Price, and what you may say about it
Most clinics either hide the price or publish a single figure they cannot honour. There is a third option, and it is the only one that does not generate complaints.
PrerequisitesModule 02 · Who decidesModule 05 · The rulesModule 10 · Treatment page anatomy
Publish a price as a range with the variable that moves it named, for example from one figure to another depending on the number of areas treated. Silence sends the reader elsewhere to find a number. A single figure reads as a promise and rarely survives the consultation. Price on application reads as a filter on wealth. The range with a reason is the only construction that sets expectation and withstands scrutiny.
What you will be able to do
By the end of this module you will be able to:
- Choose the correct price construction for each of your treatments.
- Name the variables that legitimately move a price and publish them.
- Avoid the pricing constructions that create complaints under the advertising codes.
- Build a fees page that reduces enquiry friction rather than creating it.
Four ways to handle price
There are only four, and three of them are poor.
The reason clinics choose one of the poor three is almost always the same: a reasonable fear that publishing a number invites comparison on price alone. That fear is well founded and the remedy is not silence, it is the named variable, which converts a number into a piece of information.
Why silence is the expensive option
A reader who cannot find a price does one of two things. They leave and search for the price, which takes them to a competitor or to a forum where the number they find is somebody else's price from three years ago. Or they enquire purely to ask the price, which consumes your staff time and produces an enquiry that was never a booking.
Both outcomes are worse than publishing a range. The first loses the patient entirely. The second fills your enquiry log with people you cannot help, which then makes your enquiry numbers meaningless as a measure, a problem Module 31, What to measure, and what to ignore deals with directly.
The range with a reason
The construction has three parts: a lower bound, an upper bound, and the variable that moves between them. All three are necessary. A range without the variable looks arbitrary and invites the reader to assume they will be quoted the top.
Good variables are countable and visible to the patient: the number of areas treated, the number of sessions expected, the quantity of product used, whether a review appointment is included. Poor variables are ones the patient cannot assess, such as complexity or individual requirements, which are true but tell the reader nothing they can use.
State what the price includes as well as what it is. A price that includes a review appointment and a price that does not are different products, and a patient comparing two clinics has no way of knowing unless you say.
What may legitimately move a price
| Variable | Publish it as | Why it works |
|---|---|---|
| Areas treated | From x for one area, to y for three | The patient can count areas and can therefore predict their own figure. |
| Sessions required | Per session, with the typical number stated | Prevents the far more damaging surprise of learning at session one that there are five. |
| Quantity used | Per unit, with a typical range | Standard in some treatments and understood by patients who have had them before. |
| What is included | Listed, including the review | Turns a number into a specification and makes comparison meaningful. |
| Consultation fee | Stated, and whether it is redeemable | The single most common unpleasant surprise in the sector. |
Offers, packages and the pressure problem
Time-limited offers on cosmetic interventions are the fastest way to attract regulatory attention. Guidance from the GMC on cosmetic interventions addresses financial inducements directly, and the advertising codes treat pressure to undergo an elective procedure as a serious matter. The safe position is simple: no countdowns, no "offer ends", no bundling that rewards buying more treatment than was clinically indicated.
Packages of sessions where a course is genuinely the clinical recommendation are a different matter and are legitimate, provided the package reflects what the patient needs rather than what the clinic wants to sell. The test is whether you would recommend the same number of sessions if they were paying per session.
A discount that changes what treatment somebody has is not a discount. It is clinical influence with a price tag, and it is the thing the guidance is aimed at.
The fees page
A single fees page collecting every range in one place is worth building, for three reasons: it serves the payer role from Module 02, Who decides, and how they choose directly, it is frequently the page a patient sends to whoever is paying, and it is a natural target for links from every treatment page.
Keep it plain. A table with treatment, range, variable and what is included. A dated line saying when it was last reviewed. A sentence explaining that the final figure is agreed at consultation and that nobody is treated on the day of their first consultation, if that is your policy. No photography, no persuasion.
Review it quarterly and change the date when you do. A fees page with a two-year-old date is worse than none, because it publishes a number you will not honour.
Build the fees table
An hour. You need your actual pricing, including the parts you have never written down.
- For every treatment on your build list, write the lower bound, the upper bound and the variable that moves between them.
- For each, write what is included, specifically whether a review appointment is part of the price.
- State your consultation fee and whether it is redeemable against treatment.
- Identify any treatment where you genuinely cannot give a range, and write instead what the consultation costs and what determines the eventual figure.
- Assemble the fees page. Add a review date. Diarise the next review for three months' time.
- Add the relevant range to the opening block of each treatment page, from Module 11.
Almost every clinic that does this exercise discovers at least one price that nobody could state consistently. Finding that out from a spreadsheet is cheaper than finding it out from a complaint.
Questions readers ask about this module
Will publishing prices not just attract price shoppers?
It attracts people who can afford you and repels people who cannot, before either party has spent time on the other. Clinics that publish ranges generally report that enquiries fall in number and rise in quality, which is the desired direction for both figures.
What if my prices are higher than everyone nearby?
Then the range needs the what-is-included line more than anybody else's does, because that is where the difference lives. A higher price with a specification attached is a position. A higher price with nothing attached is just a higher price.
Can I show a price only after someone gives their email?
You can, and it converts a piece of information the reader came for into a transaction, which most readers resent. It also creates a data protection obligation for information you did not need. Publishing the range and offering the workbook separately is the better arrangement.
How often should prices be updated?
Quarterly review, with the date shown. Updating more often than that suggests the ranges are too narrow. Updating less often means you will eventually be quoted a price you no longer offer, by a patient holding a printout.
Sources and primary references
Disclosure. This module contains no commercial links of any kind. This course is published by Northbank Media, is free to read, and is funded by the workbook pack and by clearly labelled series sponsorship. We do not rank, review or recommend agencies or clinics.
Module 12 of 32