Fee Schedules 

Open Dental allows unlimited fee schedules. In the Main Menu, select Setup | Fee Schedules.

Double click or Add:

There is also a tool at the bottom called Check Ins Plan Fee Schedules.

Fee schedules are determined for each patient in the following order:

* Provider.  Every patient has a provider, and every provider should have a fee schedule. So if no other fee schedule is set for a patient or for the patient's insurance, then the provider fee schedule is used.

* Patient edit window has an option for a fee schedule.  This is rarely used.  It would not be used if the patient has insurance.  If present, it will override the provider fee schedule.

* Insurance Plan. Every insurance plan is typically assigned a fee schedule, and this fee schedule overrides the other two types above.

For ins plans, there are also two special types of fee schedules:

Allowed: These will only show in the Allowed list in the Insurance Plan. An allowed fee is the UCR that the insurance company allows.  When computing estimates, all percentages are based on this allowed amount instead of on the procedure fee. Blank amounts are ignored and will not change the estimates.  But allowed amounts of zero will result in an estimate of zero.  Allowed fee schedules can be automatically added to all Ins Plans by setting that option in Module Setup, Family Module section.

Copay: These will only show in the Copay list in the Insurance Plan. This is a way to override the patient portion of an insurance estimate. A copay fee schedule can have just a few fees on it, with the rest blank. Blank amounts will not affect ordinary insurance estimates.  But if the copay fee schedule has any amount including zero, then it will override ordinary insurance estimates.

If you set a fee schedule to be one of the two types above, it will not show in ordinary fee schedule lists.  See Insurance Plan Types for an explanation of how to use the copay and allowed fee schedules with different types of insurance.

The fees themselves are changed in the Procedure Code section.