Why obtain credit Grades?

The orthodontic and dental profession is, overwhelmingly, selling “optional” treatment.  In other words, patients can choose to accept treatment now, to postpone treatment, to phase treatment (in general dental offices) or to have treatment completed in a competitor’s office.  One significant rule of marketing is the absolute necessity of making it easy for your customer (patient) to purchase what it is that you are selling.

To a significant degree, a health care practice’s financial policies determine the ability and willingness of that practice’s patients to accept and schedule the treatment plan that has been diagnosed.  During the past couple of years, during one of the worst economic downturns we have seen in recent history, most dental and orthodontic practices had declines in new patient flow and, more importantly, declines in the rate of case acceptance.  The result has been a period of one of the largest declines in net profitability in the past 50 years.  Most of the practices that have not done well during this downturn are those whose financial policies were more about being paid rather then obtaining the best possible case acceptance.  Those practices that have always had flexible financial policies, those that did not require auto debit, those that did not push outside financing, and that did not require payment at the time of service, were the practices that had the least negative impact from this downturn.   Many of these practices enjoyed significant growth during the past two years!

Of course, it is critically important that the doctor have the ability to identify, for certain, which patients are credit worthy and which are not.  Obtaining a credit grade on your patient/responsible party allows you to have solid information regarding their maturity, stability, and their integrity on the subject of money and finances.  With that knowledge you have the ability to grant a reasonable amount of credit to those deserving of credit while also having the ability to identify the relatively small percentage of patients who cause 80% of patient related problems such as poor clinical cooperation, missed appointments, and delinquency.  Spending $5 to know, for certain, that you have a responsible person of high integrity seeking your care, or a person who may be a “credit criminal” seeking your care, can bring returns a 1000 times over!