Orthodontist

[luvsJack]

DD will be seeing an orthodontist for the first time next week. Her regular dentist said she will need braces and a dentist that comes to the school and does a quick check on the kids said she will need braces.

For those of you that have children with braces--what kind of payment options did you have? I know all orthodontist will be different, but I am just trying to be a bit prepared.

My sil, her daughter and her son have all had braces and she said it was about $5000 each (her part and her insurance). Our insurance will only pay $1000. So I am looking at at least $4000.

Do most have payment plans or some kind of financiing or something? I am thinking surely they must?

Or maybe I am thinking of it all wrong. I was assuming, you go for the intial visit. If its determined that the child needs braces, you go back and get them on in one visit and "boom" you owe $4000. Is it more of a process than that? If so, then the amount due each time would be spilt up a bit more anyway.

I have no problem paying so much a month or every few weeks or whatever, just not $4000 all at one time.

 

[scrapquitler]

Our orthodontist gave us several options for payment (all interest free).
I don't remember exactly, but it was something like this:
pay all of the fee upfront, get a 15% discount
pay 50% upfront, get a 10% discount
pay 25% upfront, get a 5% discount,
then you could pay the balance over 24 months in monthly installments.

My daughter has had her braces for just about a year, and they are ready to come off, but we will still be paying for another year

 

[mjkacmom]

All 5 of mine will get braces - dd14 has them on, and has been going to the orthodontist since she was 10. For her, I had to pay $850 for her expanders, and then started an interest free payment plan once they put them on 2 years ago. She goes about every 6 weeks or so for adjustments. The total cost is $6500, and insurance pays $1500. There was a discount for paying upfront, but we decided to go with the medical flex spending route. Ds12 has only lost about 10 baby teeth, as has dd9, so they go (for free) every 6 months.

I think I'll be done paying for dd14's braces before they're even off (again, late teethers). I pay $160 a month. I'm hoping to be done with hers before I start the next 2 kids.

 

[Christine]

First of all, shop around. Get several quotes. I got three quotes. One was $5300, one was $5000, and one was $3700. They all were doing the SAME thing. The two expensive orthos had very nice offices, gaming computers/devices for the kids, and icee machines in the office. Sorry, don't need that.

My ortho had me make a downpayment of about $300 when we made our contract. I think had an interest free, montly payment over 2 years. Not all orthos offer that. Some will give you a monthly payment but they add finance charges that make it not worth it. Others will give a discount if you pay up front.

 

[N&B'smom]

My DS just got them on this past Tuesday (boy, what fun, still isn't eating anything he has to chew).

Anyway....we had the option to pay in full with a discount, pay monthly payments through an outside source (Chase I think) or put a deposit down and pay monthly payments each month that would automatically be taken out of whatever credit card or bank account we chose. (the last was done directly through the office, no outside source and no interest)

 

[Disney Ella]

I have two kids in braces and the cost is $5,200 each. Insurance covers $1500 for each of them and then since the orthodontist participates in our dental plan, he knocked another $500 off the price. We had to pay $600 per kid up front and now pay $150 per month ($75 per child) for 20 months.

 

[mamamary]

First of all, shop around. Get several quotes. I got three quotes. One was $5300, one was $5000, and one was $3700. They all were doing the SAME thing. The two expensive orthos had very nice offices, gaming computers/devices for the kids, and icee machines in the office. Sorry, don't need that.

My ortho had me make a downpayment of about $300 when we made our contract. I think had an interest free, montly payment over 2 years. Not all orthos offer that. Some will give you a monthly payment but they add finance charges that make it not worth it. Others will give a discount if you pay up front.

Yes get several quotes. The most expensive Ortho had all gaming devices in the waiting room too - not paying extra for that. Anyway we did get three different quotes for the same work.

We had a downpayment (I think around $500). Then we got on a plan to pay x amount for 12 months. It was interest free.

 

[dawson5]

I would talk with friends, look at the finished result, are they happy. You can get cheaper prices, but at what cost? Our neighbor researched and thought she had a good dentist. He is/was well-known in the community, the difference was that parents who had used him 20 years ago were happy with the results. People that had used him recently, they are not happy. She is now taking her daughter to Indianapolis to correct what that orthodontist did.

 

[cruisnfamily]

We got three quotes which were all within $200 of each other. We decided on the one we liked the best and have been happy with him. Our final cost $5200

You could pay upfront for a small discount (like 5%)
Or monthly interest free debits out of your bank acount for any term up to 2 years.
I think they also had some financing company type of option but we were not interested in that so I didn't look into the details.

