NHS contracts can be cancelled by a dentist with three months notice. A handbook containing the NHS Terms of Service and current fee scale is provided to each dentist registering for NHS work. Patients have access to an NHS complaints procedure. A small amount of clinical work is randomly sampled and some dentists are targeted based on unusual prescribing patterns. There is much less NHS work done on London and the south east of England and much more done in the north of England.
Private practice is more common in London and the south east of England.
There is no private complaints procedure but private patients can take action through the County Court as with other services. There is no sampling of private clinical work. Modified capitation Dentists can offer treatment for a monthly fee, which is based on the risk of treatment and the level of service provided. Because the plans include trauma insurance and exclude laboratory fees, they are called modified capitation plans. The fee is is set by the dentist.