Doctors are killing it

Everyone raised valid points in terms of why gp's and vets can charge R600+ for 15 minutes of consultation, whether they can help you or not, they have high costs to cover. Insurance, Liability, Secretaries, Assistants etc. It makes perfectly sense.

Why do we have the mindset though that other professional, such as Architects, Technologists, Draughtsman must be paid below the professional rates. How are they supposed to cover their fees or survive in the long term.

It is actually a rhetorical question. The building industry in SA is dead or at least in a very bad place, has been for many years. Yes, even though worldwide there is an economic depression currently, what South Africa has been experiencing for the last 10 years plus is very concerning. Building industry has some serious other challenges they face such as having to pay a middleman to be able to do work for the government or other big companies having to comply with the racial laws and quatas and connections and tender bosses. Architectural firms have to underpay their professionals and has to charge below SACAP rates in order to land jobs, even though technically it is illegal, they have no choice. Government and big contracts aside. The private individual has the mindset to only pay 0.5-1% of the building cost for a professional or experienced person to design, develop and prepare their project. This is the case in KZN anyways. Maybe things are better in JHB and CPT.

1697053992109.png

But lets take the user above as an example. Willing to pay R140 psqm. In KZN that is 1% of the building cost. The reality is that it is actually a lot more expensive to build. Lets say the designer lives in the fantasy world of the client and takes a month on the project (this is not really realistic, but whatever). Consulting, Concept. Prelim. Design Development. Municipal Approval Drawings. Specifications. Local Municipal process. Changes. Petrol. Phone Calls. Consultations. Changes. Communication with Engineers, Surveyors, Clients wife has an opinion, Changes..... etc. etc. etc..... Lets say it is a 140 sqm house. That is less than R20 000 for the month. Software alone for the year is 70-100K for the year ,depending on what all is needed. For a single person. Then there is rental, transport, expenses......

Besides my 30% maths. Something just doesn't add up.


We pay a doctor that per day.
 
Doctors actually don't make that much. I actually think that GP's are royally screwed over by Medical Aids as the amount that they will pay for a consultation hasn't increased by much over the past 15-20 years.

Let's input some real values in.

1) Reimbursement for a 15-20 min consultation R400-R450.
2) The GP works for 6.5 hours a day, 5 days a week. 1 hour for a lunch break and 0.5 hours of work for the time that they have to pay for their holiday when they're not getting paid assuming they take about 15-20 days of leave a year.

That works out to R156000 a month. Bad debt in a medical practice makes up at least one third of fees.
Other monthly expenses:
Secretary/receptionist- R15000
Rent- R6000
Malpractice insurance for a GP- R2000
Professional and association fees- R1000 (averaged monthly)
Billing company at 5% of collections- R5000
Consumables- R2000

From what is left over they still have to pay tax.

The average GP comes home with around 50-60 k a month. Much less if you're not as busy. It's not worth it at all if you consider another professional's pay with the equivalent qualifications and years of experience.
 
Jaxie said:
Doctors actually don't make that much. I actually think that GP's are royally screwed over by Medical Aids as the amount that they will pay for a consultation hasn't increased by much over the past 15-20 years.

Let's input some real values in.

1) Reimbursement for a 15-20 min consultation R400-R450.
2) The GP works for 6.5 hours a day, 5 days a week. 1 hour for a lunch break and 0.5 hours of work for the time that they have to pay for their holiday when they're not getting paid assuming they take about 15-20 days of leave a year.

That works out to R156000 a month. Bad debt in a medical practice makes up at least one third of fees.
Other monthly expenses:
Secretary/receptionist- R15000
Rent- R6000
Malpractice insurance for a GP- R2000
Professional and association fees- R1000 (averaged monthly)
Billing company at 5% of collections- R5000
Consumables- R2000

From what is left over they still have to pay tax.

The average GP comes home with around 50-60 k a month. Much less if you're not as busy. It's not worth it at all if you consider another professional's pay with the equivalent qualifications and years of experience.
Click to expand...
These are valid points. But they are also like 3 or 4 GP's in the practice / doctors rooms. Sharing a secretary and a nurse.

I think the tone of my OP came out wrong though. Private Medical is a luxury for now, and an extra tax we pay, or those who can afford it, due to government corruption and incompetence, until NHI kicks in fully anyways and noone will be able to see a doctor. I question the 6.5 hours though as I think there are not enough good doctors (and vets) and I see them work till very late at times. Nevermind that they probably go to the hospital as well.

I think I am just a bit in shock how bad the construction and architectural industry in SA is. Go to the doc and pay R600 for 15 min. No questions asked. See a potential client(s) wanting to pay R10 000 for the design and drawings for a house. That barely covers the software licensing.

/sigh

I'm sure things will get better. Must just continue trying.
 
VBot said:
To be fair, it is not just South Africa. You read about this in basically every country. It is staggering what is happening globally.
Click to expand...
Absolutely. But I think we have been there before the global crisis. The industry here face other issues on top of that. If there is a global recovery, we will continue on a downward trend unless there is some extraordinary change of events.
 
in a free market, one should study and become whatever you think is best for you. We have a 'fairly' free market
 
Had surgery a month ago, just the hospital stay was R52k for being there 4.5 hours.

