Is anyone charging a pattern fee at the wholesale lab or retail optical level? Or did that go the way of the dodo with digital files?
Is anyone charging a pattern fee at the wholesale lab or retail optical level? Or did that go the way of the dodo with digital files?
It went bye bye butterfly with the digital age!
On a side note... I remember the old days of cutting those stupid plastic patterns by hand and it sucked... I don't care what the charge was for that... it wasn't enough.
A pattern fee is just a way to penalize someone for using their own frame.
yup... although back in the olden days, the 1900's (as my daughter says) it wasn't uncommon to charge since they had to cut the patterns. But now, I know a lot of offices do a charge for use your own frame, which I think is not cool.Originally Posted by CME4SPECS
Mechanical and optical tracers to digitize shapes have come a long way from the punch style pattern makers.
I’m old enough to remember hand tracing, cutting and refining plastic patterns.
That said, there are still enough poorly shaped “nylor” pofs that even the best tracers cannot fix. That is when the fee comes in handy. A good technicians’ time is valuable. Why give it away for free?
Don’t forget about the labor required to remove, clean and trace. Optical tracers often require a high contrast black edge to capture the trace, as well as, as solid 180. All that takes labor time.
I bend light. That is what I do.
I don't. But I do know when I have to assemble say a silhouette drilled rimless on an Eye Med or VSP order, a non-discountable $20 "Assembly fee" is justified. Otherwise rather than create a fee I just juice a charge or two hear or there on the order.
Like the lensmanmd I too, many times, hand traced and cut with a heavy duty scissor a pattern blank and shaped it on the side of my trusty ancient sandstone wheel. Which is also good for rounding a snipped to shorten metal temple.
Is this in addition to a drill mount fee? We charge for drilling and grooving regardless of new frame or own frame. (just like the lab charges us)
Yes. If they keep their frames I tell them about the charge and I've never lost a job for it.
Drilling fee $85.
Assembly fee $20.
PITA fee scaled to degree of pain.
Wow! I might have to do some fee adjustments. We now participate with Davis and notice that some of their new service record forms actually list drilling and other stuff like slab offs. Our prices are less. Might have to rethink that.
I charge for patient own frame. When I sell complete glasses I will need to do a fair bit of adjusting, but that's part of the price of the frame. When I use a POF, I often have to do MORE. The frames are totally out of shape and need to realigned, they're filthy and need to be cleaned, the nose pads are hurting and need adjusted, of course they want new nose pads while I'm at it, the acetate eyewire is rolled and I need to reshape it, the figure 8 is torn out and I need to replace it, temple tips covers are chewed (dog, baby, adult, who knows?) and of course I'll replace them, drill mount complete disassembly and reassembly and supplying bushings...
POFs are a PIA compared to new frames and require professional service that customers cannot do on their own. That is service worth charging for.
You guys have definitely opened my eyes about this. You are right... they are a pain compared to a new frame. Although I inspect frames before letting the patient order new lenses. If it's really bad, I tell them and they almost never use the frame. It's always at own risk. Hmmm just some stuff for me to ponder. Definitely changing some of our fees
I like DanLiv's take.
DanLiv: what if the POF is the one they purchased from you years ago?
We do not charge a fee for any pof previously purchased from us, including drills. If it’s in our database, no fee. If it’s not, fee applies.
I bend light. That is what I do.
I agree with everything you said. I would not call that a pattern fee, I absolutely charge for all you said. ALA CARTE!
We've always allowed POF but try to be selective. Even so, we had two break at the lab in the last month after not remembering a single frame breaking for 3+ years.
The worst aspect of it is the sad frames sitting on the shelf that won't get a new home because of it.
I try to recognize the value in doing something that many other places will not do. It also saves the patient money. It may become much more common in the near future as the economy does what it will do.
Last edited by orangezero; 06-21-2022 at 03:34 PM.
It's charged for every POF, ever if they bought it last year. Even a well-treated year-old frame is going to need more reconditioning than a new frame.
Here's two other things the POF fees do for me:
1) Some lenses are polished, some are grooved, some are notched, some are drilled. It's a lot easier for my opticians to unilaterally apply, and my customers to understand, a single fee for every POF, rather than calculating individual fees case by case for the aforementioned. One fee and in the long run it all evens out.
2) tying into our discussion here drk https://www.optiboard.com/forums/sho...waiver-for-POF the POF fee can also cover your costs on broken frames. Even if you want to start by charging a mere pittance of $10, if you do 1000 pairs a year and even a quarter are POFs, that's $2,500 that you can earmark for nosepads, screws, temple tip covers, and replacement frames that opticians break. If you think of those costs as being covered by this pool of fees, it's no longer an aggravation to spend on those things. You an spend you time on other things.
If you fret the nickels and dimes, you'll inevitably miss some and end up short nickels and dimes. If you $0.25 everybody, you'll rest easier and probably have extra nickels and dimes in the end too.
DanLiv is wise.
Alternatively you can raise your frame prices by $3.33 and get the same $2500 at the end of the 1000 pairs. Or raise your lens price by $2.50 and come out the same. There are as many ways to do it as there are opticians.
Wow. That's a deep thought. Where the money comes from is immaterial.
So it boils down to whether you want to charge the patient explicitly, or implicitly.
Yes you are both absolutely correct, dollars are dollars. Here are some reasons other than $ I chose to go with a POF fee:
1. I like charging only the patients that use the service
2. My frame and lens fees are reduced by insurance, my POF fee is not. My private payers don't end up paying more than my insured customers
3. Easy reports track exactly how many POFs I've done as well as the exact $ I've brought in from them. Seeing that $$ pool will calm you next time you break an Oakley drk!
4. I only added one line item to my management system, I didn't have to change hundreds of price tags or adjust dozens of item fees. (I'll probably never change my frame prices just because I don't want to re-tag!)
5. I can very easily raise, lower, waive or otherwise modify the fee on a per-customer basis. E.g. for a high wrap shelf-beveled Oakley I would double the fee
+1
I bend light. That is what I do.
Just my two cents. Like I said, different stroke for different folks. Different stores, different settings, different pricing structures. No right way to do things. The only right way to do it, is whatever works for our own stores. I don't line item anything, other than photochromatics, clips and prism. I have hard time line iteming a $10 fee on a $600 pair of lenses.
Progressive lens RT - $300.00
Progressice lens LT - $300.00
POF fee - $10.00
Doesn't look right to me. As a consumer I would look at this and say "wow I just spent $600 on new lenses and they are going to nickel and dime me $10 bucks"
If I bought a $1000 custom suit from a tailor and I see a $20 dry cleaning and pressing fee on the receipt, it just wouldn't sit right with me.
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