How Much does your Dental Practice Pay in Credit Card Merchant Fees Every Year? Make Sure Its Worth It

How much does your dental practice pay in credit card merchant fees every year?  Are you sure it’s worth it? 

Obviously, offering patients various convenient payment options is critical to your dental business.  And, most patients have a credit card in their wallet and are ready to use it.  Although your practice incurs a merchant fee when processing these credit card charges, the advantage is instant payment to you with no repetitive billing and lingering patient accounts receivables.  The merchant fee is simply a cost of doing business. 

However, are you sure you are paying the lowest merchant rate offered.  You may be surprised, so shop around a bit to get the lowest rate possible.  There also are many third party companies that provide patient financing.  The more popular ones are Dental Fee Plan, Unicorn Financial, CareCredit and Wells Fargo.  When researching these companies be sure to determine if there are any fees to your dental practice and that their patient financing plans are nonrecourse, meaning these companies cannot come back to your practice should the patient fail to pay their credit line. 

Having a separate credit line for just dental services and procedures is a benefit to some patients.  And, most of the third party finance companies will approve the patient for a higher credit line than requested.  This provides the opportunity for the patient to request additional dental services.  Overall, credit cards and finance payment options are a must to offer your patients in today’s business climate.