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Most practices offer financing. Far fewer present it in a way that changes decisions. The gap between "we have financing available" mentioned at the end and financing woven into the cost conversation is worth real cases.
When a consult doesn't convert, price is the reason patients give most often — though it frequently masks uncertainty about outcome or surgeon. Either way, an affordability path removes one of the two barriers, and it's the one you can address on the spot.
Financing introduced only after a patient hesitates reads as a concession. Financing presented alongside the total, as one of two standard ways people pay, reads as information. Same product, materially different response.
Offering a soft-credit pre-qualification during scheduling means the patient arrives knowing their budget. That changes the consultation — you're discussing which procedure fits rather than whether anything is possible.
Practical considerations: approval rates across credit tiers, what the practice pays in merchant fees, funding speed, whether soft-credit pre-qualification is available, and how the patient experience feels. Many practices carry two lenders with different underwriting profiles to widen approvals.
Merchant fees are real and vary meaningfully. Model them into your case margin rather than treating financing as free.
Consumer credit advertising is regulated. If you promote specific rates or terms, additional disclosures are typically triggered. Deferred-interest products in particular need to be explained accurately — patients who don't understand the deferred-interest mechanism and later face retroactive charges become complaints and negative reviews. Keep the lender's compliant language and don't paraphrase it.
Coordinators should be able to move from total cost to monthly figure smoothly, explain what pre-qualification does and doesn't affect, and handle a declined application without embarrassing the patient. That last one matters — a graceful decline preserves the relationship and sometimes the case at a later date.
Track what share of cases use financing, approval rate by lender, and whether financed cases close at a different rate than cash. If almost nobody is using it, the problem is presentation, not the product.
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