Pricing a private consultation
Cost sets the floor of a consultation price and perception sets the ceiling. Work out the floor here with your own numbers, then read why the ceiling is set somewhere else entirely.
A consultation carries two costs. The clinician's time, and a share of everything that keeps the clinic open around it. Add a margin the clinic can live on and you have the lowest defensible price. The defaults here describe a small private clinic. Set your own numbers and the page recalculates as you move each control.
30 minutes at £100 an hour is £50 of clinician time. Overhead at 40 percent takes the cost floor to £70. A 30 percent margin on top suggests a price of £100.
Cost sets the floor and nothing more. Perceived value sets the ceiling, and perception is built by positioning, stated outcomes and the experience around the appointment. Patients buy the outcome, not the minutes, which is why clinics that invest in those things price above the arithmetic on this page and sustain it. Price below the floor and the clinic subsidises every patient. Price at the floor and it merely survives. The room above it belongs to clinics that give the market a reason to pay.
Questions about the assumptions
Why is cost only the floor?
Because price communicates value before the consultation happens. Two clinics can carry identical costs and sustain very different prices, and the difference is perception. The arithmetic on this page tells you the lowest price that keeps the clinic viable, not the price the market will bear.
What does the overhead percentage include?
Everything the consultation consumes beyond the clinician's time. Rent, reception, insurance, equipment, software, billing and the unbooked gaps in the diary. Forty percent is a reasonable starting point for a small private clinic, but your accounts will give you the real figure.
Why does discounting damage a clinic brand?
A discount tells the market the original price was not real, and patients who arrive on price tend to leave on price. It fills slots this month and lowers the reference point for every month after. Holding the price and raising the perceived value, through outcomes, environment and follow-up, protects both the diary and the brand.