Peter, Paul and Larry?


My apologies to the famous group of folk singers (Peter,Paul and Mary) but this post is not a musical one. This is about the tendency of dentists (myself included) for sometimes borrowing from Peter to pay Paul. Dental practice have regularly reoccurring bills to pay, including quarterly taxes, payroll taxes, payroll, rent and dental supply bills. Unfortunately sometimes our weekly or monthly cashflow does not cooperate in a timely enough fashion to allow funding these payments. I try to squirrel away taxes in a separate savings account for tax payments and I have another savings that I keep that Chase uses to dip into for any overdrafts from my checking account. I also maintain a generous credit line with Chase and I have an IRA that could be dipped into for emergencies ( So far I haven't had to go that route).

For my practice the two most stressful financial challenges I face are in August and in December. In August  and the end of December,  many New Yorkers, myself included, take vacations. My office is closed for two weeks  and give my staff is off as well. That means that no checks are deposited for half a month. I do ask Ida my office manager to come in one day towards the end of vacation to open mail, book appointments and make a deposit in our bank account.

Of course to help compensate for these swings in our cash flow, during time off, it helps to have sufficient money set aside to fund these down times. That being said, it doesn't always happen. These planned office closures are planned months in advance and even if we have to borrow from Peter to pay Paul, we go ahead and take these vacations.

How do I handle my recurring payments that are due during my vacation? Usually by juggling my cash between accounts, credit cards and credit lines. Since I have just returned from Cape Cod and my mind is still thinking nautically, I often use the boating analogy that my ship is taking on water and hopefully I will be able to pump it out when I return. I have been dealing with financial uncertainties for over 35 years and some years I take on debt ( years of famine)  and others (years of feast) I pay down my debt. So far things over all tend to work out and my debt service at the moment is less than most other dentists I know.

Most people think dentists are rich since our practices  take in significant amounts of monies but the truth is we still may have to juggle our finances from time to time. Most of the time things work out since it is only a temporary measure.   Yesterday I called into the office and spoke to my office manager who had come into open the mail and make a deposit. She had some good news. We had a large number of checks in the mail and she had made a significant enough deposit that neither Peter nor Paul had any cause to complain this summer!



from Ask Dr. Spindel - http://lspindelnycdds.blogspot.com/2018/08/peter-paul-and-larry.html - http://lspindelnycdds.blogspot.com/

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