Kathy Connor
hi everyone Kathy Connor from provisor here, today's in today's podcast we're going to talk about insurance protecting yourself your practice your employees you name it be sure to listen
Dean Steinman
hello everybody out there in podcast land this is Dean diamond from Ortho marketing and guess what we are back with another podcast for you so welcome everybody welcome welcome welcome it's now the middle of the winter 2025 and Calendar's changed and now it's time to talk about your practice and the importance of taking your practice to the next level keeping your staff on board and to help you understand options for you to really make a difference in your practice so I've got um two guests today that I'm so excited to have a board with me um I have Samantha Connor and Kathy Connor from provisor um Samantha is the founder and president of the company and Samantha is a COO and I'm so excited to have them on board and they're going to tell you a little bit about what they do and talk a little bit about the the dental and authentic industry and very importantly how you guys can really learn to keep your key people on board and different options for you there because you know it's so hard as you know for Staffing and they make sure you've got somebody on board so Samantha Kathy thanks so much for joining I appreciate it hope all is well welcome yes great
Kathy Connor
thanks for having us my pleasure
Dean Steinman
you got it so Kathy you're the founder president of the company tell us a little bit about you and provisor please
Kathy Connor
okay well we're a financial advisory firm uh first and foremost um but over the years I founded the company in 2020 I guess was my first foray in the dental world uh and since then we've kind of grown and morphed into a full service um advisory firm for dentists um whether they're just coming out of residency or school or transitioning into practice ownership we handle or we help um handle every step of that way um of course and most of that of course is Introduction introductions like for instance to you I know nothing about marketing other than what I've been told over the years um and how important it is so um yeah so we really do everything and I think that when I first um got into the financial Consulting world I saw that there was just a huge void of this industry being serviced and it's important that you know our clients dentists no matter General specialist it's so important that these clients surround themselves with people who know their industry right I they couldn't you know Ortho marketing couldn't be more specific but it's important um that they have you have this Niche for them and as with as with us
Dean Steinman
great thanks um so Samantha tell us a little B about what you guys do and why does somebody need insurance why does a dentist need your your services
Samantha Connor
yeah so I think kind of it's twofold first of all a lot of our insurances are state law that we offer so there's some things that are you know that you need to get you know to get a bank loan and to get um you know to cover state, state requirements um but also you know just the overall protection um and to come to Someone Like Us who really has like like Kathy said a a firm hold on all of the different markets and everything that's out there and you're not just going to your State Farm local State Farm and getting a policy but you're going to someone that understands Dentistry um which I think is probably the biggest reason why you know we come into play is because we know we might not be dentists but it's what we do all day every day um and really to have that conversation about you know if you're going to State Farm are they really thinking about sewers backing up into your chairs right and how that can affect you know an insurance claim um which is probably the biggest thing that's you know different right so having those Dental specific policies and dental specific protection um is really important so that's kind of the our biggest reason on protection on why we focus on one place is to because Dentistry is so different from any other market right Mo who else is worrying about Plumbing going up through a chair right you're in unfortunately that that conversation is from experience right um what were you going to say Kathy oh um so yeah and I think the other thing you know on why protecting other parts of protection also are like you know like you said Dean earlier is there's other types of protecting like just like protecting yourself versus your employees protecting your employees um as well as those types of protections that we can kind of help you with that are also so Dental specific
Dean Steinman
hm what would you say right after the bat is the number one void of a and coverage that a practice needs that they don't realize they need by going with somebody that's not an expert you mentioned the sewers or backup is that the num so what's the what's going to be the top two things that somebody right after this to look at that policy and if they don't have it need to make a phone call to you
Samantha Connor
