Family Dental Insurance

You can obtain a dental plan for your entire family for less than $12 a month. The plan can potentially save you 40-60% on your current dental expenses.

Many of you are used to a typical health insurance model for medical care. You have copays for doctors and prescriptions and a deductible for the big stuff.

Family dental insurance does not follow this model and continues to be a great disappointment.

If you had a family dental plan 15 years ago, the annual caps on the plan were probably around $1,000 per person per year. Now roll the calendar foward and quadruple the cost of dental care and guess what? The plans still have caps of around $1,000 per person.

What happend? Why do these plans defy economic sensibility? It is really quite simple. The cost of administration has gone up dramatically along with dental care. Inflation also took its toll. A crown and root canal can easily cost you $1500 to $1800. You can plow through a $1,000 worth of dentistry in a blink of an eye.

The insurance companies want to make money and paying for thousands of dollars of dental treatment would force them to charge you a fortune for dental insurance. So, they kept the benefits more or less constant and kept the price down.

If you don't need a lot of expensive dental work, this arrangement is fine. If you do need a couple of root canals and crowns, you are stuck with most of the bill.

We do have some answers to this problem, so read on.

First, it gets worse

When I was a child, my family dentist cleaned, filled and pulled teeth, made bridges, etc. They provided almost all dental services for the entire family. Children and adults went to the same dentist. Specialist were rare and considered an extreme measure.

Now, the kids go to pediodontist, the wisdom teeth are extracted by an oral surgeon and we have the endodontist, periodontist and so forth.

To summarize so far, premiums and dental costs went up each year and the benefit has stayed the same. The average family is responsible for more and more of the cost of their dental care and most families don't even have any dental insurance at all. Just hold on I am getting to the solutions.

Hope Springs Eternal

Don't get depressed, it is not as bad as it sounds. You just have to have realistic expectations and take advantage of the plans that are available. As I mentioned on the home page, don't expect to pay twenty bucks a month and have someone pay you for $5,000 of dentistry. You and I know it will never happen. But there are family dental insurance plans that can really help.

I go into a much longer explanation about each type of plan on separate pages on this site. But just to review I will list some of the information here. Use the link on each topic to get deeper into it. Believe me, it is not rocket science. Third grade arithmetic is the only prerequisite.

Here are some choices:

1. Indemnity Dental Plans - These plans have two parts to them.

The first is a discount option that will give you a PPO rate at various network dentists. You do not have to use specific dentists but staying in network will save you money.

The second part is a schedule of dental procedures. Each procedure has a dollar value associated with it. This is the amount you will be reimbursed. In other words, you pay your dentist, submit your receipt and the plan pays you. They will pay you up to $1,000 per person per year. These plans are somewhat expensive but if you need a lot of dental work over a period of a few years, you will get back more than you pay.

Major work, the expensive stuff, is not covered right away. That is why I mentioned that if you need a lot of work over a period of a few years the plans will work for you. Otherwise, stick to a good discount plan.

NOTE: I might be able to provide a group indemnity plan with as few as two employees. It can be a husband and wife working together. You will get more benefit for less money.

2. PPO Dental Insurance Plans - It is the same old story. Your dentist office tells you that they only take PPO plans. Find a ppo dental plan and you are in business. What they did not tell you is that there is really no such thing as an individual or family ppo dental plan. You are back to square one.

For more info go to our PPO Dental Insurance Page

3. Discount Dental Plans - can save you a considerable amount on your dental bills and I speak from experience. You want to be sure that the company is not one of these multilevel marketing plans that would let Charles Manson sell plans from prison. The company we represent is moving towards allowing only licensed, regulated insurance agents handle their products. Here is how the plans work:

You must go to one of the providers in the network. Although, you can change providers at any time. The network dentist charges you a reduced fee for most dental procedures. Specialist are usually discounted and this includes orthodontists. An entire family can often get coverage for $12 a month. Some plans include free cleanings, x-rays and exams. If you would like to see what plans are available in your area, go to our special discount dental plan web site.