Just finished your Foundation? What’s changing?

The first and main thing is responsibility. You now have your own number and are launched out into the clinical world as a fully fledged dentist with clinical freedom and a list of patients who have the ability to be pleased with you………. or not.

You also have financial freedom. You move from being an employee under PAYE to self employed status. Only you are now responsible for dealing with your own tax affairs, ensuring that Returns to HM Revenue and Customs are made on time, correctly, and that you are paying the right amount of tax, National Insurance and Student Loan.

This means that first and foremost you have to get your compliance right, and this means taking good advice from a reputable accountant who understands what they are doing. There are a number of HMRC forms which need to be completed which will start off your self employed career. These are quite boring, unless they are not done on time, or correctly, when penalties are imposed and suddenly they become less boring.

You can’t expect to know all the rules and regulations, but your accountant should. You will have enough to do chairside, without worrying what is around the corner from the taxman. So park this up, hand it over to someone who knows what they are doing, and let them do the job you are paying them for, whilst you get on with the job that the patient is paying you for.

A good accountant’s job does not end there. There are wrinkles and nuances in the system which can be approached in different ways, and which can be worked for your advantage, without breaking the rules and putting you in jeopardy. This is where specialist advice comes into its own, as dentists work differently to other professions. They get paid in a unique way, and they work in a world which is at times quite insecure. You need someone on your side who has a detailed awareness of all this, and so can manipulate changes in financial and taxation legislation to suit your specific circumstances, and hand the benefits to you.

You come out of your Foundation at the beginning of September. Your tax from then on will be dealt with the self-employed rules, which means that the profits that you make from 1 September through to 5 April 2025 will give rise to a tax bill the following 31 January, 2026. So it will seem like a tax holiday that first 20 months – but it’s not!

Because your monthly generation of profits will be rising as you become more dexterous, and because of the particular pattern of tax payments for dentists starting in September, the catch-up of tax can produce what may be unexpected tax monsters. This often catches new associates out; finding yourself with a big tax bill without the funds to pay it can be a nasty surprise. This highlights the value of a dental specialist advisor with an understanding of the recurring patterns in the industry.

Moving from Foundation Dentist to Associate involves a change in responsibility level in all sorts of areas. It really pays dividends to work with specialists who will take the responsibility from you in their area of expertise, leaving you free to do what you do best, being a dentist.