New vet schools

[JaynaAli]

I came to add what Minnerbelle just did. I checked my Master Promissory Note this evening (which is the contract between me and the government about these loans). I signed it in 2012, and it lays out standard 10 year, graduated 10 year, standard 25 year, and ICR and IBR 2009 as options for my repayment. If I was on PAYE or REPAYE and those went away I suppose they could yank them since they aren't in my MPN, but the ICR and IBR should still be options (for me) unless the government wants to default on thousands of contracts. My MPN doesn't mention PSLF at all. Luckily, I'm in a position like TwelveTigers in that I only took out three years worth of tuition so I don't owe a whole lot. During internship and residency I paid a couple hundred dollars a month just to keep the interest minimized as much as possible. Now that I'm a specialist I've started making much bigger payments and should have things paid off in about 18 more months...I thought about refinancing, but they weren't offering much better interest rates and I like having the possibility of getting back on an income-driven plan if I were to get laid off or something.

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[that redhead]

Like @batsenecal and @Minnerbelle say, there’s so much that can change in your life that you never expect. A lot of us went from undergrad to vet school and were already kinda used to eating ramen and not spending a ton so we figure it’s all good, we’ll just keep doing it.

But vet school already makes you feel like your life is on hold (SO many people compare themselves to their peers on social media who are traveling, getting married, etc). Who wants to keep living that life when you’re even further into adulthood?

Again, not meant to discourage outright, just more food for thought and hopefully encouragement to get your finances in order, figure out a budget and a long term plan for how to handle the debt.

 

[Coopah]

Like @batsenecal and @Minnerbelle say, there’s so much that can change in your life that you never expect. A lot of us went from undergrad to vet school and were already kinda used to eating ramen and not spending a ton so we figure it’s all good, we’ll just keep doing it.

But vet school already makes you feel like your life is on hold (SO many people compare themselves to their peers on social media who are traveling, getting married, etc). Who wants to keep living that life when you’re even further into adulthood?

Again, not meant to discourage outright, just more food for thought and hopefully encouragement to get your finances in order, figure out a budget and a long term plan for how to handle the debt.

This is so important. Minimizing school loans and budgeting for the future. I've had classmates take out an extra $11k for a new(er) car against my adamant disapproval and advice (which they asked for). If you need a new car fine but get a car loan! That's like 2% and a five year repayment whereas school loans are 30 years in some cases and interest payments are near or above 7% in some cases! He argued that he didn't want to make payments in school which I understand but then he ended up getting a more expensive car and having a payment anyway and I wanted to bash my head against a wall. He then argued it's a drop in the bucket. Which is definitely not a good reason to take out more money. So many classmates take out extra to travel or go on international and expensive externships and it hurts me. I never day anything to anyone who doesn't ask but still... oof.

 

[alygar]

Thank you all so much for your replies. Everything you've referenced is something I've considered (wanting to get married/buy a home/have kids/travel/support said kids in their endeavors) which is why I am unsure what I should/will do. Of course I wouldn't be doing those things alone and would have a combined income, but still my decisions will greatly impact that future life. It's very sad to think the goal I've worked towards my entire life is now in reach and I might not even give it a shot, though. I might PM some of you to ask further questions but thanks again for all the food for thought.

 

[zoogrl29]

This is so important and something that isn’t brought up on this forum often. Think really hard about where your life will be in 10 years and what you might want, especially for the 85-90% of us females whose fertility periods are finite. If you don’t ever want kids, good for you. But for everyone else, it’s worth thinking about. For those thinking about going to school now and accumulating a **** ton of debt, it’s so hard to imagine how your life will change over the next 5-10 years which will be just your first 5 or so years in this dream career.

Typically mat leave is unpaid. There are so many veterinarians who go back to work 2-4 weeks after giving birth because they can’t afford to not work. If you work somewhere that is production pay with negative accrual, you not only use up all of your vacation and sick days for that short mat leave... you owe your employer thousands of dollars when you get back. You’ve likely dug yourself in a hole you can’t get out of. So your income drops to just your base salary which is awful for most people who rely on their production bonuses.

And in order to pay your student loans and earn a living, you have to continue working full time at the same grueling pace you thought was fine as a young 20 something year old because again, this is your “dream job.” In order to work your child needs full time daycare which can run $2000-3000 of your after tax cash per month. So now you have your mortgage sized student loan payment (even on PAYE you still need to save for tax at the end), and maybe a real mortgage on a house cause what doctor wants to raise their children in a rented apartment?, AND childcare which is another mortgage payment. Yup three rather large mortgages. And these are all fixed costs that go out the window before you even think about money you need to buy necessities for the month. Imagine trying to juggle all of this and being stressed about not having time to spend with your Kids because you have to work so damn much. But it’s ok right...? It’s your dream job after all. It starts to really suck when this one dream prevents you from having any other dreams, esp when it’s not just you suffering through it anymore. You end up dragging your family through it. And for many people, this dream job turns out to be anything but. When you have to keep working because you have no choice due to finances, it can become really depressing. There’s a reason why suicide rate is so high.