That's excluding the surgeon and anesthesiologist, luckily medical aid paid that.
 
RedViking said:
R600 for 15 minutes. Fully booked the whole day. R15-R20 000 a day?

Doctor us currently on a yacht trip in the Bahamas though. Will be back in 2 weeks.

Let's don't mention lawyers charging R2000+ an hour. Even the time they spent on the loo.

Estate Agents..... Let's don't even talk about those snakes....

And yet people don't even want to pay R10 000 for municipal approval drawings for a R4 000 000 house.

Something seriously wrong with this place.
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I can comment based on chatting to a lawyer friend who was partner at his small firm, and charged R1300 / h.

First R80K per month goes to his expenses. That's building, reception, secretary, IT etc.
He also doesn't charge full rates for some things. If he needs to respond to an email, he needs to pull up the client file, refresh his memory, think about the answer, maybe just read the contract / whatever again and then actually type a well thought out answer. I know when I as a developer type up an answer to a customer query, it easily takes 30 minutes.
I expect lawyers answers to take longer since they have hundreds of active files at a time. If your lawyer charges you full price to reply to an email, most people will **** their pants, so he doesn't.
Then there's dead time (like waiting at the court) which he usually doesn't charge full rate, travel time, other discounts etc. I think he said he averages less than 5 hours billing per day.
And then there's people that don't pay or take a long time paying, which reduces his income even more.

Lets just say that if you are an honest and fair lawyer, the pay isn't always that good.

Then again, a friend had a lawyer with her when she went to court for a DV case. They waited hours in line (first the wrong line due to the lawyer), and the lawyer charged full fee for all of that wait time. That lawyer obviously coins it.
 
Rickster said:
Had surgery a month ago, just the hospital stay was R52k for being there 4.5 hours.

That's excluding the surgeon and anesthesiologist, luckily medical aid paid that.
Click to expand...
1992+-Digitilization remifications/symptoms....What you see are all Symptoms.
Capitalist/Communist/Socialist systems are destroying themselves from the inside out, and yet they don't understand why, thats how deeply abstract the problem is.
 
RedViking said:
Everyone raised valid points in terms of why gp's and vets can charge R600+ for 15 minutes of consultation, whether they can help you or not, they have high costs to cover. Insurance, Liability, Secretaries, Assistants etc. It makes perfectly sense.

Why do we have the mindset though that other professional, such as Architects, Technologists, Draughtsman must be paid below the professional rates. How are they supposed to cover their fees or survive in the long term.

It is actually a rhetorical question. The building industry in SA is dead or at least in a very bad place, has been for many years. Yes, even though worldwide there is an economic depression currently, what South Africa has been experiencing for the last 10 years plus is very concerning. Building industry has some serious other challenges they face such as having to pay a middleman to be able to do work for the government or other big companies having to comply with the racial laws and quatas and connections and tender bosses. Architectural firms have to underpay their professionals and has to charge below SACAP rates in order to land jobs, even though technically it is illegal, they have no choice. Government and big contracts aside. The private individual has the mindset to only pay 0.5-1% of the building cost for a professional or experienced person to design, develop and prepare their project. This is the case in KZN anyways. Maybe things are better in JHB and CPT.

View attachment 1600876

But lets take the user above as an example. Willing to pay R140 psqm. In KZN that is 1% of the building cost. The reality is that it is actually a lot more expensive to build. Lets say the designer lives in the fantasy world of the client and takes a month on the project (this is not really realistic, but whatever). Consulting, Concept. Prelim. Design Development. Municipal Approval Drawings. Specifications. Local Municipal process. Changes. Petrol. Phone Calls. Consultations. Changes. Communication with Engineers, Surveyors, Clients wife has an opinion, Changes..... etc. etc. etc..... Lets say it is a 140 sqm house. That is less than R20 000 for the month. Software alone for the year is 70-100K for the year ,depending on what all is needed. For a single person. Then there is rental, transport, expenses......

Besides my 30% maths. Something just doesn't add up.


We pay a doctor that per day.
Click to expand...
You're in the wrong area. Try the garden route.

Builders booked up 18 months in advance, just about every open plot sold and being built on, and older houses getting renovated. Just in my short 400m street there are 5 projects on the go. If I walk the dog, I pass maybe 20 projects. 18-22k per square is the going rate.

I've got some architect friends, and never see them these days. They work day and night, coining it while the going is good.
 
notayoba said:
You're in the wrong area. Try the garden route.

Builders booked up 18 months in advance, just about every open plot sold and being built on, and older houses getting renovated. Just in my short 400m street there are 5 projects on the go. If I walk the dog, I pass maybe 20 projects. 18-22k per square is the going rate.

I've got some architect friends, and never see them these days. They work day and night, coining it while the going is good.
Click to expand...
Awesome! Will reach out to some architects that side.
 
