Best Phone Systems for Dental Offices

Business phone systems offer dental offices secure voice-over-internet-protocol (VoIP) services with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) compliance assurances and advanced communications features needed for efficient operations. With a modern phone system, offices can set up automated reminders to keep preventive care patients aware of upcoming appointments. You can also send multimedia messaging service (MMS) notifications easily to ensure patients fill out their required forms ahead of time. With clear communications and reliability that typically exceeds 99.999 percent connectivity, VoIP platforms offer many advantages over their traditional landline counterpart.

The best business phone systems for dental offices provide clear audio across a multitude of devices, intuitive administrator tools and customer relationship management platform (CRM) integration to improve the customer experience. To help dentists and dental practice owners identify the right phone system for their needs, we’ve examined and tested dozens of VoIP business phone platforms. Our reviews are based on each provider’s communications features, price, ease of use, integrations and customer service. We’ve also provided the best use case to highlight each provider’s strongest features in a competitive industry with many similar offerings.

Most VoIP phone providers base their pricing on the number of user accounts with discounts available for businesses purchasing more than five accounts and annual subscribers. Based on our reviews, the average starting price for a single-user account is $15.25 per month.

At the top end in terms of available features and cost, the average monthly cost is $28.75 per user. While most providers offer a range of unlimited calling plans separated by different communication features, Zoom is one of the few providers to offer a pay-as-you-go calling plan starting at $10 per month for unlimited inbound calls with per-minute fees for outbound communications.

Add-ons are few and far between with business phone system providers. In most cases, add-ons are used to purchase additional toll-free numbers and international calling numbers. Instead, a solid assortment of essential features are typically included in entry-level plans with advanced features included in upper-tier plans. One service provider that goes against the industry standard is Vonage, which offers 18 paid add-on features and a separate API product, making it one of the most customizable options available.

The only other major expense to consider is the cost of purchasing optional IP-compatible office phones or VoIP adapters if you want to continue using your existing telephone hardware. As a cloud-based system, it’s possible to take and make phone calls from any internet-connected device including desktop computers, laptops, tablets and mobile phones. If you purchase new business VoIP phones from any of the major service providers, they’ll arrive preconfigured for your account. All you’ll need to do is plug them in and log in with the appropriate credentials.

With no hardware to manage, you won’t need to worry about installation costs. Implementation and system administration are considered relatively easy and don’t typically require the assistance of information technology (IT) staff. For dental offices with unique or complex requirements, professional implementation is available from most providers for an additional fee that requires a personal consultation.

Dental practices can benefit immensely from a reliable and HIPAA-compliant phone system with advanced calling features. Potential headaches are reduced with HIPAA-compliant accounts that have functionality guardrails to protect sensitive patient information. With available integrations, small practices can spend more time on patient care by setting automated reminders for regular checkups scheduled months ahead of time. Larger practices with multiple office locations can implement interactive voice response menus and advanced routing features to ensure patients, vendors and insurance companies can reach the right person quickly.

Small practices looking for a simple but effective phone system will likely find all of the calling features they need with an entry-level plan. Most plans at this level include basic calling features like caller ID, extension dialing, call menus, music on hold and unlimited domestic calling. It’s important to note that many features including SMS, verbatim audio capture and some chatbots and messaging channels are not HIPAA-compliant.

HIPAA Compliance

Fines for using non-HIPAA-compliant VoIP range from $100 to more than $1 million for the most serious offenses. To ensure you’re protecting sensitive patient information during communications, it’s important to find a HIPAA-compliant phone service provider. Most business phone service providers and all of the ones we’ve reviewed offer HIPAA-compliant services. Many have BAAs for medical and dental offices as well as limited functionality to ensure secure communication. This legal agreement outlines the service provider’s knowledge and responsibility to protect all patient data. Feature limitations may include disabling visual email, voicemail and texting.

Software Integrations

The ability to integrate your phone and CRM platforms opens a world of new opportunities to improve customer outcomes. Next to legal compliance, integrations are arguably the most valuable part of a modern phone system. Front office staff can provide personalized service to inbound callers thanks to immediate access to their previous visits, future appointments and account notes. Automated scheduling tools can send appointment reminders to patients for regular checkups or help ensure they’ve completed their required paperwork before the office visit. Integrations for CRMs and other business applications may require a middle-tier plan with some providers.

Video Communications

In addition to phone service, most business phone providers include free but limited video conferencing that may be ideal for virtual dentistry. As telehealth grows in the medical field with increasing visits for general practitioners, nurses and mental health specialists, more dental patients are seeking detailed advice outside of business hours. Many dental insurance providers, including Delta Dental, provide coverage for virtual dentist visits. With the right video and photo tools, dentists can evaluate and solve many oral issues and dental concerns. This can include identifying cavities, gum disease, chipped teeth and issues leading to pain and swelling.

IVR

IVR menus direct callers based on the answer they provide through the keypad or voice response. They help reduce the time front office staff fields repetitive questions, freeing them to focus on providing service to patients in the office and callers who require a personal touch. IVRs are easy to set up and manage through the administrator’s dashboard. Most dashboards include basic templates you can modify and set up wizards to help guide you through the implementation process. You can set custom rules for certain hours to ensure callers are always directed to the right place and able to reach a human in an emergency situation.

