Problems in practice

Problems will happen. It’s how you deal with them that makes all the difference.

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I had an incident recently that really got me thinking about how important it is for any business to handle problems well.

We flew to Turkey and had paid our travel company for hotel transfers. We spent an hour waiting at the airport and then had to pay for a taxi because no one showed up.

It was pretty annoying.

I sent the company a request for a refund of what we paid for the transfer. 5½ weeks later, after 6 emails and a phone call we have received no refund, just fob offs and BS excuses.

The company has lost a regular customer over quite a trivial amount of money.

Problems will always happen even in the best run businesses. In a dental practice there can be problems with billing, treatment, waiting times, communication and many other things.

My experience made me realise something.

If you handle problems well you can actually enhance patient loyalty. If you handle them badly you can lose the patient or, even worse, wind up with an AHPRA complaint.

So, here are my suggestions to deal with problems:

1. Listen super well
   People who have had a problem want to be heard. Listen to them without cutting them off.

2. Apologise
   If something has gone wrong apologise and offer to rectify it immediately. Don’t give people the run around.

3. Do it ASAP
   Don’t make the patient wait 5 weeks. Fix the problem as soon as possible.

4. Give your staff discretion
   I gave my staff the discretion to spend up to $100 instantly to fix any valid patient problem.

5. Follow up
   Check in later with the patient to make sure that the problem is fixed and that they are happy.

6. A little extra
   Consider giving the patient a little extra gift to apologise for the inconvenience.

Do you have a system and rules for dealing with problems in your office?

If not, it would be a great topic for a future staff meeting.