Seven London dental practices.
The same question, on the same day.
I called each one as a new patient asking about a single implant.
Then I scored every call against the same 7-stage framework.
I phoned seven private dental practices in and around London on one afternoon in April 2026. Every call was the same: a new patient, no previous records, told by another dentist that he needs a single implant, asking what it costs and how it works.
No practice knew it was being measured. Nothing was staged and nothing was edited. Every call was then scored against a fixed 7-stage framework, 0–5 per stage — the same framework used on 25 practices in an earlier study. The rubric, with every anchor written out, is here.
Practices are lettered A to G. Names, staff names and locations are withheld deliberately, including for the two that did well.
| Practice | Greeting | Stages 2–7 | Overall | Took contact |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | 3 | 0.2 | 0.6 | No |
| B | 3 | 0.3 | 0.7 | No |
| C | 3 | 0.7 | 1.0 | No |
| D | 2 | 1.8 | 1.9 | No |
| E | 3 | 2.8 | 2.9 | No |
| F | 4 | 3.7 | 3.7 | Yes |
| G | 4 | 3.7 | 3.7 | Yes |
The same shape appeared in an earlier sample of 25 practices in a different country: greeting 3.4, everything after it 1.7. Different market, different language, different way of paying for dentistry. Same failure, in the same place.
Short extracts, in the patient's words and the practice's. Nothing is paraphrased.
No price was given. No question was asked. The caller was handed a different phone number and the call ended.
A patient enquiring about several thousand pounds of treatment was asked to dial a second number himself. He never did.
Four separate figures were quoted before anyone asked which tooth it was. The patient added them up himself, said the total out loud, and then said it was expensive.
The objection was stated out loud, in plain English, by a patient who was asking how to pay. The practice does offer finance. It was never mentioned. No name was taken and the call ended.
The caller volunteered two things without being asked: that he had just moved to London, and that he was nervous. Neither was acknowledged.
A new arrival with no dentist, saying he is anxious, is the easiest patient in dentistry to keep for twenty years. He was answered with a description of a procedure. The implant price he was given was "starting from four thousand" with nothing after it.
The best explanation of the seven. One inclusive price, the consultation deposit refunded against treatment, finance terms, a discount for paying in full, and a proper check that it had landed.
Everything up to that point was done well. Then a patient who had just said the offer sounded good was asked to do the remembering, the deciding and the dialling. No name, no number, no follow-up.
The first question after hello was the patient's name. Then why he was calling, which tooth, and whether it hurt — before any price was discussed.
This practice quoted the highest price of the seven. It is also one of only two that still had a way to reach the patient after he hung up.
The only practice that raised an additional cost before the patient could discover it later and feel misled.
Four questions no other practice asked. This call also ended without a booking — but with an email address, a promise to send surgeon profiles, and a reason for the patient to open it.
Every practice answered the phone politely. Every receptionist was accurate about the prices in front of her. Nobody was rude, nobody was unhelpful, nobody made a mistake anyone would notice.
Three callers said the price was expensive out loud. Two got a real answer about paying monthly. One was told it would be explained at the consultation.
Two practices asked what had brought the patient to them. Five did not. Two asked which tooth. Five did not.
And the same patient, asking the same question on the same afternoon, was quoted £1,700 by one practice and around £5,000 by another. Both are private practices in the same city treating the same missing tooth.
The two practices that scored highest are also the two that finished the call still able to contact him. That is not a coincidence, and it is the cheapest thing on this page to fix.
None of this needs new patients, new marketing or new equipment. Every one of these callers had already found the practice, already picked up the phone, and already said what he wanted to buy.
What is missing is a written standard for the call, and someone checking whether it was followed. That is what I build. But the measurement comes first.
Review 14 days of inbound call recordings from one of your practices. Score every new-patient call against the same 7-stage framework. Return a written breakdown with the calls that were lost, what was said, and what each one was worth.
The recordings, and your average case value. Nothing else.
The breakdown within 7 days, and a number.
Nothing. If the number doesn't justify the time it took you to send the files, I'll say so and go away.
Say so, and I'll call one of your practices myself as a patient and send you that breakdown instead — exactly as I did for the seven on this page. Same framework, nothing required from you.
Run this on one of my practices