How do nhs dentists get paid

In essence, a dentist carrying out a course of treatment involving one filling will earn exactly the same fee as if that patient required a dozen fillings and hours were needed to provide the treatment. It did nothing of the sort. And even if you do have cooperation from a child, treatment often takes twice as long as for an adult. What we currently have is a failing dental service where clinicians are having to be too focused on targets to spend adequate time on giving individual prevention advice, are overwhelmed by sheer patient numbers and are constantly banging their heads against parental brick walls.

I once had a patient spread out a picnic with cookies and soft drinks in my surgery for her children while she had her check-up. Very quickly, teeth become grossly decayed, infected and require the drastic measure of general anaesthesia and extraction. Duplication of support for HSC activity is not permitted under the FSS, and GDPs wishing to claim for support from wider business support schemes must do so in relation to private activity only. We would advise you speak to your accountant and other professional advisers to determine your course of action.

Practitioners should be aware that we are required to share data with HMRC in order to validate taxation and payments. We anticipate that HMRC will reconcile any payments they make. If you are a salaried dentist, working in Hospital Dental Services, Community Dental Services or prison dentistry, for example, your employment status should not be affected by this crisis.

You will continue to receive your salary. However, it should be noted that they may be deployed elsewhere within the health service.

For more info on this please see our latest advice on redeployment see questions This may prove quite stressful and members should be aware that they have access to our hour counselling service. This is an exceedingly challenging time for business in the UK.

The COVID outbreak is impacting the incomes of private practices and many are currently in desperate financial circumstances. We are lobbying Government and representing your interests during this difficult time. Chancellor Rishi Sunak has pledged additional support for business, on top of measures set out in the budget.

These include:. This is a stressful time and members should be aware that they have access to our hour counselling service. Dentists who are worried they cannot meet their current personal household expenditure can also apply to the BDA Benevolent Fund for financial assistance. Dental practices were not included in the new measures introduced in Budget to give business rate exemptions to retail businesses. We believe that in the context of the business disruption caused by the COVID outbreak, it is essential that this exemption be widened to include dental practices.

We've made representations to government to that effect and we will update you on any progress made. The measures announced by the Chancellor last year to support the self-employed during the COVID outbreak did not support the majority of self-employed dentists. We have been working hard on your behalf, lobbying government to provide sufficient financial support to the self-employed during this time of national crisis.

Associates in significant financial hardship may also speak to the BDA Benevolent Fund about their situation and the possibility of financial aid. We believe that it is best if practices do continue to pay all or most of the capitation money to associates, but on condition that associates repay some of that money if they have not been able to provide routine and other treatment to patients because of the lockdown or reduced activity. This continues to be a challenging time for dentists and dental practices all over the country.

Practice owners under financial pressure have the following options regarding staff payments:. You may agree reduced hours working. You could suggest or ask your staff to suggest to you a temporary cut in hours and hence a proportional reduction in their pay.

There is no obligation for them to agree, but if you are frank and explain the circumstances and the alternatives lay-off or even possible closure of the business then they might be agreeable. Any agreement to reduced hours or short-time working should be put in writing — including the new hours, the rate of pay, the date the reduced hours start and the date for reviewing reduced hours or the date that they return to their normal hours — and signed by the employee.

Employed staff will either be entitled to full pay or only to guarantee payments during any period where there is no work. Employees are entitled to a maximum of five days of guarantee payments in any three months. Practices do not have to pay anything to staff once they have had their five days of guarantee payments.

There is a clause in the BDA model contract of employment entitling employers to lay off staff with only guarantee pay. In all other circumstances, where practices have no work for staff, they will have to pay staff in full if the practice closes or if they need fewer staff.

If staff are on guarantee payments for more than four consecutive weeks or more than six weeks in any week period , they can give the practice a notice to claim redundancy pay. The practice may, if it wishes, issue a counter notice to that.

A tribunal would then decide whether there is a reasonable prospect of the employee returning, within four weeks of giving the original notice, to full employment for at least 13 weeks. The provisions are not very simple. Our advice team is happy to advise on individual situations. The Government is keen to avoid redundancies if at all possible. That is why is has introduced pay for furloughed workers.

However, practices may be able to make staff redundant. And it will restore the formal right for patients to be registered with a dentist - something that was removed by the contract. Currently, no-one in England has the right to return to a dentist if there is no space for them, no matter how long they have been treated by that dentist in the past. Official NHS statistics show that more than one million fewer patients visited an NHS dentists in the two years after the introduction of the contract than the two years before.

The next call on this money is the material costs, currently running at an average of seven per cent in practices we work with. At this point if you are still reading! I suspect that anyone who has done this sum will now be wondering what they can do to make things better! Which levers can you pull to improve your situation?

In reality, if the dentist is unwilling or unable to increase their gross, the only lever that will make a significant difference is how much the associate dentist gets paid. In recent years, low prices in high street opticians and a competitive corporate market for vets has meant that both opticians and vets earn half of what they did 20 years ago. The dental corporates know this, and with an oversupply of willing young dentists we have the perfect environment for pay cuts.