Rip Off Britain - Spectacles

stu1505

Sorry to repeat what has already been written, but after 25 years in the industry it is really annoying when we are accused of ripping people off.
I agree that the raw materials for the lenses are inexpensive, but it should be remembered that the Opticians don't make the lenses, we buy them from a lens manufacturer who must also try to make a profit. Every pair of lenses are different, the range of prescriptions are huge, not to mention the range of materials, finishes etc. which may be required and the lab must be prepared for any of these.

The eye examination, as has been quoted earlier, costs much more to conduct than the £20-£30 charged, due to the cost of employing an Optometrist, purchasing and maintaining all of the equipment required to conduct a full eye examination (which is expected by customers and also by legislation). Unless we all want to start paying in excess of £60 for an eye exam, this cost must be recouped somewhere, and the only way of doing this is to build it into the cost of glasses.
Every customer that leaves a practice with their prescription to visit a website or non testing 'shop' (who do not have any of these costs) will inflate the price of product for everyone else! The web sites don't need the floor space or the expense of stocking the 500+ frames that a patient in an optical practice would expect to be able to view and try on, they just need to have a photo of them and know they can order them.
It is possible in most practices to buy budget glasses, with basic frames and lenses. However we should not be accused of ripping people off by recommending products which will improve appearance, comfort or visual quality. They are after all recommendations not compulsary.
Whenever I am dispensing a pair of glasses, I always think, what would I have or what would I give to my friends or family if this was their prescription. I would hate for anyone to leave and feel that I had ripped them off.

twinkle1981_2

Oldbiggles wrote: »

Curses! Curses!
Don’t it make you want to swear?.
I’ve watched ‘’BBC’s ‘Rip Off Britain’’ today.
Once again Opticians have been exposed as money grubbing parasites, (or words to that effect).
The presenters of this programme; Angela Rippon, Gloria Hunniford and Jennie Bond have highlighted just how much lenses cost and the fantastic mark-up charged by spectacle providers.
It seems that 25 pence is the average cost of lenses, and that includes the more complex ones, so how on earth can Opticians justify the extortionate average charge for specs of £150 a pair? Which I've just paid a month ago.

Sick! Sick! :mad::mad::mad:

I work in an opticians and have never come across a complex lens that cost around 25 pence. Or a standard lens for that matter.

rustyboy21

twinkle1981 wrote: »

I work in an opticians and have never come across a complex lens that cost around 25 pence. Or a standard lens for that matter.

25p for a lens is more than likely the piece of plastic which is unfinished, unshaped and in effect a block of plastic, before you wonderful optician people get hold of it and grind it,polish it,shape it and fit it to our frames.

Why dont the opticians all get together and have a budget end range where you supply the customer with a cheap tacky frame, the piece of plastic and some wet and dry sandpaper, so the patient can DIY it? Think you could make a small margin, selling them at £10 a pair? Obviously you would need to charge full price for the test though, maybe £60?

That may shut these moaners up once and for all.

Have any opticians thought of charging full price for a test, say £80 and saying we will refund the cost of it, if you buy from us? Is it legal and can you opt out of the NHS subsidy like dentists have? The more people who wont pay for the script, stop clogging up test appointments for the likes of us, who dont want to buy off the internet, then I wont have to wait 3 weeks next time for my test.

Arg

rustyboy21 wrote: »

That may shut these moaners up once and for all.

The only people who are moaning are some opticians saying our eyes will fall out if we don't [STRIKE]spend more than we need to[/STRIKE] get their magic eyetest every other week.

rustyboy21

Arg wrote: »

The only people who are moaning are some opticians saying our eyes will fall out if we don't [STRIKE]spend more than we need to[/STRIKE] get their magic eyetest every other week.

I don't think you have caught the gist of the thread here

There are people moaning that opticians are ripping them off and the rest are saying there are reasons why glasses cost so much when you purchase them. Do you wear specs? if so you would realise that you only have a test approx every 2 years, which is also heavily subsidised by the opticians themselves.;)

Jeff_Bridges_hair

rustyboy21 wrote: »

I don't think you have caught the gist of the thread here

There are people moaning that opticians are ripping them off and the rest are saying there are reasons why glasses cost so much when you purchase them. Do you wear specs? if so you would realise that you only have a test approx every 2 years, which is also heavily subsidised by the opticians themselves.;)

Oh come on dont let the facts get in the way of heresay and BBC scaremongering.

