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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

up shit creek without a paddle.... Urgent help/advice needed please.

263 replies

HolyFail · 31/05/2011 15:45

Regular poster with recent namechange here....

A friend of mine was seeing this guy - a lot older than her, he is very well off and as a birthday present offered to buy her veneers (sp*)

So she went to a dental clinic, had her actual teeth filed down to pins and is wearing temp veneers until her appointment next week.

1st payment was made (cash, by him)
2nd payment is due next week before the job is complete (thousands of pounds due)

He has dumped her! And told her to sort it out herself - she is a young woman with no money - sure she works, but is not earning enough to pay for this and she has requested to pay on finance but she has a crap credit rating so has therefore been declined!

In addition to "How could you be so stupid" What can I advise her here? Does anyone have any experience in this kind of thing?

Any suggestions welcome? We've been through how stupid she has been, we just need to find a way to sort this?

OP posts:
sarahtigh · 02/06/2011 10:07

agree with other dentists here, veneer preps should be minimal most of the time i do not generally use temporaries as remove very little if any tooth, but I do not do huge amounts of cosmetic dentistry and worked in rural NHS practice. only in rare cases will veneers be done on NHS

Even crown preps should not be like triangles with points should still be tooth shaped , most veneers are about 0.5mm thick and a porcelain crown needs a minimum thickness of 1-1.5mm sometimes teeth are broken and have old fillings in which need to be removed so there is less tooth left but you have to work with that not create that,

good dentistry involves preserving well what remains; sometimes you can not save teeth and implants are a good option, I do not do them myself but refer they are not a minor procedure but success rates are very good and infections are rare not general side effects.

Like Jasper and grumpy can not really comment as have not seen preparations but I can not see that it is an assault and unless your friend was sedated rather than local anaesthetic she will have been deemed to have understood consent form,( payment is hardly likely to be in small print and so obscure no-one woul realise it was there) it is not the dentists fault if you do not read it, or ask questions in fact when I do large courses of treatment I spend more time making sure patients understand the treatment side effects costs and how long it should last etc, as recovering bad debts is very difficult later, but i would be reluctant to fit crowns veneers if I knew payment was unlikely.

Unfortunately we have heard all the excuses for non payment from the obvious I forgot my purse/ wallet etc, thought I did not have to pay today so from what you say the dentist is being sympathetic but he is not going to fit 8 veneers for nothing,

Blondeshavemorefun · 02/06/2011 10:08

so x often brought new teeth for girlfriends Hmm

Original poster
HolyFail · 02/06/2011 10:11

according to the dentist blondes, yes, equally Hmm

OP posts:
Gster · 02/06/2011 10:26

Dodgy geezer. Pays cash. Pays for lots of blondes to get teeth done. Boobs too ?

erm..... sounds highly dodgy, like she was being groomed.

Vicky2011 · 02/06/2011 10:37

This is one of those cases where Steig Larsson has the right idea - this man needs branding with "keep away I am a dangerous TWUNT"

differentnameforthis · 02/06/2011 12:06

Regardless of how long the tempories last, the permanent veneers will have already been/are in the process of being made. That will leave a lab bill to be paid. The dentist will need the money to do that, regardless of when they get fitted.

And I don't think 'shaming' the dentist is fair! Regardless of the outcome. He/she has done no wrong.

differentnameforthis · 02/06/2011 12:13

i mean it seems like the dentist is not declaring this income

That would be impossible in this case. For a start she signed a contract & he will have lab bills to pay = huge paper trail.

differentnameforthis · 02/06/2011 12:21

MumblingRagDoll

That picture is not how they prep teeth for veneers these days! I too am a dental nurse & have never seen teeth preped to that extreme.

<a class="break-all" href="http://www.google.com.au/imgres?imgurl=www.drkathy.com/veneer.jpg&imgrefurl=www.drkathy.com/veneers.htm&h=772&w=1181&sz=253&tbnid=Bwzv7RFdkjdqiM:&tbnh=98&tbnw=150&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dveneers%26tbm%3Disch%26tbo%3Du&zoom=1&q=veneers&usg=__3h053KGigds3l7p4a4qF1OHBCW8=&sa=X&ei=zXDnTampFoeSuwOhhu2CDg&ved=0CEwQ9QEwAg&biw=1600&bih=680" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">www.google.com.au/imgres?imgurl=www.drkathy.com/veneer.jpg&imgrefurl=www.drkathy.com/veneers.htm&h=772&w=1181&sz=253&tbnid=Bwzv7RFdkjdqiM:&tbnh=98&tbnw=150&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dveneers%26tbm%3Disch%26tbo%3Du&zoom=1&q=veneers&usg=__3h053KGigds3l7p4a4qF1OHBCW8=&sa=X&ei=zXDnTampFoeSuwOhhu2CDg&ved=0CEwQ9QEwAg&biw=1600&bih=680

ChippingIn · 02/06/2011 12:25

Well, what a roller coaster! Hopefully this means the ex will be out of her life for good and if he is £4000 is a small price to pay really.

OTheHugeManatee · 02/06/2011 12:35

I'm astonished and horrified by this story. Who was this deeply sinister man, who brought so many people to this dentist for cosmetic treatment? It's like something out of a David Lynch film.

Your poor friend, I'm just so glad she's going to get her teeth fixed Sad

breathing · 02/06/2011 12:38

No offence but im amazed people arent suggesting the onus was on the girl as well. An expensive gift to accept.

differentnameforthis · 02/06/2011 12:52

I have a sneaky feeling that the dentist may have pushed for this application to go through

Your friend has simply been lucky. There is no way that I know of that a dentist can sway the decision making process of a finance company. It is an independent company and in my experience, they have their own criteria for who does/doesn't get funding & the dentist has no say.