Never have I thought waiting to this age is a bonus, but my family is grown (my 21 yr old still lives with me, but he helps). Daycare is awful and when you have your kids you won’t want to put them in one. It’s torture. How hard is it for any of you to take a year off? Is it possible? What if you have issues with your pregnancy? I had pre-eclampsia and was on bed rest the last 3mos with my youngest...no working. I was a tech and had no income and went on food stamps etc. I got a job at the local zoo (zookeepers in Fl make the **** they scoop-10 an hr if you’re lucky) and so did my husband and we both worked our schedules around so one of us was always there (I had 3 10’s he had 4). How will you handle it as a Dr. with 150k+ of debt?


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[JaynaAli]

Never have I thought waiting to this age is a bonus, but my family is grown (my 21 yr old still lives with me, but he helps). Daycare is awful and when you have your kids you won’t want to put them in one. It’s torture. How hard is it for any of you to take a year off? Is it possible? What if you have issues with your pregnancy? I had pre-eclampsia and was on bed rest the last 3mos with my youngest...no working. I was a tech and had no income and went on food stamps etc. I got a job at the local zoo (zookeepers in Fl make the **** they scoop-10 an hr if you’re lucky) and so did my husband and we both worked our schedules around so one of us was always there (I had 3 10’s he had 4). How will you handle it as a Dr. with 150k+ of debt?


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I’ve never known of a US vet getting a year off without doing so by quitting their job and then waiting a year to find another. Most of my friends who have had babies while in private practice take 6-8 weeks of maternity leave. And it’s been often unpaid maternity leave and/or people using their vacation to get some money. Sometimes people can use their short term disability insurance to provide some income during maternity leave but that is probably dependent on your benefits. I’ve seen people take as little as 4 weeks, but the two who have done that are people who take their infants to work with them. During my residency, a couple faculty members took 6 months, but I haven’t heard of anyone able to do that in private practice.

 

[Minnerbelle]

Most of my friends who have had babies while in private practice take 6-8 weeks of maternity leave. And it’s been often unpaid maternity leave and/or people using their vacation to get some money. Sometimes people can use their short term disability insurance to provide some income during maternity leave but that is probably dependent on your benefits.

It’s so sad. My classmates are mostly in their mid 30s now so this is all a big deal. Mat leave of 6-8 weeks being common is such an abomination. For most women their bodies are barely functioning normally at that point post partum and newborns are exhausting around the clock. Typically those who are able to take 12-16 weeks off are those with spouses who also bring in decent income. Short term disability is better than nothing, but your employer has to offer it, you had to have had it essentially a year prior to giving birth, and it only gives you like 60% of your salary for up to 6 weeks with the most common plans. Or you get it from the AVMA and there was a huge fiasco this past year about them considering dropping the pregnancy coverage. Short term disability is also expensive.

And if you work for an employer who has ****ty high deductible health insurance plans (cough cough VCA, this is a common complaint...) you might be stuck with like $5,000 in just deductibles if you’re lucky enough that your entire pregnancy and birth occur in the same calendar year... $10k if the pregnancy spans two calendar years. On top of unpaid leave and possible negative accrual. And needing to have other people care for your newborn super early in their lives and spending an arm and a leg for that. Add to it the stress of student loan payments and the daily stress of clinical practice (like **** being a veterinarian in and of itself is a stressful job even if you love it). A lot of vet moms make it work. But it’s a lot, and for many of them it brings on a new level of regret.

 

[Coopah]

It’s so sad. My classmates are mostly in their mid 30s now so this is all a big deal. Mat leave of 6-8 weeks being common is such an abomination. For most women their bodies are barely functioning normally at that point post partum and newborns are exhausting around the clock. Typically those who are able to take 12-16 weeks off are those with spouses who also bring in decent income. Short term disability is better than nothing, but your employer has to offer it, you had to have had it essentially a year prior to giving birth, and it only gives you like 60% of your salary for up to 6 weeks with the most common plans. Or you get it from the AVMA and there was a huge fiasco this past year about them considering dropping the pregnancy coverage. Short term disability is also expensive.

And if you work for an employer who has ****ty high deductible health insurance plans (cough cough VCA, this is a common complaint...) you might be stuck with like $5,000 in just deductibles if you’re lucky enough that your entire pregnancy and birth occur in the same calendar year... $10k if the pregnancy spans two calendar years. On top of unpaid leave and possible negative accrual. And needing to have other people care for your newborn super early in their lives and spending an arm and a leg for that. Add to it the stress of student loan payments and the daily stress of clinical practice (like **** being a veterinarian in and of itself is a stressful job even if you love it). A lot of vet moms make it work. But it’s a lot, and for many of them it brings on a new level of regret.

This is such useful information, even though I never plan on having children. Do companies usually offer negative accrual payment plans? How expensive is short/long term disability through the AVMA? Would you recommend it? Sorry if it's a bit off topic.

 

[battie]

Sorry if it's a bit off topic

Theres no such thing as off topic in vet med!!!

