40 minutes · £58 · nothing booked on the day

Your first visit, minute by minute

The thing that stops most people booking is not the treatment. It is not knowing what will happen once they sit down. So here is the whole appointment, in order, including the bits people dislike.

Ask for an appointment What it costs
The waiting room at Northlight Dental, with chairs beside a tall window.
  1. 0 min

    You arrive

    Reception is a desk in the same room as the seating, not a hatch. Tell us your name. If you would rather wait outside and be texted when we are ready, say so — a lot of people do.

  2. 5 min

    Paperwork

    One side of A4: medical history, medication, allergies. There is a box for “anything that makes dental treatment difficult for you”. It is worth filling in.

  3. 15 min

    We look

    You sit down, the chair tilts back, and we count and check every tooth, your gums, your tongue and the soft tissue. Nothing is done to you at this stage. You can stop at any point by raising your left hand.

  4. 35 min

    X-rays, if we need them

    Usually two small films to see between the back teeth. If you gag, tell us before we start — there are smaller sensors and there is a way to take the picture from outside your cheek.

  5. 40 min

    We tell you what it costs before anything is booked. You can walk out.

    You get a written plan with a price against every item, in order of what is urgent and what can wait. Nothing is booked in that appointment unless you ask for it. Take it home. Ring us in a month, or in a year.

Before you come

What to bring

A list of your medication
Including anything from a pharmacy. Blood thinners and bisphosphonates change how we plan treatment, and people forget them.
Your last dentist’s name, if you can remember it
Only so we can ask for X-rays and save you having new ones. If you cannot remember, it genuinely does not matter.
Someone, if you want to
Into the surgery as well as the waiting room. It helps more often than not.
Nothing else
No referral, no forms printed at home, no ID. You do not need to have been to a dentist before.
Chairs and a low table beside the window in the waiting room.

Nervous about the dentist?

Turn this on and we will explain everything — what each treatment actually feels like, what the noises are, and how to make us stop. It stays on as you move around the site.

The last stop, and the important one

You are told what it costs before anything is booked. You can walk out.

You leave with a written plan: every item, a price against each one, and an order that says what is urgent and what can wait a year. Nothing is booked in that appointment unless you ask for it. Take it home. Ring us in a month, or in a year, or never — the plan stays valid and the price does not change for twelve months.

Price ambush is the second-biggest reason adults stop going to the dentist, after fear. It is an entirely solvable problem and we have solved it by writing the numbers down.

Every fee we charge Ask for an appointment

If it hurts today

Do not book a first appointment and wait. Ring 0161 496 0999 and say it is pain. We keep slots free every day for exactly this.

What to do right now