At VEW there was talk of a change of VSP policy to reimburse for edging VSP jobs, and a change in policy toward breakages produced thereby. What have you heard about this lately? Do any of you who edge in-house do VSP jobs? As I understand it, you get no income, and have to eat your own breakages. Is that correct? Is that changing? Thanks for the info.
Its funny you bring that up as our lab just learned the hard way. A dispenser at the docs office ordered uncuts by accident so we figured we'd go along with it and do the work. According to the doc they didn't reimburse anything for the lab work. Just standard pay out to the VSP lab who suppllied the uncuts. Needless to say he is making sure that ordering accident doesn't happen again.
Pez:D
With the ridiculously high remake rates that labs have always had to absorb, this doesn't surpise me a bit. I know VSP is a different monster than a regular lab but...
There's only so much one can eat at their own expense. I predict in the near future that more labs will follow suit and charge back all remakes to the customer.
It's not just the material costs to consider. Don't forget the time in administration, processing labor and shipping costs both ways -all for free to the customer.
Bottom line is...other than non-adapts which will happen periodically, we can certainly do a better job in controlling bad measurements and terrible dispensing.
In fact, I wouldn't be at all surprised that if we had to cover our own remake costs, the remake rate would drop to less than 1%.
Actually, I was thinking strictly of remakes persuant to in-house edging/drilling/mounting. Would VSP offer a discount (less than 100%) on the replacement uncuts? None of that matters if VSP doesn't pay us something for doing the benchwork in the first place.Originally Posted by eyemanflying
Why would you carry all the liability upon yourself in edging their lenses and get nothing for it??
Too simplistic, IMHO. Believing the above would be like saying all the "first-prescribed" prescription drugs' efficacy would improve if the doctors had to "pay" for any med changes the patient subsequently needed to obtain the desired result/relief.
The difference in optical is that the position on the food chain of the lab/lens maunfacturer is currently analogous to the medical insurers.
Maybe this is a contributing reason why health insurance costs are so high?
It's humans, on both side of the desk, and it's definately *not* all a science..
FWIW
Barry
Maybe this is another good reason to not accept VSP
Since VSP took away the dispensing fee for patient's using their own frame we no longer ask the VSP lab to send uncuts. We have asked them to if it's a remake and a change in frame. If you choose to do the work in your own lab (really why would you?) then if you screw up the lenses the lab offers you the same discount they would any of their customers because at that point it is a private transaction between you and the VSP lab.
Just say NO to Drugs and oh yes, doing VSP in house! Several years ago we played around with uncits for POF jobs to do our patients a "favor" and not have them be without their glasses for a few days. Not only do you bear the breakage expense if it happens but we found our patients didn't show their appreciation much and of course then you are obligated to do it every time for that patient, since you did them such a "favor" last time. On top of everything else it seems to promote the idea that it's OK to get by with a single pair of glasses. Not smart. IMHO.
Chris Beard
The State of Jefferson !
I'm a Medford man – Medford, Oregon. Up in Medford, we take our time making up our minds."
What Chris said and I wanted to see what the new format looks like when I reply.
hmmm- need to find my smilies---
I like VSP, but....
VSP is a discount plan, so they won't get the turnaround time as a cash patient. If you want to use your own frame, it goes to the VSP lab and patient waits. If you want to pay regular price, we can edge it in house. You get what you pay for.
The VSP regional network plans (fancy name for medicaid) let you use your own lab. Signature plan doesn't. I do OK with the regional network plan because most want just what the insurance covers and I do pretty well with single vision in a value line frame edged in house. Sometimes I think of glasses like Pizza, the plain has the better profit margin, adding anchovies just doesn't help that much.
Harry
Well, exactly! Historically, edging VSP jobs has no upside, and a possible downside, as breakages do happen. I heard that was about to change. The people saying this the loudest were edger and bench-room suppliers. We don't have a benchroom in this practice, since we have so much third-party, especially VSP. I'd love to get back to doing my own work, and a policy change from VSP might make that profitable. Again, has anyone heard of an upcoming change of policy?
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