 

[Teepster87]

Another one of my issues with new schools are scholarships, or lack thereof.

My school likes to share that like ~78% of all students get some sort of scholarship through the CVM. A lot of these pools of money have been gifted over the years by past alumni, faculty, etc. With a brand new institution, I think there's going to be a drastic lack of scholarships to go around. There's less relief there, and then even more competition for the handful of scholarships offered from Zoetis/Merck/AVMA/etc.

 

[Minnerbelle]

This is such useful information, even though I never plan on having children. Do companies usually offer negative accrual payment plans? How expensive is short/long term disability through the AVMA? Would you recommend it? Sorry if it's a bit off topic.

payment structure depends on your employer. Prosal isn’t a bad idea in terms of fairness in that as an associate you get paid for the amount of work you do, so you don’t have to worry about your employers lowballing you. And it’s pretty common. Even straight salary, you should be negotiating each year based on how much you produced the year before. Whether or not there’s negative accrual depends on your employer. It’s not uncommon. Before it was super common because it used to be the rule at VCA. But now they let you choose between a few different pay structures. In essence it does exist still no matter what you choose, but 2 of the 3 options will let you minimize the burn by allowing you to reset your negative accrual every quarter or every year. So you only take a “hit” for either the year or quarter that you’re on leave. But you typically end up with a lower base salary.

I would never go without long term disability. If your hand gets mauled and you can’t do your job anymore, you want to still be able to have income for the rest of your life. I have one privately through an independent company and I pay I think about $110/month. It’s a plan that pays out if I can’t work as a general practitioner anymore (but I could still work doing other things), which is the expensive part. Some plans will not pay out if you’re capable of working as a Walmart greeter. For long term disability I would get it independent of your employer because your rate often gets determined at the age you sign up and most people will not stay with the same employer throughout their careers. I use AFLAC through my employer for short term disability though, and I think monthly premium is also something like $110/month. I’ll probably get rid of it once I’m done having kids. My long term kicks in after just 2 months, and we always keep a 6 month emergency fund in our bank account.

when I originally looked into it, I decided against the AVMA plans. But I don’t remember how much they were or what the plan details were. I’m glad I didn’t because they literally almost took away the maternity leave payout this year since they said it’s unfair for those who didn’t plan on having kids as it drove up the premium costs. It’s true that it’s unfair esp as many people only get the insurance for the years they plan on being pregnant, but it sucks to not have an option for STD for mat leave in a profession with so many women without access to paid leave from their employer. It currently covers 4 weeks of leave (again better than nothing, but it’s awful).

 

[LetItSnow]

If you work somewhere that is production pay with negative accrual,

And lest people think this isn't a real thing .... production pay with the possibility of negative accrual is certainly not how everyone is paid, but it is also not at all uncommon. Worse yet, early in your career when your efficiency is low, you likely will be skimming closer to your base pay than later.

And in many cases, you can take however much time you want off (yay unlimited vacation?) .... except that you won't be producing and many employers just keep right on counting that against you. So you take vacation and guess what - you have to just make up that time unless you want to fall behind, unless you have a job that keeps you far enough ahead that you can just eat the loss.

Don't discount this stuff. It matters. Being a vet in today's economic world can really lock you into that decision.

I happen to like ER work, but god forbid I didn't, because I could not even CONSIDER transitioning to GP with what GP docs typically make given my need to support 3 kids and make up retirement savings ground I lost during school. Period. Not an option.

Think about that - taking a job that without some really amazing circumstance you can't afford to leave.

 

[Coopah]

payment structure depends on your employer. Prosal isn’t a bad idea in terms of fairness in that as an associate you get paid for the amount of work you do, so you don’t have to worry about your employers lowballing you. And it’s pretty common. Even straight salary, you should be negotiating each year based on how much you produced the year before. Whether or not there’s negative accrual depends on your employer. It’s not uncommon. Before it was super common because it used to be the rule at VCA. But now they let you choose between a few different pay structures. In essence it does exist still no matter what you choose, but 2 of the 3 options will let you minimize the burn by allowing you to reset your negative accrual every quarter or every year. So you only take a “hit” for either the year or quarter that you’re on leave. But you typically end up with a lower base salary.

I would never go without long term disability. If your hand gets mauled and you can’t do your job anymore, you want to still be able to have income for the rest of your life. I have one privately through an independent company and I pay I think about $110/month. It’s a plan that pays out if I can’t work as a general practitioner anymore (but I could still work doing other things), which is the expensive part. Some plans will not pay out if you’re capable of working as a Walmart greeter. For long term disability I would get it independent of your employer because your rate often gets determined at the age you sign up and most people will not stay with the same employer throughout their careers. I use AFLAC through my employer for short term disability though, and I think monthly premium is also something like $110/month. I’ll probably get rid of it once I’m done having kids. My long term kicks in after just 2 months, and we always keep a 6 month emergency fund in our bank account.

when I originally looked into it, I decided against the AVMA plans. But I don’t remember how much they were or what the plan details were. I’m glad I didn’t because they literally almost took away the maternity leave payout this year since they said it’s unfair for those who didn’t plan on having kids as it drove up the premium costs. It’s true that it’s unfair esp as many people only get the insurance for the years they plan on being pregnant, but it sucks to not have an option for STD for mat leave in a profession with so many women without access to paid leave from their employer. It currently covers 4 weeks of leave (again better than nothing, but it’s awful).