first and foremost is is a dental specific product like for sewers for materials um you know for like that type of things for those type of issues and then the other two are ones that are employee practice liability um that is a big one that we see that just people don't have on their policies and what that is is that is protecting you from being sued by either a employee that's claiming things like discrimination or a a CL or a patient that's that's doing discrimination or claiming discrimination against an employee um so all of what the employees are as well as yourself you're considered employee in that but that's a big one that we see missing you know you're standing over patience you're it's a very um intimate relationship with the dentist um so a lot of people don't have employee practice liability um and then the third I would say is data breach um which is you know you're claiming so much the hackers are changing the world right companies cannot keep up with how quickly these hackers are learning things um and you don't think about a dental office you know you're thinking about credit card companies and Banks and financial firms that need this data breach insurance but they're going after these little guys who have a lot of personal information on their clients
Kathy Connor
and a lot of exposure
Dean Steinman
shoot yeah no encryption yeah I've got one client that you know got data breached and got locked out and ransomware and he had um and he had to spent $200,000 to unlock his computer a is because he didn't real think to get it off a computer and put on the cloud all right first and foremost you know and secondly didn't have the insurance for it you know so that was a heck of a check to write out um because it wasn't prepared properly um and you had no choice you know it's um pay it or you're gone so um super important guys after after listening to this and don't do it right now but after listening to this check your policy and then you you got a you have a really good resource um to to contact now also let's talk a little bit about you know employees and attracting people all right because we we met and you guys gave me a great case study and a story about you know what a practice can do as far as invest making investments into their key employees and making it valuable for them to stay on so I why don't you talk a little bit about a good a you know a good case study that um give pie somebody piece of mind to know they're not going to lose them key employee um because they're investing in them
Kathy Connor
yeah I mean first of it's so important because first of all it's very hard to find great employees these days you know I mean outside of stealing somebody from another practice it's tough I mean there's a lot of we know several people who have dental staffing companies and you know there everyone's hungry um a lot of people didn't want to go back to work after covid so it's Staffing is definitely an issue and we get it in the beginning if somebody's just doing a startup or let's say a new startup you know everybody's got their hand out for money you know you need you need this we need to change the plumbing whatever it's very tight at the time and but the one thing that they forget is valuing um their employee it's and it it it's it's just it's more than just giving them benefits right it's empowering these people it's recognizing first of all as the the chief dishwasher there or chief clinician there you have to decide if that person is a good fit for the role that they're playing and then when you find that when you realize that that's your person you want to do you want to empower them to become also a leader in your practice because you're you should only have one job as a practitioner and that's you know doing doing clinical work you know you shouldn't have to worry about the schedule you shouldn't have to worry and you know this I'm sure you teach this um so not only empowering your employees by you know getting them educated and taking them you know taking your whole group um to to further educate them is how they can work as a team but the benefits that you can give them let's say that we can help um doctors you know find the right fit for their practice um come in the form of a 401k or group health or life insurance I think this is one of the stories that we spoke about um that that life insurance is becoming a huge asset to many of our practitioners whereas they give a life insurance policy to their employees um where and the practice is partly beneficiary as well as that Employees Family um so it's it's it's very much deeper and much more complicated than than I'm making it out to be but that's something you don't see you know certainly import as Samantha said there are stat mandated benefits that you have to give an employee um but outside of that what what is going to make a difference a something like a cash valued life insurance policy that they can actually look at the statement every month and see that they're acre cash that they're saving is very powerful you know the 401K also is nice but that's their money going in really so this is something that you give to that employee as a benefit um beyond that and Beyond the state mandated I think Group Health you know certainly we hear it all the time that um the practice owner says I I can't afford it you know because I've got five 60 year olds working for me it's expensive you know and the doctor so he acquired this practice with these great employees but he feel like he feels like he can't he or she feels like he can't afford it um we C we can find a plan that works because those employees are going to leave if this is a benefit that they need and the selling doctor perhaps you know that was a benefit that they have and now you know the new new doctor doesn't want to put that in place
Dean Steinman
it's very expensive as you as you know as a small business owner I need to do everything possible to keep my employees and besides payroll you know insurance is my biggest expense yes you know it's it's it's crazy and you know so it's great that people should realize now there you have options out there guys you know especially you know you know you know have to go to whatever you've got there are certain opportunities especially you know ones that could be worked in do you guys also like roll things up for bigger companies together or this is there a particular size that that practice should look at if if there were you know two two or three employees is that is that okay or do you need to have a certain you know number you want to answer that s
