Can I extract my Denplan payments?
My previous dentist continued to receive payments for 18 months after I’d moved 250 miles away and become an NHS patient
I signed up with Denplan when I lived in Cambridge. I have now moved 250 miles away and find I have been paying the Cambridge dentist for the past 18 months. I registered with a new dentist and took in my Denplan paperwork. I assumed I was registered as his Denplan patient.
When I phoned the new dentist for a check-up, I discovered I was an NHS patient. My money was still going to the dentist in Cambridge but he refuses to refund the £569 I’ve paid since I moved. I’ve decided to stay as an NHS patient as I’m not earning much these days and I could do with the Denplan payments back. I’ve cancelled the direct debit. MR, Morpeth, Northumberland
You had assumed you were paying into an insurance policy which paid for your treatment. You have now learned that Denplan is not insurance. The company collects the fees and forwards them to whichever dentist you are registered with.
Your old dentist’s file note says you were keeping your options open until you found another dentist and that, when you did, you would get in touch. You don’t remember saying that and believe no one would expect you to travel 500 miles for every checkup.
But as you have been with Denplan since 1999, it asked the dentist to repay some of your money although it believed you partly contributed to the confusion by not reading correspondence from the old surgery.
The dentist agreed and Denplan has sent you as a goodwill gesture £379 which is two-thirds the amount you feel you have wasted.
You can email Margaret Dibben at your.problems@observer.co.uk or write to Margaret Dibben, Your Problems, The Observer, Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU. Include a phone number.
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