Like ripping a bandaid off

If a patient wants a lot of dentistry — let's say several implants and a bunch of crowns — there are two ways you can tell them how much it will cost: slowly or all at once.

To me, telling a patient the fee is like ripping a bandaid off. It's less painful and more successful if you do it in one quick go rather than doing it gradually.

Yet, so many dentists do it little by little.

It all stems from dentists' fear of rejection. They're scared that if they tell the patient how much the work will be then the patient won't like them any more and may leave the practice. This leads them to beat around the bush and unnecessarily delay telling the patient how much a big case will be.

They think that if they can delay for a while and let the news out in little bits then the patient will follow along.

A friend of mine (who has lots of money) left a dentist a few years ago because he got strung along in this way. The dentist kept doing treatment and instead of telling him how much the whole job was, constantly added things as he went along. In the end my friend lost trust. Instead, if the dentist had told my friend at the start that the all-up cost was going to be $XXX my friend would have been fine with it.

I encourage you to think of the bandaid analogy next time you quote a fee.