Dental fee guide sees modest increase in 2025

The B.C. dental association has released their annual fee guide for 2025. Learn more about how this could impact your group benefits plan and your employees.

The B.C. dental association has now released their annual fee guide which offers recommendations for the pricing of dental services to help ensure access to competitively and reasonable priced dental services. In B.C., the dental fee guide increase for 2025 is 3.27%, which was effective February 1. This is down from last year’s increase of 4.73% and 2023’s increase of 5.99%. This downward trend is positive for both the employer and plan members. Lower fee increases will likely result in improved dental plan sustainability for plan sponsors and less out of pocket increases for plan members.

The dental fee guide is used by insurers to determine the maximum reimbursement amounts for dental claims. Dentists in B.C. are not required to charge the fees listed in the dental fee guide, as the guide only provides a recommendation of what to charge. Each dental office independently determines how much they wish to charge for various treatments.

The dental fee guide has a direct impact on group benefits plans with members who utilize dental services. For example, if a dentist follows the dental fee guide and increases their prices by 3.27%, a group plan can expect increased claims of approximately the same percentage if employees continue to use the same level of dental coverage.

Insurers also use the dental fee guide to determine price standards for the average cost of various services and supplies, which are known as reasonable and customary amounts, which affects individual plan members. An employee will have to pay out of pocket for any cost that exceeds the reasonable and customary amount if a dentist chooses to charge a higher fee. If an employee finds that their dentist consistently charges above the reasonable and customary amount, they may wish to look for a new dental office with fees that are closer to the normal range.

Questions about your employee dental plan? Contact us today!