Jaxie said:
Doctors actually don't make that much. I actually think that GP's are royally screwed over by Medical Aids as the amount that they will pay for a consultation hasn't increased by much over the past 15-20 years.

Let's input some real values in.

1) Reimbursement for a 15-20 min consultation R400-R450.
2) The GP works for 6.5 hours a day, 5 days a week. 1 hour for a lunch break and 0.5 hours of work for the time that they have to pay for their holiday when they're not getting paid assuming they take about 15-20 days of leave a year.

That works out to R156000 a month. Bad debt in a medical practice makes up at least one third of fees.
Other monthly expenses:
Secretary/receptionist- R15000
Rent- R6000
Malpractice insurance for a GP- R2000
Professional and association fees- R1000 (averaged monthly)
Billing company at 5% of collections- R5000
Consumables- R2000

From what is left over they still have to pay tax.

The average GP comes home with around 50-60 k a month. Much less if you're not as busy. It's not worth it at all if you consider another professional's pay with the equivalent qualifications and years of experience.
Click to expand...
Theres a string of parasitic costs attached to a string of parasitic services/products etc(With digital its so easy and fast=A dangerous abstract game) that end up killing to golden duck in this game of life=The average individual. The "value" attached to these costs through the whole ecconomic system is so huge that the effect is exponential spiralling upwards out of control due to the nature of it(It feeds on itself as a result), thats it has the potential to destroy any monetary system over time. It will kill the host eventually, and to recover from that in one to three generations will be hardly possible, due to educated lack of foresight & common sense, this outcome cannot be seen, or forseen, so unfortunately this cycle must go its course and destroy, which leaves the good people of the world found in each country vanurable to ever have a good life ever again in their lifetimes and taken over by sofisticated criminality, a crime against humanity if you ever going to see one.
 
Moto Guzzi said:
Theres a string of parasitic costs attached to a string of parasitic services/products etc(With digital its so easy and fast=A dangerous abstract game) that end up killing to golden duck in this game of life=The average individual. The "value" attached to these costs through the whole ecconomic system is so huge that the effect is exponential spiralling upwards out of control due to the nature of it(It feeds on itself as a result), thats it has the potential to destroy any monetary system over time. It will kill the host eventually, and to recover from that in one to three generations will be hardly possible, due to educated lack of foresight & common sense, this outcome cannot be seen, or forseen, so unfortunately this cycle must go its course and destroy, which leaves the good people of the world found in each country vanurable to ever have a good life ever again in their lifetimes and taken over by sofisticated criminality, a crime against humanity if you ever going to see one.
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I read that twice and I still don't understand what I just read.
 
MagNorthDigital said:
I've met some incredible veterinarians, I'm talking delivering a foal at 2am dedicated. Your doctor needs to go back to Cuba. His first family misses him dearly.
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He is actually the local GP, I was being facetious. He is as Afrikaans as I am (ja, ek is 'n Boertjie). I have huge respect for vets.
 
McRuder said:
Went to see a specialist the other day. I saw his day's calendar at the counter. Approx 16 appointments between 800 and 1200 at R2000 each, then 12 x Angios at R105k each. R1.3 mill for the day.
Click to expand...

On the operation side they usually pay something like 40% to the hospital, 20% to the anesthesiologist etc., but it's still a few R100k into the pocket (before tax).
 
RedViking said:
Everyone raised valid points in terms of why gp's and vets can charge R600+ for 15 minutes of consultation, whether they can help you or not, they have high costs to cover. Insurance, Liability, Secretaries, Assistants etc. It makes perfectly sense.
...

We pay a doctor that per day.
Click to expand...

I saw an article today talking about the suicide rate among veterinarians in the US. For men it's 2x and for women 4x higher than the national average.

www.bbc.com

The acute suicide crisis among veterinarians: 'You're always going to be failing somebody'

Suicide rates among veterinarians are staggering. The crisis is dire – but there may be hope in sight.
www.bbc.com www.bbc.com
 
animal531 said:
I saw an article today talking about the suicide rate among veterinarians in the US. For men it's 2x and for women 4x higher than the national average.

www.bbc.com

The acute suicide crisis among veterinarians: 'You're always going to be failing somebody'

Suicide rates among veterinarians are staggering. The crisis is dire – but there may be hope in sight.
www.bbc.com www.bbc.com
Click to expand...
Suicide is high no matter who it is. Society is sick. Pushing all their other woke stuff and more people will get mentally ill. But yeah, I can imagine the medical industry is a mess.

Vet costs are insane though in here they partner with products and suppliers to push a specific brand down your throat.

Sorry, we don't sell Advocate, we only sell Nexgard or whatever. It only cost R50 more but is much better. Suck it up buttercup.

Spent around R5000+ every single month the last 4/5 months just on the dog. The now have her on a monthly subscription service where you have to spend a R600- R1000 on the injections for her skin.

I heard a vet say "if you can't afford our fees, then you should consider not having a dog".

Also if you don't feed them Hills you are evil.

Edit: /it's almost Friday, lighten up!

Edit 2: Just got a reminder I have to take dog to vet for het monthly subscription service injection.
 
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