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Professional Courtesy: Say Hello to Great Service by Thomas Giacobbi, DDS, Editorial Director, Dentaltown Magazine

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Say Hello to Great Service
by Thomas Giacobbi, DDS, FAGD, Editorial Director, Dentaltown Magazine
Did you hear the one about the dental office that increased business after it replaced the front office person? I have, too. In fact, everyone has probably heard this from a colleague at one point or another. The impression patients receive on the phone is not to be underestimated.

"Thank you for calling Chandler Dental Health. This is Dr. Tom." These are the words that existing or future patients might hear when they call my practice. I think most dentists would agree that the telephone is probably the most critical piece of office equipment in their practices. The dental profession functioned well before computers were ubiquitous, but the telephone has been available since the beginning.

Calling a business of any type and getting voicemail or some other automated phone tree is frustrating when you really want to speak with a human. When the two team members in my front office are occupied with checking a patient in/out or on another line with a call, the other team members in our practice are expected to answer the phone when it rings.

When I answer a call the reactions vary from, "I'm sorry, is the office closed?" to "What happened to the receptionists?" I tell everyone the same thing - they were busy on the other phone lines or with patients and I do not like calls going to voicemail. Everybody is impressed.

Once we are past the initial reaction, I find out why they called and about half the time it is something very simple: they are calling to confirm an appointment, verify an appointment time or ask a question. When the questions are clinical in nature I am often able to resolve the issue on the spot and perhaps avoid an unnecessary trip to the office or a phone message that would result in a return call later. Nowadays, when you call patients back, you don't always reach them on the first try.

What about patients who want to cancel or move an appointment? Doctors and support staff who are helping with the phones should know the practice management software well enough to accomplish these basic tasks. If the issue is too difficult to solve, I will put the person on hold for the front office. In many cases, by the time we have exchanged greetings and I have determined the reason for the call, the person in the front who was busy is now available. I will always relay the information I gathered from the caller on hold so there is a smooth transition. Never put a person on hold and let someone else get the call without passing along the information.

Have you ever listened to a recording of your front office team members on the phone? This is frequently referred to as a mystery call and it is a service offered by many consultants and trainers. I have attended training with Jay Geier's Scheduling Institute and this is a service it provides. In fact, its Five-Star Challenge is a free mystery call to rate the phone skills of your practice. Listening back to a phone call is no different than a football team watching film of its last game. There are lessons to be learned with this perspective of "outside looking in."

The next time opportunity calls your practice, answer the phone and then share your experience online in the comments section of this article. If you have a question that you would like me to answer in a future column, my e-mail is tom@dentaltown.com.

Dentaltown Magazine
September 2025
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