And lest people think this isn't a real thing .... production pay with the possibility of negative accrual is certainly not how everyone is paid, but it is also not at all uncommon. Worse yet, early in your career when your efficiency is low, you likely will be skimming closer to your base pay than later.

And in many cases, you can take however much time you want off (yay unlimited vacation?) .... except that you won't be producing and many employers just keep right on counting that against you. So you take vacation and guess what - you have to just make up that time unless you want to fall behind, unless you have a job that keeps you far enough ahead that you can just eat the loss.

Don't discount this stuff. It matters. Being a vet in today's economic world can really lock you into that decision.

I happen to like ER work, but god forbid I didn't, because I could not even CONSIDER transitioning to GP with what GP docs typically make given my need to support 3 kids and make up retirement savings ground I lost during school. Period. Not an option.

Think about that - taking a job that without some really amazing circumstance you can't afford to leave.

Prosal, I've seen the word before but I'm still a little unsure about what exactly it means. It's just pay based on production? I've heard of companies that offer base salary and production bonus, is that the same thing? How do you know if they're going to ding you for negative production before you get a good look at the contract?

Thank you both for all this info!

 

[Minnerbelle]

Prosal, I've seen the word before but I'm still a little unsure about what exactly it means. It's just pay based on production? I've heard of companies that offer base salary and production bonus, is that the same thing? How do you know if they're going to ding you for negative production before you get a good look at the contract?

Thank you both for all this info!

Prosal is production pay with a base salary. It means you’re guaranteed to be paid your base salary and if you produce above that salary you get a bonus. Depends on the contract if it’s monthly, quarterly, yearly, etc... Also depends on your employer what you earn production on. And these details are suuuper important. Some employers are cheap and will not pay their doctors for prescription refills or tech appointment vaccines, and typically you get a very small percentage for preventatives and prescription diets. Some employers will give you production on anything signed off by a veterinarian (products and services). These details make a big difference. Also how busy each practice is makes a big difference. If you’re added on to replace a busy doctor or in a super busy practice with enough business to go around, it’s great. If you’re added on to a practice that was just getting a bit too busy for the existing doctors but not busy enough for an extra doctor, or added on in the hopes of expanding just to give the single doctor owner some time for vacation, you may be in for trouble. You won’t know an employer’s pay style unless you see the contract. If you’re applying for a corporate job it’s more or less standard so you can maybe just ask someone who works at said corporate, but things are still negotiable as far as base salary goes, and if very lucky sometimes percentage of production.

I was lucky. I almost always met production esp before I raised my base salary from $80k to $100k, and my bonuses were on the order of thousands a month leading to about $120k. So losing that extra production would have hurt a lot. I was also lucky that I was productive from day one. I know others who were hired at a practice that didn’t really need a new doctor and they had a low base salary so weren’t paid much AND they were in the hole for over a year just because of the initial couple of months of twiddling their thumbs at work through no fault of their own.

Simplified example: Base salary of 80k with 20% production bonus paid out monthly. Assuming you make 20% on all services and products (typically not true).

With a salary of 80k, monthly you are guaranteed to make $6,666 before taxes. In order to break even with 20% production, you need to sell $33,333 of services and products per month.

Let’s say the month of July is busy and you produce $50,000. You will be paid 20% of that, or $10,000. That means your bonus check is going to be an amazing $3,334 that month. Cha-Ching.

You go on a 2 week vacation overseas in August cause you earned it man. You’re about to burn out because you’ve been double booked all day this past couple of months. It’s still busy so you still manage to produce $25k in half the month. But you still don’t meet production. So you earn yourself a $33,333 - $25,000 = $8,333 x 20% = $-1,666 that month. This means you’ll still be paid the regular $6,666 this month, but any bonus you earn after that will be used to pay back what you owe. In essence you need to produce $8,333 additionally to your usual $33,333 next month to earn a bonus. Imagine instead that you’re not busy and you only earn like $13,333 that month... your hole will be $4000 deep and you’ll need to produce $20,000 extra to make up for it.

Let’s say you have a 4 day work week and work 16 shifts a month. Each day you miss work, you need to produce an additional $2083 to make up for it. That’s can be a big deal when you consider that many appointments run $100-150 for the client. You need to see 10-15 more appointments on top of your usual caseload to make up each missed day to put it in perspective.

 

[that redhead]

@zoogrl29 I started maternity leave on Feb 1 and I’m taking 12 weeks. I can do this because:

1) I’ve been squirreling money from my monthly paycheck and not putting as much as possible toward my loans.

2) My employer is very generously giving me one month paid off of those three months, which she does NOT have to do.

3) My clinic is large enough that FMLA applies.

4) My husband gets two weeks paid paternity leave and has a ton of vacation and sick time he can use. He also has good health insurance we’re both on.