Samantha Connor
yeah it can really to be honest it can just be it has to be more than one person so it can't just be the owner and you can't discriminate so if you you can't just put in a group health plan for like you and your husband that works for you um and then not give it to your employees so you know you have to have it for everyone but if you can do it for you know you and your family and and one employee um is very you can do that or you if you have 30 employees um you can do it for them yeah you can you can discriminate against yourself so like if you have 10 15 employees you can say I don't want to be on this that's okay people can opt out um you have to offer it to everyone
Dean Steinman
yeah now you have to if you offer to pay for an full person's benefits you have to offer that for everybody or can you like classify somebody that you'll contribute versus like you have your main office manager and you say part of the perkus I'm going to pay for your insurance but then you have a part-time person or a lower level person do you have to offer the same exact coverage or there's different it
Samantha Connor
there's there are different classifications you can offer different levels to different leveled people they just have to be kind of classified correctly and in the state of at least in the state of New Jersey and a lot of other states it also depends on what type of Corporation you have so if you have an LLC versus a C Corp there's some insurances that that changes how you offer things to people um it changes whether you can be in them or not or whether you can opt out of things or not um so every state has like a little bit of a different kind of you know intricacy there like in New for I'm just going to use an example in New Jersey if you're an LLC you can opt out as the owner in your workers comp but in New York you can't like it's completely different so every state is a little bit different um on that front and it just depends on your situation but a f minute phone call you know with with one of us or you know our group health expert we can we can figure that out for you you know in in two questions
Dean Steinman
okay so you we have people listening to all over the world but let's just talk from the states do you guys if somebody in any state will you be able to work with somebody
Kathy Connor
yep okay yes 50 states all 50 states to partly answer your question before yeah so when we're looking to work with a client where if you're a s proprietor with just one employee or you have you know 50 employees um really we can handle anything um and and some of those benefits as Sam was saying not only you cannot discriminate but a lot of them like let's say a profit sharing plan that goes by you know how much money they're making so if you have very high earners that could you know possibly cost you more to contribute to that for these employees um but chances are the doc is the highest earner hopefully in that practice although we've seen we have some stories but we won't talk about embezzlement right now but certainly that that's uh something you yourself from as well um we have many clients who had bad apples you know take advantage of them in their practice
Dean Steinman
it's bad I've had a guest in the past that was expert in ed and it's astronomical what percentage of practices are getting stolen from more than half it's incredible you know and you don't know until you know that's the problem you know
Samantha Connor
well going back to data reach insurance we talked about earlier we had a client who whose office manager was had hacked into their payroll company and was writing herself checks that no one that like small enough that it wouldn't like hit the bottom line and just writing herself check to like give herself more payroll because she was in charge of payroll and you know so and that was a data breach that that was they were logging in he was she was logging in as the dentist
Dean Steinman
you don't you're focused on running your business you know you don't look into it there and and there's so many ways to do that so you have to be careful even though somebody you think you've been trusting for 20 years right there is the biggest problem you know which it's a shame that that that happens but you know and so that's why you have to need somebody like this um so obviously there's lots of different types of insurance from Financial from Financial to to you know liability to to running a a business what would you say are the three main um policies that somebody should have as a practice let's say for a young practice that start up through three years or what have you what are the three main things that they should be able to look at to make sure they have in place as they grow in the practice
Kathy Connor
