Updated: 1/1/2020
Can I see what I’m going to pay at the dentist before my visit? Sometimes.
Most dentists don’t have a list of treatment prices available for patients. While they may have their reasons for not making these prices available, many patients still find the lack of information frustrating.
However, there are some other ways to find out what you will pay at your visit (including our mobile app for our plan’s discounted prices).
How Do I Find Out How Much My Dental Visit Will Cost?
1. Call your dentist before your visit and ask
Most dental administrative assistants and hygienists understand that dental treatment is expensive and that people don’t like to spend a lot of money on dental care. Ask your dentist how much your first visit will cost (or any visit after that). Your first dental visit at a new dentist (along with each subsequent routine visit) usually includes a cleaning, dental x-rays and a dental exam. Prices may vary depending on:
- the type of dentist you see (specialist or general dentist)
- how many x-rays you need
- the type of dental cleaning you need to get (some people need a deep cleaning, which costs more)
2. Ask your dentist if you can see the treatment plan costs before agreeing to treatment
You shouldn’t have to ask about treatment plan costs—most, if not all, dental offices give you this information—but don’t hesitate to ask if you need to. After you have a cleaning and x-rays, your dentist or dental hygienist will put together a treatment plan for follow-up work that is needed.
Typically, they’ll pull you aside to let you look over the treatment plan before agreeing to it. You can then take care of your treatment on that visit (if the dentist has the availability) or during a follow-up visit.
3. See our dental plan savings resource
We recently put together a resource that breaks down each dental visit by treatment and procedure with the prices (average price without a dental plan and average price with your dental plan). This information was pulled from the Care 500 plan price list. All 1Dental savings plans follow a discounted price list, but only Care 500 allows you to view the full list of savings online.
4. Follow the ADA. They release updated procedure costs each year.
The American Dental Association releases updated dental procedure costs each year. They’ve already released 18 new codes for 2018. These books may be a bit technical, as they’re primarily meant for dentists as they look to see how much they should charge for each procedure, but it’s a place where you can see suggested procedure prices.
Why Doesn’t My Dentist List Prices on Their Website?
- It’s difficult to list accurate prices for each situation. Dentists can’t usually give exact prices when they don’t know the situation yet. We spent a lot of time working on our savings resource to give our members an understanding of what they can expect to pay, but these sample invoices can vary depending on treatment needed.
Here are a few examples:
Cleaning vs. Deep Cleaning: You could come to your dentist’s office for a regular exam and cleaning, but while you’re there, your dentist sees the condition of your teeth and gums and decides to perform a deep cleaning. This cleaning costs more money. - Number of Dental X-Rays: If you go to your dentist for an exam and report that you have a toothache, you might need an x-ray of the tooth to make sure there isn’t an underlying problem. Each individual x-ray costs money.
- Tooth Fillings: This is fairly common. You go to your dentist for a routine visit and cleaning and they find a few cavities that need to be filled. This is when your dentist typically recommends a treatment plan. You can usually elect to get the filling done right away or schedule a follow-up appointment. Fillings will be an additional cost.
- Dentists have to work with dental insurance companies. Every dentist has a price list that includes the procedures they perform, but so does every dental insurance company. When dentists work with these different insurance plans, the dental insurance company ends up setting the price through things like fee reductions and copays.
According to this Tooth Talk article by Dr. Igor Kaplansky:
“In general, dental insurance companies use what is called a Usual, Customary and Reasonable (UCR) fee guide. The companies set their own price that they will allow for every dental procedure that they cover; it’s not based on what a dentist actually charges, but what the dental insurance company wants to cover. For example, your dentist may charge $80 for a dental cleaning, but the insurance company will only allow $60, because that is their set UCR fee. That leaves you with a $20 out-of-pocket expense.”
How Do Dentists Determine Their Prices?
There are a few organizations that offer suggested pricing and data for dentists: the American Dental Association and the National Dental Advisory Service. But pricing essentially comes down to three things:
- Cost of the materials and equipment used
- Cost of the dental chair occupancy for the appointment
- Cost of the dentist’s time
And then, of course, there are salaries for dental staff, facility expenses, etc. We go into more details about the cost breakdown of a dental office in another blog post.
Conclusion
We know this subject can be confusing, but we hope this post was able to shed some light on the tricky question of how much you’ll pay at the dentist. Also, be sure to check out our resources that I mentioned above to get an idea of what you might expect to pay at the dentist with and without your dental discount plan.
It’s interesting to know that the dental chair occupancy is part of the costs when computing dental service bill. I’ve recently moved to Denver due to a new job I got hired for so I’m going to have to find a new dentist I would regularly go to for checkups. It’s good to know how I can gauge prices so I can find one that fits my budget.
Im certain the providers get to charge whatever they want. The 500 price list for a D7210 – Extraction of an extracted tooth requiring removal of bone or sectioning of tooth reads $165 for one tooth. An Aspen Dental office wanted $323 originally and after the discount was applied, they wanted $258 per tooth. On the join Careington website it states “see exactly what you will pay for each procedure” – it neglects to say whose. I’m telling Dave Ramsey.
Hi Ruth, would you mind emailing us these concerns at customercare@1dental.com or give us a call at 800-372-7615 so we can understand your experience better and see how we can help?
Yes, as I’ve seen on some other comments, my dentist, who is on your provider list, keeps telling me crowns aren’t covered by my Aetna Dental Access Plan that I got through 1Dental. What can I do about that? Just find another provider on the list who will agree to give me the discount on a crown?
Thank you for sharing your experience with us.
Dental crowns are discounted with the Care500 AND the Aetna Dental Access Plan. It sounds like this might be a provider issue. Would you mind emailing us at customercare@1dental.com with the provider name and this problem you encountered so we can get someone from our team to reach out to this dental practice?
