A little thought experiment regarding fees.

Timmy G Location: Raytown, MO: Stealing this from some reading this week. It's just a little What-if thought experiment used to look at things from a different perspective then usual. If you want to play along, great. If you don't want to, feel free to lurk. So the question----What if, very suddenly and totally out of your control you had to cut ALL prices and the fees you could get by 20%. For purposes of this exercise, it's 100% impossible to avoid. What would you change and do differently to best try and manage it so as to remain in business.

Tooth Carpenter Location: Dallas: Delta and other are already doing that as a favour for us

what can I do ?

1. Reduce the staff

2. Decrease hygienist salary

3. Work more hours

4. Send the crowns to chepo labs

5. Refuse doing dentures( PPO fees)

6. Ignore recall care, it's a lost leader with PPO

7. Encourage emergency that need endos and extractions

what will I do ?

Drop the force that tell you to reduce your fees.

kidesperanto: Make less money.But seriously, cut days and make sure all chairs filled at all times. Empty chairs are killer.

skuzma2dds Location:Baltimore, Maryland; More rads, more FL varnish, More small stuff.

mikedental; Location: Silverton, Oregon; Evaluate what procedures I am losing money on, and try to find ways to stop doing them, or add additional procedures to that one. For instance, reps are always pushing for [retacted] things like a quick in office whitening during a cleaning, treatment planning quads of fillings needing replaced instead of 1 or 2. In general pushing the ethical line of proper treatment planning into a jiffy lube where you are coerced into getting every coolant flushed and wipers changed to make a profit.

SkiDoc Wade: If it were forced on me then I'd realize I'm in a profession that no longer allows me to do my best. I'd start doing mediocre dentistry. Standard of care but nothing great. Cheap composite, binding agents , speed would go up, mistakes would increase. Dentistry wouldn't last as long. I'd use cheapest Chinese lab. Fit be dambed. My only concern would be barely meeting the SOC. This would be a job and not a passion for excellence anymore. Maybe help be a lesson in capitalism to world

Timmy G Location: Raytown, MO: I'm curious, any reason to not do that now, anyway? Some interesting responses so far, I hope we get more.

alanrw Location: SoCal: Would have to look very hard at all overhead items. Workplace benefits would probably suffer. Staffing would have to be razor thin.

rpiotrowski Location: Elmsford, NY; I'd channel a little bit of Adam Smith. I'd focus on the procedures that I'm really good at and can do quickly. Market for more of those procedures.

Find my niche and run with it. Examples are http://www.shouldice.com/ They only do hernia operations[in Cannada].In dentistry the only one I can think of off the top of my head is McCall Dentures.

tricuspid Location: Tennessee; Go spend some time at Medicaid heavy offices and you will see how they operate on low reimbursement. Pay staff minimal amount w/ no benefits. Cheapo labs and materials. Double and triple book people so there are no holes anywhere in the schedule. Make sure you are utilizing delegated duties to their full extent. No more freebies on anything. Every single service or appointment that can be billed must be billed.

rpiotrowski Location: Elmsford, NY; Hi Tim, I'm not mikedental but I have an opinion on this (I know, I know, opinions are like a******, everyone has one) ;) . I do procedures that don't make me as much money as other procedures because I like to help people.

Lots of people don't want to go somewhere else and would rather just see me, even if it takes me longer to do the same procedure. And also, since I'm my own boss, I like doing different procedures. As long as I can, I'm going to perform all the procedures I've been trained to do.

But that's just me. Rich

kidesperanto: Im constantly working on efficiency and cost cutting. Its the whole "working on the business" idea.

OctothorpGolfNovemberFoxtrot; Zero MA. Saturday and evening hours with an associate. No more benefits for staff (vacation hours, 401(k), licensing fees, health insurance), militant oversight of materials (only two cotton rolls, etc). Since staff are the greatest cost overall, someone is probably getting fired.

SkiDoc Wade: Because with the 20% profit margin they are profitable right now. After a 20% margin drop some things become unprofitable. So no need to do it now if they are profitable now.