A year is too long for most (all?) places to get by without a vet that they depend on, unfortunately. Depending on speciality, it may be even worse/more limiting because they can’t easily fill that roll with just anyone; one of our local specialists was out for just six weeks. I also worked full time the entire time (37w with two in there) because my clinic needed me. Any advanced time off would have been taken from possible FMLA and it would have been really hard on my employer and coworkers to make it work. And I would have had to come back sooner! I’m very fortunate I had no complications but it happens. Not a job conducive to working from home, obviously!

 

[LetItSnow]

Re: ProSal.

MB explained the basics well. Just a few thoughts.

I <hate> the term 'bonus'. It's not a bonus. You earned that money, pure and simple. Lots of employers use the term bonus, but really, they're just paying you what you've earned that they're contractually obligated to pay you. It bugs me that so many call it a 'bonus' as if it's some generous-hearted gift from your employer. It's not. In actuality, you're giving them an interest-free loan of money you've earned for whatever period of time your payout is. Not saying that isn't still a reasonable pay structure, but it ain't a bonus.

Pro-sal pays you fairly based off what you actually produce while at the same time guaranteeing you at least a base minimum (in most pro-sal implementations, anyway). The penalty for not making enough production to cover your base will differ from implementation to implementation, but is pretty typically something like what MB described.

Some people argue that pro-sal encourages vets to oversell/overcharge. In practice, I have never seen that and I think it is likely rare. Honestly, most vets just want to move cases; trying to get people to pay for things they don't need just means rejected recommendations, so it probably isn't actually worth it.

Last I heard, fairly typical production pay in GP was 20-23%, with some lower and a few higher. In ER, it's usually a titch higher, like 22-25%. I've been lucky to be at 25% since day 1. Most places don't count certain things (some GPs don't count food sales, for instance...... I don't get credit for icu nursing costs, urns for cremation, and a few other minor things).

For me, I ran 60% over base salary this year. I could have quit working in August and, while I wouldn't have gotten the lump sum payout for the last 2 quarters of the year, I would have kept getting my base salary and wrapped up the year. I considered taking December off just to recharge.

You won't know until you get a good look at the contract, but you can (and should) certainly ask what their pay structure is. Remember that as a new vet your efficiency is likely to be low for a while, so your production will be low, so find out how that will be handled and account for it in your budgeting/planning.

 

[LetItSnow]

A year is too long for most (all?) places to get by without a vet that they depend on, unfortunately.

Ironically, we have had a DVM colleague out on medical leave for ... 2 years now. Work-related injury, and according to our lawyers we have to hold her spot forevvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvver.

Makes no sense to me, but .....

 

[that redhead]

@Coopah I was prosal at my first job. @Minnerbelle explains it really well. I would absolutely ask outright if you’ll be penalized at any point for not meeting production, whether it’s your first year out (toughest for me) or in the future if you have kids, get sick, take a longer vacation, etc. Do this before signing, of course. I don’t think I ever didn’t make production but I also started with a lower base. (We’ve discusses that over in the vet forum; people see a low base and freak out and ask for higher butttt that makes it harder to meet your production numbers.) I will say I didn’t like the feeling of having to produce. Not that I would ever recommend anything unnecessary but it just gave me more of a slimey salesman feel. Now I’m on straight salary (which has its own drawbacks too) but I like that I don’t depend on people’s pocketbooks to effect my own.

 

[that redhead]

Ironically, we have had a DVM colleague out on medical leave for ... 2 years now. Work-related injury, and according to our lawyers we have to hold her spot forevvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvver.

Makes no sense to me, but .....

Yikes!

 

[Minnerbelle]

Re: ProSal.

MB explained the basics well. Just a few thoughts.

I <hate> the term 'bonus'. It's not a bonus. You earned that money, pure and simple. Lots of employers use the term bonus, but really, they're just paying you what you've earned that they're contractually obligated to pay you. It bugs me that so many call it a 'bonus' as if it's some generous-hearted gift from your employer. It's not. In actuality, you're giving them an interest-free loan of money you've earned for whatever period of time your payout is. Not saying that isn't still a reasonable pay structure, but it ain't a bonus.

So F@&$ing true! It’s def not a bonus. Just what you earned. There is no such thing as paid time off. No paid sick days. No paid vacation. No paid holidays. The most aggravating thing is when VCA sends you to whole day “paid” training for stupid ass communications and leadership seminars. They say you’re paid because you have a guaranteed paid base. But in reality, you ****ing owe them $2000-2500 in production for going to their stupid thing you don’t even want to go to. This happened to me once for a day where I had to go to a third party “employee satisfaction” focus group. Oh the ****ing irony. I was totally ready to bitch about it but the facilitator was like “so we all know you hate the negative accrual thing so we’re not going to waste time on that”

Some people argue that pro-sal encourages vets to oversell/overcharge. In practice, I have never seen that and I think it is likely rare. Honestly, most vets just want to move cases; trying to get people to pay for things they don't need just means rejected recommendations, so it probably isn't actually worth it.

