When it comes to dentistry, 97% of Americans value oral health. However, many are uninsured, leading to the patient incurring high dental costs. For insured patients, insurance companies act as the middleman, often providing coverage for patients and paying fees to dental companies. The problem is that the insurance companies are taking the bulk of the revenue.
Insurance companies charge patients much more than market value in insurance copays and premiums. At the same time, dental practices receive much lower than market value for dental services in fees from these companies.
Dental practices are missing a big chunk of revenue while patients aren’t receiving total rewards. Read on to learn how your dental membership plans can be improved by shifting to a subscription dental care model.
What Is Subscription Dental Care?
The reality is this – 77 million Americans currently lack private dental insurance according to Business Wire, and current trends indicate this number will only increase with time. Workers are shifting to industries that don’t provide dental benefits, and Americans are less incentivized than ever to purchase it themselves.
Insurance is leading to inflating costs with a reduction in benefits, and as a result, people are neglecting their oral health by avoiding the dentist until it’s necessary. How can dental practices reel patients back in with regular preventative care?
One highly effective solution is subscription-based dental care by offering dental memberships that provide an affordable dental plan that includes preventative care and discounted rates on other treatments.
These in-house dental plans can be offered annually or monthly, but monthly plans are the most attractive and popular with potential patients. Since dental practices receive the fees directly, they’re better able to cover administrative costs and generate revenue.
Benefits of Subscription Dental Care for DSOs
In-house dental plans enable patients to get their bang for their buck, as the increase in patient loyalty creates more consistent and steady revenue for practices, so they can offer these discounted rates that provide better returns than insurance ever.
Instead of gambling with costs with an insurance company or receiving no breaks without insurance, patients can pay a membership fee for free teeth cleanings and discounted treatments. Here’s how subscription dental care works:
More Uninsured Patients Can Be Reached
Uninsured patients are much less likely to seek dental care, mainly routine preventative care, because they anticipate high costs and know they have no coverage to ease the financial burden.
By offering discounted rates to the uninsured through monthly or yearly subscription plans, you can attract new patients to your dental practice.
Many uninsured patients overestimate the cost of dental treatment. If they see an offer for reduced rates that include a package deal for multiple different treatments, such as x-rays, oral exams, cleanings, and fluoride treatments, they’re more likely to go to you than some other dental practice that offers no incentives for the uninsured.
1. Easy Enrollment
The most unattractive aspect of dental insurance is how confusing it is for patients to determine what benefits they provide and how much they will pay. Adding to the situation’s complexity, patients must meet strict requirements, making selecting the cost of treatment very complicated and frustrating.
In-house dental plans eliminate the headaches of determining costs by streamlining the process for our customers. They know precisely what they’re getting and how much they’re paying.
There are no surprise costs that weren’t discussed beforehand or hidden fine print like with insurance plans. This makes discounted plans much more attractive and straightforward compared to dental insurance. Dental practices are also simpler because they don’t have to deal with as much administrative work from insurance.
2. Cut Out Insurance Companies and Turn Networks Into a Revenue Model
Insurance companies are not paying practice market rates and instead keeping most of the revenue for themselves, leaving dental practices to bear the cost and barely break even.
Membership plans place the power back into the hands of the dental practices themselves. The rates are set by the dental practice, and they receive the fees in full from their patients. The lack of administrative paperwork leaves no room for confusion or disputes over misrepresentations.
Patients pay their monthly or annual membership fee upfront and then receive the benefits of that plan. Safeguards can ensure that patients cannot just take advantage of benefits and cancel without paying.
Because you are also attracting more uninsured patients and keeping them loyal by demonstrating that you care about their ability to afford dental treatment and will accommodate them, this helps to generate a more consistent stream of revenue. Patients who are members of these subscription plans visit the dental office more often.
3. Dental Support Organization (DSO) and Dentist
Patients with insurance want to reap the full benefits since they’re typically paying a lot for it. As a result, they’re only going to go to dental practices that are in-network with their insurance to get as much back from the cost of treatment as possible.
This is cutting you off from an entire customer base. However, Dental Support Organizations (DSOs) can help you become affiliated or partnered with other dental practices to increase each others’ customer base.
The DSO takes care of the administrative tasks so you can focus on what you know best – providing high-quality dental care to patients that need it. You can find and affiliate with dentists in other parts of the country. Since they want to expand their coverage, they can provide you with more patients.
Why Should You Use Accresa for Subscription-Based Dental Care?
At Accresa, we can manage patient memberships, payments, subscriptions, and payments through individual-based pre-tax accounts. With Accresa, we consider all payment options and let patients utilize their FSAs and HSAs to pay for membership costs. Our auto-substantiation feature allows you to validate the transaction with these specialty accounts in real-time and keeps data tracking up to date to meet all IRS reporting standards regarding accepting FSA/HRA and HSA payments. When you use the Accresa platform, we offer customizable plan designs, efficient prices, automated enrollment for employees, and a user-friendly interface.
- Group Management: With Accresa, you can receive from those that do sell to groups. If people pay with HSA or FSA cards, it will automatically be adjudicated, a benefit you can’t obtain without Accresa.
- Enterprise Solution: Have employer groups with scattered employees all over the country? We can help you manage!
- Expand Your Network: Accresa can help you expand your network to address your coverage needs in certain areas.
Use Accresa for Your Subscription Dental Care
With Accresa as your subscription care manager, you’ll be able to streamline the administrative process, save on costs, increase your customer network, and make the entire process of accumulating new patients and growing revenue much easier with Accresa.
We’ll take all the work out of payments, billing, and management of memberships so that you can entice new patients with your in-house dental membership plans, and we’ll help you keep them by doing all the back-end work. Healthcare doesn’t need to be so complicated. Please leave all of the software and administrative tasks to us! Accresa will help reduce healthcare costs for both patients and providers. Contact us today to get started!
