
← Dentistry Made Simple with Dr. Tarun 'TBone' Agarwal8 sep · 27 min
How to Handle Discounts and Financing for High-Value Dental Cases
Complex-care treatment planning is not just about codes and fees. It is about chair time, material costs, financing, patient outcomes, and helping your team make confident decisions.
In this episode, T-Bone and Meredith explain how Raleigh Dental Arts approaches discounts and financing for implant and complete-care cases. They share how to evaluate the real cost of treatment, give treatment coordinators appropriate flexibility, and use financing to help more patients move forward without sacrificing the health of the practice.
Main Topics
Why complex-care financial conversations are different from general dentistryUnderstanding chair time, cost of goods, opportunity cost, and profitabilityTraining treatment coordinators to make informed financial decisionsWhen discounts may make sense and when they do notWhy financing can create more accepted treatment and better patient accessHow to balance patient advocacy with building a healthy businessThe difference between presenting procedures and guiding a complete-care conversationCreating a financial framework that protects the doctor’s time and the practice’s marginsIn This Episode
Why chair time—not procedure codes—should guide complex-care pricingHow to calculate flexibility using material costs, lab fees, and opportunity costWhen multi-implant cases may allow for a discountWhy financing and discounts should usually be separate optionsA simple way to respond when patients ask for a discountHow third-party financing can increase case acceptance despite merchant feesWhy treatment coordinators need visibility into the business side of treatmentTimestamps
00:00 – Implant costs, discounts, and the 90% of $1.5M mindset
05:02 – Meredith’s shift from line-item treatment planning to complete care
07:04 – General dentistry vs. advanced and emotional dentistry
09:40 – Teaching treatment coordinators how to make discount decisions
12:39 – Chair time, extra visits, and opportunity cost
14:46 – Material costs and the economics of multi-implant cases
17:12 – Financing fees and setting boundaries around discounts