For the most part, I think most doctors do the right thing. If anything I was more apt to discount **** when I was on production because I felt like it was less of “stealing from the employer” since it meant I was personally penalized for it. So I let more things slide. This is poor behavior on my part, but in the opposite direction than how people think prosal would make you behave.

But I don’t think it’s all that uncommon for negative behaviors to result from prosal. Not necessarily unethical, but you can see it affected some people. In both multi doctor practices I worked at, there was that one doctor that everyone knew was more financially motivated than the rest. I don’t think it was typically that they pushed unnecessary diagnostics (though necessary as we all know is relative), but they tended to have more clients unwilling to see them because their bills would run high with that doctor. Now, you could argue they were practicing “better” medicine, but the clients didn’t perceive that way and every doctor practiced pretty good medicine at these hospitals. Also, when dealing with the random any doctor tasks, the same individuals always seem to be on the lookout for the expensive drug refills, but for some reason the annoying non-money-generating tasks sat in the box forever. And same thing for walk-ins.

One thing I liked was that at one of my hospitals the doctors had made a pact with each other to not burden each other with our own cases. And that was reinforced with the rule that if you needed someone to call a client to discuss labs, your production for that labwork got transferred to the doctor making the call. So if you got stuck dealing with someone else’s shipwreck you at least got paid for it, and it made people less reluctant to pass their **** on to you.

 

[Minnerbelle]

Congrats btw!

@Coopah I was prosal at my first job. @Minnerbelle explains it really well. I would absolutely ask outright if you’ll be penalized at any point for not meeting production, whether it’s your first year out (toughest for me) or in the future if you have kids, get sick, take a longer vacation, etc. Do this before signing, of course.

And if there’s negative accrual, also inquire about whether you would be allowed one reset after starting to account for the blow of not being busy/efficient enough. Once you build clientele and become more efficient and productive, it would be nice to just refresh and start over from 0 so that you are not paying for those first 6-12 months for the next year or more.

 

[Coopah]

Prosal is production pay with a base salary. It means you’re guaranteed to be paid your base salary and if you produce above that salary you get a bonus. Depends on the contract if it’s monthly, quarterly, yearly, etc... Also depends on your employer what you earn production on. And these details are suuuper important. Some employers are cheap and will not pay their doctors for prescription refills or tech appointment vaccines, and typically you get a very small percentage for preventatives and prescription diets. Some employers will give you production on anything signed off by a veterinarian (products and services). These details make a big difference. Also how busy each practice is makes a big difference. If you’re added on to replace a busy doctor or in a super busy practice with enough business to go around, it’s great. If you’re added on to a practice that was just getting a bit too busy for the existing doctors but not busy enough for an extra doctor, or added on in the hopes of expanding just to give the single doctor owner some time for vacation, you may be in for trouble. You won’t know an employer’s pay style unless you see the contract. If you’re applying for a corporate job it’s more or less standard so you can maybe just ask someone who works at said corporate, but things are still negotiable as far as base salary goes, and if very lucky sometimes percentage of production.

I was lucky. I almost always met production esp before I raised my base salary from $80k to $100k, and my bonuses were on the order of thousands a month leading to about $120k. So losing that extra production would have hurt a lot. I was also lucky that I was productive from day one. I know others who were hired at a practice that didn’t really need a new doctor and they had a low base salary so weren’t paid much AND they were in the hole for over a year just because of the initial couple of months of twiddling their thumbs at work through no fault of their own.

Simplified example: Base salary of 80k with 20% production bonus paid out monthly. Assuming you make 20% on all services and products (typically not true).

With a salary of 80k, monthly you are guaranteed to make $6,666 before taxes. In order to break even with 20% production, you need to sell $33,333 of services and products per month.

Let’s say the month of July is busy and you produce $50,000. You will be paid 20% of that, or $10,000. That means your bonus check is going to be an amazing $3,334 that month. Cha-Ching.

You go on a 2 week vacation overseas in August cause you earned it man. You’re about to burn out because you’ve been double booked all day this past couple of months. It’s still busy so you still manage to produce $25k in half the month. But you still don’t meet production. So you earn yourself a $33,333 - $25,000 = $8,333 x 20% = $-1,666 that month. This means you’ll still be paid the regular $6,666 this month, but any bonus you earn after that will be used to pay back what you owe. In essence you need to produce $8,333 additionally to your usual $33,333 next month to earn a bonus. Imagine instead that you’re not busy and you only earn like $13,333 that month... your hole will be $4000 deep and you’ll need to produce $20,000 extra to make up for it.

Let’s say you have a 4 day work week and work 16 shifts a month. Each day you miss work, you need to produce an additional $2083 to make up for it. That’s can be a big deal when you consider that many appointments run $100-150 for the client. You need to see 10-15 more appointments on top of your usual caseload to make up each missed day to put it in perspective.

Holy cow! I never knew! Does every place that does prosal have negative accrual? Or do some places do salary plus production bonus (not really a bonus) with no negative accrual? What are other pay structures and which do you prefer?