We paid $1,000 up front. Our dental insurance paid $1,500. Then we paid $150 per month for 18 months. We were done paying before the braces were off. We were not required to put that much down at all, we just wanted to get it paid as quicklyy as possible so we chose to do it that way. We could also have taken 24 months to pay but we chose 18.

 

[luvsJack]

Thanks for the responses. The one I have an appointment with is the ortho my sil used but I can see from their website that the price may be for a few "extras" like a kid-friendly office. I think after we see her, I will get an appointment with at least one more.

DD's teeth aren't terribly bad but I think its starting to bother her that they are crooked. Both of ther brothers have perfectly straight teeth (without having had braces) and she is always saying something about why she doesn't have their straight teeth.

 

[SpecialK]

I have two in braces. When I was initially looking, I got quotes from three offices. All were within a few hundred dollars of each other. I went with the orthodontist who uses the Smart Smile System - supposed to be less painful adjustments and quicker results because wires are not hand-adjusted. That also happened to be the office with the games and nice waiting room.

All the offices offered a payment plan and a discount for paying up front.

One thing I also looked at was the office staff. I talked to one woman who was so curt and rude I knocked that office off the list. No way was I going to deal with that for the next four years.

 

[tvguy]

We had a choice of payments of $125 a month, or pay up front and get a 20% discount.
I dipped into savings and paid cash and made the payments to my savings account. No point having money sit in the bank earning 3% interest (at the time today it would be about point 5 %) when it could cut 20% off the total cost.

 

[mjkacmom]

We had a choice of payments of $125 a month, or pay up front and get a 20% discount.
I dipped into savings and paid cash and made the payments to my savings account. No point having money sit in the bank earning 3% interest (at the time today it would be about point 5 %) when it could cut 20% off the total cost.

20%! We were only offer 5%, so we decided that medical flex spending was the way to go.

 

[JVL1018]

My kids haven't started braces yet, but I had braces myself a few years ago.
The ortho was totally no frills, didn't take credit cards, was an older guy, but he was good.
Mine was $1000 from insurance, $1000 down payment and $125/month for 18 months. (18 months was the original time I was supposed to have them on-it ended up being 27 months)
No extra % for doing payments instead of paying it all at once. The price was the price.
I'm taking my kids to the same ortho when the time comes.

 

[cruisnfamily]

Thanks for the responses. The one I have an appointment with is the ortho my sil used but I can see from their website that the price may be for a few "extras" like a kid-friendly office. I think after we see her, I will get an appointment with at least one more.

DD's teeth aren't terribly bad but I think its starting to bother her that they are crooked. Both of ther brothers have perfectly straight teeth (without having had braces) and she is always saying something about why she doesn't have their straight teeth.

Really, I kind of think all the offices are pretty kid friendly with video games and such.

I was very concerned with price but all the places were about the same so we ended up going with the Dr we liked best who also happened to have a kid friendly office but it didn't cost any more than the ones that didn't have kid friendly stuff.

 

[aprilgail2]

20%! We were only offer 5%, so we decided that medical flex spending was the way to go.

I did flex spending too-- made 2 payments of 1800.00 one the first Jan and one the second January.

 

[tiggerlover]

DS's brace were about $5000. He started seeing the orthodontist about two years before he needed the braces because he needed some extra work. He had to have some teeth pulled (by his regular dentist) and then have space maintainers put in until he was ready for the braces. My insurance covered $1500, we put $1000 down and pay $140 a month until they are paid off. The $5000 included the two year pre-work, the braces and all office visits.

 

[Nonie12]

Oh geez! These prices are so big! It's hard to think that right now I'm pregnant w/ first child and in about 10 yrs. I might be needing to look in to getting them. I hope that prices go down by then. I remember when I got my braces. My mom was shocked! I can't belive that soon she'll be granny!

 

[Nonie12]

Oh geez! These prices are so big! It's hard to think that right now I'm pregnant w/ first child and in about 10 yrs. I might be needing to look in to getting them. I hope that prices go down by then. I remember when I got my braces. My mom was shocked! I can't belive that soon she'll be granny!

Good thing we have a little thing called insurance that will cover it if we need them.

 

[luv2nascar]

dd has braces. We paid $450 month she got impressions. Next month paid $450 when she got her spacers in month later got braces. We pay $110 month for 24 mos. I think that makes her braces around $$3700
She'll have them on a little over two years. It will be two year in March.