing a figure.
- Three access requests a dental practice gets, none of them an FAQA wheelchair user, a deaf patient needing an interpreter and a patient asking about sedation are three different requests.
- Why a dental record cannot simply be deleted on requestDental records carry a statutory retention period. What the assistant may explain, and why the request still has to reach a person.
- A patient wants to stop paying the monthly planEnding a dental plan means a notice period, a direct debit and sometimes a plan provider. What can be explained and what cannot be ended.
Try it on your own material
Upload a document or point it at your site, paste one line of HTML, then ask it something only your business could answer.