Analytics

The easiest improvements in business come from objective data highlighting areas in need of improvement. Basic call analytics included with most entry-level plans provide a clear path to incremental improvement in areas like customer wait times, efficient staff scheduling and missed calls. The advanced analytics included with many top-tier plans help simplify complex data with heat mapping tools to visualize data and spot trends in an instant. As a dentist, you can get a clear snapshot of your business at any point with real-time reporting on metrics, including call time, handle time, abandonments, answer speed and agent availability.

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Make a worry-free decision when selecting your next business phone system provider by following these five simple steps.

1. See what’s out there.

If you’ve been busy becoming your region’s best periodontist or oral surgeon, you probably haven’t paid close attention to the recent innovations and features available in today’s all-in-one communications platforms.

We recommend new shoppers spend some time reading online reviews to see how this product category has evolved in recent years. If it’s been a long time since you’ve switched to a new business phone service, you may be surprised by many of the AI-powered, time-saving features being added to communications platforms.

2. Define what you need.

Most business phone plans offer a similar list of features and competitive pricing. However, many of those features are spread differently across service providers, making it difficult to compare pricing in an apples-to-apples manner. Rather than sort through service tiers from different providers to find the right plan, we recommend making a list of your top communications requirements and features. Once you’ve taken the time to define your requirements, you’ll be able to find a phone system capable of serving you and your patients properly.

3. Schedule a demo.

As a long-term recurring expense, it’s important to find the right business phone provider. Most companies will work hard to turn you into a long-term customer, usually with a live demonstration. Although live demos are essentially a sales pitch, they still provide an opportunity to see all of the communications features in action with examples specific to your business needs.

4. Compare prices.

If you’ve made it through the first three steps, then you’ve narrowed down your search from dozens of phone service providers to a few final contenders. If all things seem about equal at this stage, feel free to let price dictate your decision. Be sure to pay special attention to potential overages, especially if you’re making international phone calls.

5. Start with monthly terms.

Before you make a long-term commitment to any provider, consider signing up for a monthly plan if possible. While annual plans come with discounts as high as 30 percent, they often include early cancellation fees equal to the full term’s price. After you’ve paid for your service for a month or two and you’re still satisfied, you can move to a discounted long-term plan and, hopefully, never think about changing your phone service provider again.

Modern VoIP phone platforms provide many advantages over traditional copper landline and on-premise private branch exchange systems. Today’s cloud-based systems deliver comprehensive communications services for secure voice calls, team messaging, MMS and video conferencing. You can typically access all of your communications features and tools on any internet-connected device including desktop computers, laptops, tablets, web browsers and mobile phones. Without any hardware to install or maintain, the systems are relatively easy and inexpensive to manage from your administrator’s dashboard. With integrations capable of connecting your VoIP phone system to the rest of your business applications, you can maintain a single source of information for all of your customer-touching data.

Cost

With the ability to combine many communications features and eliminate costly hardware installation and maintenance, VoIP phone systems are about 50 percent less expensive than older business phone technologies. While cloud-based systems include ongoing monthly fees, there are no added expenses to upgrade hardware or pay IT specialists to make changes to your system. In many instances, you can mix and match plans to provide some employees with more features at a higher cost while spending less on other employees who don’t require the same communications features and added expense.

Scalability

Cloud-based phone systems are highly flexible platforms that make it easy to implement and make changes as needed. Whether you’re adding a new employee, removing a phone line, updating the call menu or upgrading to a better plan, you can accomplish it from your administrator’s dashboard. Most dashboards are intuitive and designed with the first-time user in mind with installation wizards and easy-to-use templates for setting up your system. Once you’re up and running, it’s easy to make changes using the same guided menus to assist you at every step along the way.

Reliability

When VoIP technology was launched in the mid-1990s, it was limited by low-speed internet. However, modern broadband connections can deliver clear HD audio and video with near-perfect reliability. Even with inclement weather or power failures, you’ll still have access to your VoIP communications so long as you have a Wi-Fi or cellular signal. Most service providers advertise 99.999 percent reliability thanks to geographically diverse data centers that eliminate outages and scheduled downtime effectively. In many instances, you can find service-level agreements to guarantee zero downtime or service interruptions.

Improved customer service

All-in-one communications platforms offer a wide assortment of time-saving features that can improve customer outcomes. With CRM integrations available through most providers, you’ll have relevant patient information at your fingertips as soon as you answer an incoming call. Front office staff will be able to provide personalized service to returning patients. Other tools like automated MMS allow you to send reminder notifications about upcoming appointments and provide links to documents for new patients to complete.

Mobile access

From occasional emergency calls to full-time virtual dentistry, the ability to engage with patients and staff outside of the office is a major advantage for many dental practices. All of the business phone providers we’ve reviewed include free mobile apps for Android and iOS with every plan. Since calls come through the app, it’s easy to distinguish between business and personal calls on any mobile device. In most cases, the mobile experience and functionality are nearly identical to their desktop and web browser counterparts. Many providers offer features like call flip that let you move calls between devices seamlessly.