Do You Know What Each Clinician Actually Costs You?

After frame stock, registered optometrists and dispensing opticians are the biggest expense in your practice. Their salaries alone are significant, but the true employment cost goes well beyond what appears on the payslip.

Most practice owners have a general sense of what their staff cost. Few have calculated the full employment cost of each clinician against the revenue they generate.

The real cost

Start with the salary. Add employer's National Insurance, which for most clinicians will be several thousand pounds per year. Add pension contributions. Add training and CPD costs, essential for maintaining GOC registration. Add equipment or software licences specific to that clinician's work.

Then factor in the less obvious costs. Holiday pay means roughly 28 days per year when they're not generating revenue. Sick pay covers days when the clinic loses capacity or you pay for a locum. And there's the time spent on non-revenue activities: admin, meetings, mentoring, or gaps between appointments that can't be filled.

The real cost of employing a clinician is typically 30 to 40 percent higher than their headline salary.

Revenue per clinician

How much revenue does each clinician generate? This requires tracking appointments by clinician and understanding what each appointment leads to in dispensing revenue, contact lens sales, and additional services.

Not all clinicians generate the same revenue. Some are better at recommending additional tests or upgrades. Some have higher dispensing conversion rates. Some attract more private patients versus NHS. This isn't a criticism of anyone. It's information you need for scheduling, hiring, and allocating clinic time.

Why this matters for hiring decisions

If you're thinking about bringing on another optometrist or dispensing optician, the question isn't whether you're busy enough. It's whether the numbers support the hire.

How many additional appointments per week does the new clinician need to cover their full employment cost? What's the realistic revenue per appointment based on your data? And what happens if it takes three to six months to build a full diary?

With that information, you can make the decision with confidence. Without it, you're hoping it works out.

Using the data you already have

Most practice management systems capture enough data for this analysis. Appointment records, dispensing records, and staff schedules are all there. The missing piece is usually someone pulling it together and presenting it clearly.

This is the kind of analysis I do with optical practice clients as part of their regular management accounts. If you'd like to know more, I've put together a guide covering five financial challenges specific to independent opticians. Download it from my opticians page.