Ok, I'm going to say it, and I'm going to get in trouble, and once again I am ignoring my signature. but…. really, I do NOT get the price of veterinary dentals.
Yes, my practice tends to charge a little less than my local colleagues. Partly this is because I am old school and believe that a single mom working two jobs to raise her kids should be able to have a cat for them. But, frankly, it is easier to sound noble when you have no school loans and the mortgage is long since paid off.
So, if, say, the place down the street quotes $800 for something and I will do it for $650 that's fine. I have less overhead and if we all charged the same we would be price fixing like the … well, like almost every other vendor of services these days.
But when I see a 6 year old Bichon with a fair amount of tartar, needs a scrape and polishing,no extractions, and I might quote $225- $250 after the initial visit and blood panel, and they pull out some quote for $900, or $1200, or $1600, (yes, I have actually seen these), what am I supposed to say?
How can you charge 2-3X what you charge for a full ovariohysterectomy (spay), (and although we do a lot of them, this is still a pretty big surgery), to clean teeth? Honestly. I do not get it.
It's embarrassing for me, I have no desire to come off as the questionably 'cheap' animal hospital, but, frankly, (and I have owned and run hospitals for a long time, with pretty fair success,), this particular subset of prices makes no sense to me.
Just the opinion of one curmudgeonly old veterinarian, take it for what it's worth.
