Q.
Hi Dr Tennet Apologies in adavance for the length of this email. At 03.52am I start my day (my brain seems to work at high optimum frequency at this time of the morning) (-:) Q 1. Out of the 9 Panel Experts only 2 indicate Treatment Fees (yourself & Dr Butt) on their website whlist the remaining 6 don’t. I then deduce from this that approx 80% (2/9)of your Panel of Experts are embrassed to show their fee’s for some unknown reason, please correct me if there is another reason? Please can you confirm whether this behaviour is reflected across the entire Private Dental Market in the UK as a whole? Q.2 As Panels of experts should you not all lead by Example by ensuring that the “The Price Marker Act of 2004” (http://www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si2004/20040102.htm) is adherred too? Q.3 Having spoken to Consumer Direct I understand that any Dentist that is NOT displaying their Treatment Fees (not to be confused with a Treatment Plan) to Customers will can be referred to Trading Standards who in turn will visit to confirm if the is Law is being broken by that Dentist in question and consequently they can face Criminal Charges and a Fine. Is it then right to classify that Dental Practice as poor in Customer Service? Q.4 In 8 January 2009, the following website I understand will be launched www.dentalpricecheck.com by a Canary Wharf highflier who has as I understand financed ten millions pounds of his own money and has ingeniously captered the details of over 10,000 Private Dentists and their Treatment Fees which people can search online similar to comparison websites (he has over 600,000 Treatment Fees). One of the good deeds he will be doing is sharing Treatment Fees with the Office of Fair Trading for any unfair pricing and Consumers Groups such as the likes of Which Magazine and Consumer Advice Bureau. What are your views on this from the Consumers perspective and what are the positives and negatives from the dentist point of view? Q.5 What reasons would you or would you not classify the above website as a Champion of the Consumers website? Look forward to your comments and that of your Panel of Experts. Kind Regards