Some dentists do recommend one crown that is not listed on our schedule – it’s possible that is what the dentist is referring to – but we have many crowns listed on our schedule that qualify for a discount – comparable to the crown sometimes recommended by dentists.
Unfortunately many Dentists are saying the crown they use are not on a schedule so they will give you 20% off. They then jack up the price and charge you what they want. So wrong,
We have been working to get that crown on our fee schedule because a lot of dentists favor it. However, there is a similar crown that is just as good that is on our fee schedule and offers a greater discount than 20%. It’s all about talking with your dentist about the best options for you (based on the plan you have).
We are sorry you had a difficult experience with that! Again, we are working hard to remedy that if we can.
I think my membership is great. My dentist is great as well accepting your discount plan. Saved me about half for a crown and extraction. Yes, the number 1 worry for a visit to the dentist is cost. What I saved at my dental visit more than paid for my membership.
Thank you for sharing! We love hearing from our members about how they have been able to save.
Signed up for 1dental the same day a crown fell out. Was covered. Very pleased with the service, the staff, the facilities. No charge for the x-rays and saved more than 50% on the services. Recommending the plan to our family.
That’s awesome, Rita. Thank you so much for sharing! We love hearing these stories from our members. And thank you for recommending the plan to your family!
While I understand that prices will vary from dentist to dentist and region to region, I was a bit dismayed at the cost of my recent visit.
Your site listed full upper and lower dentures at $701. I joined and picked a local dentist that was listed. Turns out that my full upper and lower dentures are going to cost me $1100. Not really a ‘bad’ price considering how much it would cost without your discount, but still quite misleading. I also had to pay $56 for an x-ray, which I wasn’t planning on.
When combining all costs, $99 for the Carington Plan, $56 for the x-ray, and $1100 for the dentures, the total out of pocket is $1255. Just rather disappointed.
We are so sorry to hear of your disappointment. May I ask if the dentist honored the discounts listed on our fee schedule and/or if there were additional treatments included with your visit that we did not include in our resource online?
We had this resource reviewed by a local dentist, but there may be a better way to display the information to members if the cost was too far from what we estimated in our resource.
We would love your input, if you’re willing to offer it, so we can improve this material. Please feel free to send any feedback you have to editor@1dental.com. You can address it to me (Natasha) and I’ll be sure to look it over!
Can you email me an updated information on my account as to who takes this insurance and the information I need for the dentist I have an appointment tomorrow and would like it before i go.
I’m sorry for the delay in getting you a response. You can email us at customercare@1dental.com and we can get you the information you need! You can also visit our website at 1dental.com to find a list of dentists near you and more info about how to use your plan.
This is a really helpful resource we put together for using your plan: https://www.1dental.com/dental-plan-savings/
I had called for new cards, plus list of dentists and list of eye doctors in our area (48603–Saginaw, Mich. But never got yet.
Hi Ronald, can you try giving us a call again? Or you can email us at customercare@1dental.com. I’ll pass along your info to our contact center, as well.
I was charged $69 for a teeth cleaning which was supposed to have been free for having been a long time member. I did not have my letter stating this with me at the dentist as I supposed he would have a record of it. Is there any chance of receiving a refund?
Hi Betty, thank you for commenting! We don’t offer free cleanings with our plans. Our plans are set up as discounts at the dental office, so the $69 you received would be about right with the cleaning and oral exam. The cleaning would have cost much more than that without your plan.
You said you received a letter saying you would get a free cleaning? Could you email us that at customercare@1dental.com?
THIS IS A RIP OFF! I PAID FOR MY HUSBAND AND MYSELF FOR THE YEAR AND THE ONE DENTAL PLACE THAT ACCEPTS THIS PLAN HAS DIFFERENT CODES FOR CROWNSTHEN YOU DO. SO, INSTEAD OF PAYING 511.00 FOR A CROWN LIKE IS LISTED ON YOUR PRICE, i HAVE TO PAY 2,000.00 FOR EZCH CROWN! WILL NOT BE SUCKERE INTO THIS AGAIN!!
Hi Tina, I can understand how frustrating that would be. There are crowns that are not listed on our fee schedules that some dentists will sometimes recommend. If you haven’t gotten this crown yet, I would encourage you to speak with your dentist and ask him if there are any crowns listed on our fee schedule that would be comparable to the one he is recommending.
He may have good reasons for recommending a particular crown but another crown may be just as good to use – and it will be discounted according to our fee schedule.
I went to a dentist last year, that took careington, and he told me I need a crown. I asked how much it would be, I was told $500.00, but they were moving out of the area. So I had to go to another dentist. Since I have been going to this dentist, he is very expensive. He told me a crown would be $1089.20, that is more than double. All his thing are more than double.
Hi Rose. And is the new dentist one of our providers? We see this happen from time to time. Sometimes dentists will recommend a different type of crown – one that is not included on our fee schedule. You can always ask him if there is another crown on our fee schedule that would be comparable to the one he’s recommending. Oftentimes there is.
Please send me notice on my renewal of my 1dental.com
I’m looking into this. I apologize for the delayed response. Have you still not received anything from us? You can also email us at customercare@1dental.com whenever you have questions!
Great piece of article Natasha. This kind of post helps to educate people to understand the importance of visiting your dentist every 6 months. The prices is the second thing, it might be overwhelming when the dental staff discuss you with the possible cost but you can always compare it with the other dental clinic. Through that you can decide who gives quality and reasonable prices.
I’m enrolled. I’m now a senior, is there a difference in benefits?
Hi Debbie, thanks for asking! We don’t actually have different rates for seniors for our plans. You can talk to your dentist when you’re using your plan and see if there are any additional discounts for you there. Sometimes dental offices have a senior discount special.