I think just I mean malpractice insurance so you you want to make sure that that you have the right coverage and also you want to make sure that your entity is covered so there's a lot of solo practitioners out there that oh I have malpractice insurance yes but do you have malpractice insurance to cover your entity so you have like a 1099 you have an endodontist you know or Paro guy coming in you know once once a month to see see your patients and even though you never even look or lay eyes on that patient because that independent contractor is in your practice um providing a service to another patient if that let's say the pario gets served with Mount practice lawsuit your entity is going to be sued and you are also so having an entity policy is important um and I would say the what Samantha was speaking about earlier epli wrongful termination um you know yes sexual harassment comes up discrimination but I would say epli is used mostly for wrongful termination you know because yeah so you have to treat all your employees equally you can't have in your employee handbook you know if you're late more than six times you know we're we're going to have to take action or write you up or whatever you can't have somebody who's your let's say you have a rock star hygienist who just blows everyone else away but she shows up late every day but she's the hardest worker she gets the most done and yet here's somebody who is always on time but is like a turtle like a Slowpoke you know maybe for no other reason than that's just how she works she's more methodical you know she's not you know um working at high she's working at her own speed um yeah that's a problem where you know doctors treat people differently and um that could be a wrongful termination case easy if you fire the person who's slow because she's too slow she can say well really this person comes in late every single day has never been written up why aren't you firing ing her you know typee of thing so that stuff goes on all the time and when you're brand new you're hiring new people you don't you haven't established um you know stat who's valuable and who's going to work out um epli insurance is very important and these insurances are cheap um they're just added on I mean some of them are Standalone policies but in most cases we can just add it to their EX existing business owners policy and it's it's like a you know a rider an option on a car it's very very inexpensive compared to the car
Samantha Connor
and especially if you're from the epli standpoint and the termination and having that as a new practice owner even if you're doing an acquisition that means normally you're acquiring all of the staff and you're probably very much younger than the person you're buying it from so you know whoever that might be that's been the office manager for 40 years you're probably not going to work with that person the same as the person you bought the practice from and very often we see those issues and that's where Epi comes in a lot it's not just hiring new people it is getting rid of the people that you were like oh I'm going to keep them they're great and then you realize that you know it's they're not right because you're you're in a different situation um so especially if you buy a brand new practice making sure that you really vet out those people um and if you don't that you have the backup of epli
Kathy Connor
yeah I but also I think that and I'm not sure Dean if you talked to your clients about that but probably the best way to go in an acquisition situation is sit down with all your new employees and say all right here's the good news and the bad news the bad news is all y'all are getting fired tomorrow morning at nine o'clock I have to let you all go but at 9 9:05 I'm going to rehire you all and the reason for that is because now they go into a new probation period as you you as their boss right now they have to sign your employee handbook that lays out the rules um spends a great deal of time of laying out rules that could mitigate a employment practice liability like a wrongful termination or a sexual sexual harassment you know those kind of Clauses in employee handbook put the ball in the employees court so if you say that if it's in the handbook that if you're being harassed at work it is incumbent upon you as the employee to put it in writing your situation what's going on and then I will you know I'll mediate um or I'll look at that and determine what what course of action has to be taken because it puts it puts the ball in the employees Court to to tell you what's going on so that you can absolutely handle it um before before people even did employee handbooks or use them I mean there were lawsuits all over for stupid things that could have been avoided you know if they had that employ employee handbook so when you fire everyone and rehire them then you have your own employee handbook they you walk them through the rules and you said I'm just then they have a whole new set of benefits you can change them or you can say I'm in to make them better
Dean Steinman
how does somebody get an employee handbook do they get it from an HR company do they get it from you do they have to hire a lawyer um because I have one from my for my company in my place it's integral part of what I do but somebody doesn't have one what how do they even go about researching it or finding the right way to put one together
Kathy Connor
there there's a lot of options um the Ada actually if you're a member of the Ada they have like a a free version online um you know it's very Broad in general you could po you know just out of you know trying to save money you could take that and then kind of you know um work with that frame and add you know employment harass Clauses but for you to do that you would need somebody who who is has some knowledge of legal issues or legal precedent in that state because there is some State specificity where it comes to that
Samantha Connor