A bit like buying a car on finance, the sales man will have to final say on whether the costumer gets finance or not!

mathanxiety · 02/06/2011 15:09

'There is a contract here between the woman and her ex-boyfriend.' No there is not, MrGimpy, neither verbal nor written. He was giving her the veneers as a gift. Unless you are suggesting she was sleeping with him in return for the veneers and when she stopped doing that (because he dumped her) then she reneged on her end of the agreement?

Nor is there any hint that the woman signed any sort of contract with the dentist that involved her agreeing to pay or to be responsible for payment if the BF didn't pay. The document she may have signed was probably consent to the procedure, not consent to be responsible for the bill, as far as the OP knows.

OP, I am glad your friend will no longer have anything to do with the BF. That was the worst case scenario outcome here.

However, I think the dentist sounds just as dodgy in his own way. He has accepted clients from this man whom he knows is a scumbag in the past and presumably accepted payment in unmarked envelopes too. I do not like the company he keeps, and he seems to know this former BF of your friend well.

He may have taken out a loan or line of credit himself to cover the costs of the procedure and your friend may now be paying back his loan with interest. If this is how he did it, he can probably hide the income just as he could have done with the cash transaction. No doubt he has a cash payment arrangement with the company that makes the veneers (he may well own or partly own it). I don't think anyone could possibly 'push' an established institution to give credit to someone who was turned down multiple times before. What paperwork will she have to sign? What collateral will she have to put up? She needs a solicitor.

mathanxiety · 02/06/2011 15:13

Breathing, the young woman is a believer in fairy tales who was taken in by a sugar daddy.

Plenty of women get expensive engagement rings, anniversary bands, etc., from men and there is no expectation that the women will have to pay.

breathing · 02/06/2011 16:48

A woman who accepted a gift maybe worth £5000 after a few months. Glad she is sorted but silly girl. I think its awful but she does need to take some responsibility.
Engagement rings get given back (or should).

mathanxiety · 02/06/2011 18:00

That is the point about this being a form of assault. There is nothing to give back. She is now forced to pay for something that wasn't her idea in the first place.

All this young woman is responsible for is believing in fairy tales and accepting a gift, but if someone says they will give you a gift, be it large or small, and you are happy with the idea and think the giver is ok with it too, that acceptance doesn't constitute an agreement to pay for the gift.

breathing · 02/06/2011 18:08

Im sorry I dont agree. I dont by any means think its the poor girl's "fault" but think she shouldnt be held up as an innocent lamb. She is a woman, not a child, who accepted a very expensive gift from a man she knew only a few months. Everyone , even the dentist, seems to be being held more responsible than she is. Like I said, I am glad it will be ok but, fair play, she needs to be held responsible as well.

mathanxiety · 02/06/2011 18:15

At what point of expensiveness does a gift become the responsibility of the receiver to pay for? Or is it the price that makes you think she should pay?

breathing · 02/06/2011 18:16

Its the not accepting it I was thinking more of tbh

breathing · 02/06/2011 18:17

Gold digging idiot who got what she deserved some might say

springydaffs · 02/06/2011 18:32

The whole things stinks doesn't it - man, dentist, finance company. Perhaps they're all masons? Or the mafia. I sincerely hope your friend realises this man is frighteningly bad news. Perhaps she could wait a (long) while and then inform the police? Something very fishy is going on between those 3 and I think the law will be interested to hear about it, to keep an eye on them apart from anything.

mathanxiety · 02/06/2011 18:36

If I had to pay 5K for everything stupid I have done in my life I'd have been in negative figures a long time ago. I think that's a steep price to pay for naivete. (Ultimately worth it if it keeps her from having anything more to do with this man or any more of his ilk though)

But still, does she deserve some sort of punishment for being lied to?

suburbophobe · 02/06/2011 18:47

I agree, very fishy, what dentist would tell you you will be shot by someone he knows as a client Shock and the fact that she is not the first to be brought in to him to have her teeth done.

As for her, she was either massively naive or doesn't want to look at reality (and OP's posts would suggest that), like my dad always said "there IS no free lunch"....

jasper · 02/06/2011 21:44

springdaffs I really don't understand why the police would be in the least interested.
And in what way do the dentist and the finance company stink?

I have patients with extremely colourful criminal pasts. What they do in their own time is of no concern of mine whatsoever. I treat them with the utmost respect, as they do me. if they introduce their friends to me , same applies.

Does that make me dodgy?

sarahtigh · 02/06/2011 23:09

it is not prefessional to refuse to treat anyone on the basis of their past whether criminal or not, sometimes it is really difficult in the morning you could be treating a lady whose tooth was broken she says by her drunken husband then 2 hours later that husband is your patient, my treating them does not make me approve or condone such behaviour in fact the duty of patient confidentiality means I must treat each as if I know nothing about the other may need to write police report about injuries etc, but can not judge or refuse to treat alleged or indeed refuse if he was found guilty though a good receptionist if aware would try and ensure they were not booked in at same time.
neither unless you believe someone elses life is in danger do you go ringing police informing on patients yes if someone told you they were going to kill someone else but not if they said they had smashed a shop window last night; just the same way a ambulance man will not tell the police a patient took illegal drugs etc
jasper is right she is not dodgy just professional, to the dentist the EX is a satisfied customer who then recommends him to others, the way all businesses depend on recommendation by satisfied clients