How your written plan and exact quote work

Before you book a flight you should be holding a document, not a number. A dental quote before travelling abroad is only worth something if it names every tooth, names the material going into it, gives a price per line, gives a total, and says in writing which two or three things could change and by how much. That document is what the dentist who will treat you sends you, free, within 24 hours of your X-ray arriving, and it is the same document the treatment is then carried out against.

What you send

A panoramic X-ray, photographs, and any quote you already hold

Who reads it

The dentist who will treat you, not a coordinator

How long

24 hours

What you get

A written plan, tooth by tooth, with a price per line and a total

What it costs

Free, and there is nothing to pay to receive it

What fixes the price

The CBCT scan taken on your first day, which confirms or corrects the plan

Languages

Albanian, English, Italian and Spanish

What to send, and what each thing tells us

A panoramic X-ray, taken in the last twelve months. This is the single most useful item. It shows bone levels, root shapes, old root fillings, retained roots and the sinus floor. Most dentists will give you a copy as a file if you ask; a clear photograph of it on a screen is usually good enough to plan from.

** A relaxed smile, a wide smile, and the upper teeth from below with the lips held back. Daylight, no flash.

** From your own dentist, from a clinic in Turkey, from another clinic in Tirana. It is read line by line rather than undercut, and that reading is a service in its own right: a second opinion on your quote.

** Which months you could travel, and roughly what you are prepared to spend. The second one is not a negotiating position; it decides which of several clinically valid routes gets planned first.

What the plan document contains

A worked extract from a real plan structure looks like this:

Every figure in that column comes from the published dental prices list. Nothing on a plan is a figure invented for one patient, which is the practical reason the list is public.

When the price is exact, and the two things that can move it

The plan sent by e-mail is priced from a flat X-ray, which is a shadow. The CBCT scan taken on your first morning is three-dimensional and it is what confirms the plan or corrects it. From the moment that scan has been reviewed with you, the total is exact for the treatment described.

Two things genuinely can change between the plan and the scan, and both are named on your document before you travel.

** A crack that a flat image cannot show is the usual cause. The plan already carries the extraction and the replacement priced, so what changes is which of two pre-priced routes is taken, not the arrival of a number you have never seen.

** A graft line appears, at 200–400 euro for that site, or a sinus lift at 500–800 euro. Both are on the plan as conditional lines from the start wherever the X-ray leaves the question open.

Nothing is added to your treatment without you seeing the revised figure and agreeing to it before the appointment starts. A clinic that discovers extra work while your mouth is open and tells you the price afterwards has made a choice about how it does business, not a clinical discovery.

Why this is not how a package quote works

A package price is a single figure covering an unspecified list. It is easier to compare between clinics and it is impossible to audit, which is why the figure so often changes on arrival. The alternative is more work to produce and less comfortable to read, because it shows you the teeth you would rather not think about. It is also the only format in which you can tell whether two quotes are describing the same treatment.

For scale, a single implant on the UK private market runs £2,000–2,500, and published Turkish clinic ranges put one at €300–700. Neither number tells you what is inside it. A plan does.

Your visit follows the plan

The days in Tirana are laid out from the sequence in your document: which appointment is on which morning, which afternoons are free, and when you can fly. That calendar is described on your visit to Tirana, and it is built before you book flights rather than after.

FAQ

Do I have to pay for the treatment plan?

No. The plan, the reading of your X-ray and the first consultation are free. The reason is straightforward: a plan is the only honest way for you to decide, and charging for it would push patients towards a phone estimate instead. You are free to take the document to your own dentist or to another clinic, and a number of patients do exactly that.

Can you quote from photographs alone, without an X-ray?

We can give you a range, and we will tell you it is a range. Photographs show colour, shape, wear and gum position. They cannot show bone height, root condition or an infection at a root tip, which are the three things that decide whether a tooth is kept or replaced. A quote built from photographs alone is the kind that changes on the day, so we would rather wait for the X-ray than send you a figure we cannot stand behind.

How long is the quoted price held?

The list prices are published and reviewed periodically rather than changed per patient, so a total does not drift while you make up your mind. The exact validity period for a quoted total is on the document itself.

What if I only want part of the plan?

Then the plan is rewritten with the lines you want and a total for those. Staging a mouth over two or three years is a legitimate approach and a common one, and a written sequence is what makes it safe: the order matters, because some work has to be done before other work and some gaps are better left until a neighbouring tooth is settled. Tell us the budget and the plan is built inside it rather than trimmed at the till.

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