so yeah the AO has one as well um has one on their website at that Sim much like the Ada but the best place to probably go is whoever helped you with your purchase if they're also an employment attorney a lot of them are they're like D specific um attorneys out there they're going to have you know they're they're most likely in your state they're most likely you know in your in your realm they understand the employment law in and if they're if they can't do it because they're just practice Acquisitions but they probably know someone in your state that is that's all they do is they read employment contracts and they help write people write handbooks um so whoever your employment contract with or whever you use for your practice acquisition that's a good place to go first um to make an employee handbook and then you know obviously if you don't want to spend that money like Kathy said the Ada the AO your malpractice company probably has a template as well um I know medpro is a big one they have a template on their website that's available to you um just to kind of get those Dental specific or Orthodontics specific words
Kathy Connor
yeah it's important to get have that right out of the gate because you really can't have an employee sign it six months after you opened your door and you all of a sudden you're presenting them this and they're like wait a minute you know we you can't actually get them have them sign that without some consideration believe it or not
Dean Steinman
how often somebody I'm sorry how often should somebody like meet with somebody like you to check to make sure everything is squared away make sure you have the right policy make sure you have the right updates make sure you have the right programs in place you guys do this monthly quarterly yearly every 10 year how of what's the ideal scenario for somebody to pick up the phone
Samantha Connor
we look at all of our clients information annually um we go through we do an annual review for all of our clients our most of our policy terms are for a year so that's kind of when we can look at new things however we're in constant contact with our clients so we are always asking the questions like we do like a big we call it spring cleaning everyone hears from us in the spring so it's spring cleaning what's wrong what's right you know like like this is part of your spring duties before summer hits um but at very least your your person that does this for you should be reaching out to you in you know but if they're not you should at very least be looking at all of your policies annually especially because insurance companies tend to change prices you know they they go to the insurance board and they they ask for increases I mean they ask for things to be changed so your policy could be getting you know exponentially more expensive because you're in California perfect example unfortunately are these wildfires in California right those policies in California depending on if a company how many offices a company lost you know one company could raise their prices crazy because they Lo had X number of losses and another company might have just locked out and had no losses and their prices aren't going to go up so moving you from a company to one company you know just having that annual renewal you're probably paying too much because you know something happened with that company so at minimum you should be looking at everything annually
Kathy Connor
yeah and unfortunately people who are not our clients when they do become our clients they're like we asked them you know when was the last time you looked at your policies and what they offer you know they never they've never looked at them
Samantha Connor
I got it at graduation our favorite line
Kathy Connor
what's that
Samantha Connor
I got it at graduation
Kathy Connor
that too
Dean Steinman
okay right you got to look at it guys it's like anything you have to check up you should meet with your financial planner you should meet with your accountant you should meet with your lawyer you should meet with you know this and and your this is such an important part of your of your company and your health and the growth um this is incredible so guys thanks so much for joining I really appreciate this has been so insightful um so if somebody wants more information um learn about you guys or just set up a a call what's the best way for them to do so
Samantha Connor
probably our website um is the best way to reach us um you can get all my personal information right on the front page um usually you you start with me at uh at provisor um so provisor protect just like it um. us is the best way to get a hold of me or you know we can share our cell phone numbers as well we're always on our phones um and we're all across we work in all 50 states all across the country so we have certain hours that are California hours certain days where they're New York hours so we're pretty much on uh if we can answer we answer
Dean Steinman
great that's appreciate so again guys you need to be taking a look at this this is so important for your practice um samanther and Kathy are experts in the field um work with how many practices do you guys work with
Kathy Connor
we probably have 5,000
Dean Steinman
okay so if you're looking for the the dental experts here you go 5,000 practices they know this industry all right
Kathy Connor
so our our services are free
Dean Steinman
there you go okay even better so um so everybody out there Spring's coming right around the corner thank God it's been a crazy tough winter here in the in the Northeast so it's time to um you know spring is right on the corner get your spring cleaning in place make sure you get your stuff cleared up and um you'll be very happy that you reached out so Sam cath thanks so much for joining appreciate it podcast lamb do your spring cleaning early all right it's important to do so thanks everybody for listening thanks for all the comments um follows on on social media um getting messages and really appreciate it and everybody out there be safe be happy and make sure to call thanks so much everybody bye bye
Kathy Connor
bye