CPMCOptom

I dont know why I bothered qualifying as an optometrist if the public think we're just money grabbers. Opticians were once a valued service and now its come to this, ridiculous. We actually look after the health of your eyes first and give glasses second. As far as spectacles go think about how much you pay for dental treatment or private healthcare. Its the same thing but you think you're getting ripped off, fair enough I for one hate people who think we're just after their money thats not why I got into healthcare now I wish I didn't. Without us a LOT of people would be walking around with undiagnosed diabetes, high blood pressure, cancer, brain tumours, high cholesterol to name just a few. You think we're going to do that for free those who are charging low prices for frame undervalue our ability and service to the general public. We care about our patients we are NOT there to rip you off but what we charge for a sight test is peanuts compared to the service we are providing you. Most people think you go to the opticians to get specs, correct you do, but we look after the health of your eyes first and foremost, remember that!!

hansi

CPMCOptom wrote: »

I dont know why I bothered qualifying as an optometrist if the public think we're just money grabbers. Opticians were once a valued service and now its come to this, ridiculous. We actually look after the health of your eyes first and give glasses second. As far as spectacles go think about how much you pay for dental treatment or private healthcare. Its the same thing but you think you're getting ripped off, fair enough I for one hate people who think we're just after their money thats not why I got into healthcare now I wish I didn't. Without us a LOT of people would be walking around with undiagnosed diabetes, high blood pressure, cancer, brain tumours, high cholesterol to name just a few. You think we're going to do that for free those who are charging low prices for frame undervalue our ability and service to the general public. We care about our patients we are NOT there to rip you off but what we charge for a sight test is peanuts compared to the service we are providing you. Most people think you go to the opticians to get specs, correct you do, but we look after the health of your eyes first and foremost, remember that!!

Yes, I accept what you say but I think that most gripes are about the very high cost of the actual spectacles which vary widely. I, myself, have a very strong varifocal prescription, for which I was quoted over £200 by a well known high street optician. I eventually bought them for £60 from a small specialist shop in my town.I Have bought from them before with no problems Yes, I know you're going to say there's a difference with makes of lenses, but I can see fine through them so why should I have to pay £200 plus!

phead

rustyboy21 wrote: »

25p for a lens is more than likely the piece of plastic which is unfinished, unshaped and in effect a block of plastic, before you wonderful optician people get hold of it and grind it,polish it,shape it and fit it to our frames.

"optician people" err, you mean the machine that does it.

Lets stop this propping up of a rip off business, my friend used to manage a chain opticians in a small town, they did £1M clear profit every year. The internal prices(note not trade price) for lenses are about £5 for basic ones, raising up as they get more complex. The coating are already built in so don't fall for that scam, the cost is the same with or without them. Basic frames start from about £9 going upwards, they are all about the brand not the quality, posh brands cost more.

optometrists used to make big money, an independent within a chain used to do 200K easy, as they got a percentage of the spend of every customer that they handed over to the sales staff. That has gone down lately though , as many more of them are just employed by the branch on a salary. Yes an eye test is cheap, as the high price of the glasses paid for it, but that is their problem. The public are getting wise, the glasses cash machine is running dry.

Nilrem

And the cost of that machine?
Both in initial outlay and running costs? (not to mention the trained staff who do a lot of the bits the machine can't do, and keep the machine running)/

It's very easy to say something costs pennies - if you just look at the raw materials - I can go and get sand by the ton for £30 from my local builders merchant (and they're ripping me off as it only costs pennies per ton to pull it out of the ground...), so why does a sheet of glass cost so much? I mean it's only sand and some time on the machine that makes it.
Come to think of it, why does that Intel CPU I've been looking at cost over £200...it's only a few grams of silicone with some impurities

When you pay for glasses you're paying for
The training (usually ongoing), and time of usually 3 of 4 people (optician + the people that fit the glasses, and admin staff) at the Opticians.
The cost of the premises the optician works in (usually not exactly cheap).
The cost of the Opticians equipment and show stock - usually requiring regular maintenance and replacement.
The cost of getting the lenses actually made (which might only be a few pounds for a basic lens but for more complex lenses that will go up a lot) - and all the associated costs with the machinery. Yes a lens might cost 25p in raw materials, but it might also take several hours on a number multimillion pound machine to go from the solid optical quality glass or plastic block to the finishing machine*...
The cost of the frames (and for designer frames it won't be the Optician who makes the biggest profit on them).
The cost of getting someone to fit the lenses into the frames (something that I believe is still labour intensive as there are a lot of variables).

Compare the cost of your opticians appointment to say the cost of a plumber - now one costs about £30 for the appointment lasting 15-30 minutes minimum at his premises, and is usually "free" if you buy the product (glasses) from them, the other is likely to cost you £70+ not including any parts for someone who has lower level of training, no overheads for a nice shiny premises, and for something that isn't a necessity for health.



*IIRC the shops that can "make" glasses on site in under an hour just do the finishing on the largely completed lenses (they'll have blanks that are nearly done to certain specifications so it only takes a short time to actually get them to a range of final specifications) and fit them.