This is amazing information thank you so much!

 

[Minnerbelle]

Holy cow! I never knew! Does every place that does prosal have negative accrual? Or do some places do salary plus production bonus (not really a bonus) with no negative accrual? What are other pay structures and which do you prefer?

This is amazing information thank you so much!

Not every place has negative accrual. So any type of pay structure can be good or bad depending on the details. The devil really is in the details. One little detail can be the difference of thousands of dollars. Let’s say prescription refills were not included, that’s a huuuuge deal. You have many patients who are on chronic drugs that run $70-100 per month. If you get credit for those, that’s passive income in your pocket of $15-20 per month per patient. No negative accrual is good and all, but if you work for a slow clinic and you can’t produce much to begin with, any sort of production system will suck. That being said, unless the clinic is overpaying you based on how much you typically produce (doubtful) straight salary is the most likely way you will be cheated of money.

My favorite thus far was quarterly production without negative accrual. I had my base salary set at 100k. So each quarter I was guaranteed 25k. I got production over that base if I produced enough. But if I didn’t, I just wouldn’t get a bonus that quarter but there wasn’t a negative amount that would follow me to the next quarter. So I would work and never take time off during 2nd and 3rd quarter when it was very busy to maximize my bonus checks. But take all of my time off during either 1st or 4th quarter when I wasn’t going to be making much anyway but still earn that 100k base.

 

[dyachei]

Just to discuss the medical leave thing...I worked for corporate and had been in a car accident. Most of the immediate injuries were taken care of quickly, but I had a concussion and couldn't do simple math for a time. I took about a week off then. I had to have a few surgeries as a result of the accident and I took time off for that with corporate with no issue. Then, a few months later, I was in the ER with appendicitis. My medical director said (and this is a quote) "you're disrupting my schedule too much" when discussing with her that I was literally in the ER (on a Sunday, one of my days off) and they said surgery was my only option. I was back to work by the end of the week, though I couldn't lift more than 15 lbs. It was because of this accident I learned I had Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome and I ended up having other joint issues that needed to be addressed. I took some time off to address them and they fired me because my FMLA had run out over the course of the 5 months I had been back since the accident. Luckily I had long term disability (which they now have as a required benefit - when I was employed with them, it was optional) and was able to call my loan company and ask for a short period of time where I could not make payments to figure out what to do (called forbearance). I had been looking at buying a practice before then and this really pushed that into high gear for me. By the end of 5 months after being fired, I had a business open and was seeing new patients - thanks to my parents helping me buy it. Part of the money used to buy the business also afforded me a salary (though lower than what I'd had before) and I was able to survive with that and continue making student loan payments.

none of that was planned, none of that would have been "ok" if I didn't have parents that could help me financially. I tell you this story because you don't typically get that kind of time off from employers, even the ones that talk up their benefits and could probably afford it more, like corporate medicine. And it can happen to anyone.

 

[PippyPony]

a few months later, I was in the ER with appendicitis. My medical director said (and this is a quote) "you're disrupting my schedule too much" when discussing with her that I was literally in the ER (on a Sunday, one of my days off)

This is terrible! How can an employer -- especially one in a medical field -- be so uncaring in this day and age?

I'm sorry you had to go through that, dy.

 

[ajs513]

This is terrible! How can an employer -- especially one in a medical field -- be so uncaring in this day and age?

I'm sorry you had to go through that, dy.

Some employers really just don’t care. A veterinarian I worked for was in the hospital after a suicide attempt, and was then in inpatient therapy. When he got out, the hospital he worked for fired him. He had a wife who had recently lost her job, as well as two young children. Everything was awful and he didn’t know what to do. Soooo he attempted suicide again.

Just to clarify, this happened a decade ago and he’s fine now

 

[SARdoghandler]

This whole conversation makes me glad for many of the things we get to enjoy in Canada. Both an education that is significantly subsidized to decrease debt load (I still have a lot, but not nearly as much as I'd have as a US student by a long shot) as well as typically ~18 months "paid" maternity leave. I say "paid" as it is usually (as far as I know) paid by the government - at 35-55% of your regular income depending on how long you take. Most veterinarians in Canada I've talked to take around 12-18 months for each child they have. Very common to see 1 year locum positions here for relief vets to cover maternity leave positions. I have also accepted a job on prosal with negative accrual and negative accrual cannot build over mat leave in Canada as technically you are not on their pay roll over that time. My negative accrual also resets yearly, and my base salary is about what I expected to get without any production in the contract, so I'm happy with that (but reserve the right to change my mind once I've actually been working in that for a while )

I think without those types of things guaranteed to me (i.e. being a US citizen), I would have chosen a different career. But that's my personal choices, not what everyone should do.

 

[sheltermed]

Can I just say I love Canada? I love Canada.

 

[Teepster87]

We'll let Canada have the next new school.

 

[ajs513]

Yea but in Canada everyone looks like this and you’re legally mandated to eat Kraft dinner at least once a day. No thanks.

 

[dyachei]

This is terrible! How can an employer -- especially one in a medical field -- be so uncaring in this day and age?

