There is a first time for everything. This is the first time I have fired my dentist…read more
Note: I recommend reading all the 1 star reviews, they are consistent with my review. No business is perfect, but when you have a cancerous culture that does not cherish the client relationship it shows. This is an example of just that, at least the front of house.
The reality is the actual work of dentistry is fine in this establishment. It's the admin, front desk, customer service, lack of availability, and difficulty of being a client that leaves a lot to be had. Not to mention when or if you fire them how difficult they will be when it comes to moving your dental records to your next dentist. It was very frustrating to be a patient at times given that this is the way they choose to do business.
My wife and I were patients since we moved to Austin in 2017. The quality of the dental work is fine.
The front of office is a 1 out of 10 at its worst and a 5 out of 10 on average.
I am sure the practice will have some response that will paint us as unreasonable clients, but here are my key issues:
1. If your teen has an appointment (simple cleaning) , they will not see them unless the parent is present, we had an issue where my wife was single parenting for the week while I was on a business trip and found out after she had dropped my son off for his appointment and took my other son to school that this was their policy. Fair enough, except for the fact that by the time my wife got back, 15 minutes late, they canceled his appointment, for a policy they enforced and communicated after the fact. The biggest issue was not the policy, but how the staff treated my wife through this situation, and the fact that when my wife alerted the dentist to the incident she sided with her staff and never got back to my wife regarding the incident. Not acceptable for any business owner.
2. My dentist (Dr Heggen) only works 2 days a week, so if you have any near term issues, IE major tooth pain, you may have to wait weeks , like 4 or 5 to get in to see the dentist, not great if you can't chew or have major tooth pain. In my situation, I had a filling put in in March by my dentist that was hurting for months that they tried to adjust and was still off, and I had major issues as the pain increased. I tried to schedule to have it looked at given they had done the work, however had major issues getting in to see my dentist given the lack of availability, regardless of the fact that I could only chew in one side of my mouth. Not great.
3. When you leave they will refuse to send your actual digital records to your new dentist , isn't it 2024????? This will cause your next dentist to either have them sent via snail mail or you will have to physically pick them up yourself. Also they will not release records to your new dentist, just to you. It's completely ridiculous. Also new dentist will have to more than likely do an entire set of new XRays since paper XRays are not as clear as the digital real ones. This was absurd, but not off brand for the behavior we experienced which caused us to leave.
4. Lastly, even after being a patient for 7 years they mispronounced my wife's name. A small issue but again consistently on brand for why this place is not great.
A side note I went to my new dentist and had the opposite experience with front of house. Friendly, proactive, super nice, went out of their way to make things easy. Reminded me what really good service and a great client experience is supposed to be.