I'm sorry you had to go through that, dy.

The answer is that my medical director cared a lot more about her bottom line than she did about her employee. And it's not uncommon - there are so many business owners that treat their techs like crap or try to work their employees into oblivion.

 

[genny]

you’re legally mandated to eat Kraft dinner

What's wrong with Kraft dinner?

 

[ajs513]

What's wrong with Kraft dinner?

Nothing, mainly just making a South Park joke.

 

[EngrSC]

So much valuable information in this thread! Thanks to everyone that’s contributed.

Not to derail this thread further, but those of you that were married during vet school (@that redhead and @LetItSnow), any tips on not destroying your relationship? I’m nervous about what vet school will do to my marriage (we’ll be living separately but hopefully in the same region of the country)

 

[dyachei]

Ma

So much valuable information in this thread! Thanks to everyone that’s contributed.

Not to derail this thread further, but those of you that were married during vet school (@that redhead and @LetItSnow), any tips on not destroying your relationship? I’m nervous about what vet school will do to my marriage (we’ll be living separately but hopefully in the same region of the country)

make time for your significant other but make sure they understand the time commitment that vet school is. I roped my husband into helping me study soi could be productive and spend time with him

 

[PippyPony]

So much valuable information in this thread! Thanks to everyone that’s contributed.

Not to derail this thread further, but those of you that were married during vet school (@that redhead and @LetItSnow), any tips on not destroying your relationship? I’m nervous about what vet school will do to my marriage (we’ll be living separately but hopefully in the same region of the country)

I will say that I have struggled with this a LOT, especially in the first year and a half or so. So I don't have great tips except try to remain civil even when you are stressed. Because you will be stressed a lot.

Also, as school has gone on, I've started asking my husband for more help and understanding way in advance of tough stretches. Like, "hey, 10 days from now I'm going to go into a stretch of 7 days of hell -- i am anticipating needing some extra support during that week"

Lastly, try to go on vacations and take full advantage of times when you have a lighter workload by pitching in as much as you can around the house.

Edit: living separately might help.

 

[Minnerbelle]

So much valuable information in this thread! Thanks to everyone that’s contributed.

Not to derail this thread further, but those of you that were married during vet school (@that redhead and @LetItSnow), any tips on not destroying your relationship? I’m nervous about what vet school will do to my marriage (we’ll be living separately but hopefully in the same region of the country)

I wasn’t married while in vet school, but one piece of advice is to remember that vet school is what you make of it. You will NEVER feel like you’ve studied enough. So accept that and plan accordingly. You WILL have time for anything that you want to prioritize. So prioritize time with your husband. Even if it’s one day a week (if testing schedule is not consistent, it can change and maybe make it the day after your biggest exam of the week or a weekend day) set that aside to spend with hubby where you just don’t do anything school related. And stick to it. Don’t cancel because of “that big test coming up.” You will always have a big test coming up. Studying one day less might mean a B instead of an A, or C instead of a B. But your hubs is more important than that. If you don’t agree, then that’s how relationships/marriages end in vet school. Unless it’s occasional, don’t make that time where you also hang out with vet school friends unless your hubby actually really wants them around. Vet people have a really bad habit of talking about vet things the whole time and it can be really off putting. If he’s far enough away that you can’t see him weekly, that actually might work better for you. But in that case set aside time every day or however many days a week where you won’t flake on a call/Skype/whatever and give your full undivided attention, and really prioritize the entire weekends, holidays, and breaks to spend with hubby. As much as you won’t realize it, you actually have more free time as a vet student than you probably will in practice or as a house officer especially when you factor in vacations and weekends. So set some time for those important to you!

Once you’re in clinics and in practice I also found that it was much more aggravating for my now husband because it’s harder for me to disengage when I want to/he wants me to be. It became much easier when we both learned that on the days I’m working, just not to expect much from me at all. We both stopped expecting me to leave at any particular time. I learned never to text “I’m almost done” or “I’m leaving soon.” And he’s learned to never ask when I think I’ll be done. Something always comes up, and it ends up taking much longer and that’s infuriating for the person waiting. It turned into “assume I’m not coming home and act accordingly (eat without me, etc...) until i text that I’m driving!” And if I’m furiously texting on my off time, it’s either because a staff’s pet is sick, or a colleague needs time sensitive help and they don’t know what else to do. I will not take work calls/texts during my off time that I’m spending time with hubs otherwise, and he’s learned not to be annoyed/mad if I actually do for the above situations or have to leave the house. Because it’s super stressful for me to be trying to deal with that with hubs getting mad being all like, “ugh again!? Why do you have to answer that?” Or tapping his feet hovering wondering when I’m going to be done. He now accepts that if I have to go or take a call/text it’s for something I wouldn’t be able to live with if I didn’t. We used to get into fights about that all the time, but we’re at a much better understanding about it now.

 

[Minnerbelle]

Psssst.... ownership.........

If I ever go back to full time GP, it will for sure be as an owner. But If I were to go that route I’d want to stew on it first to figure out what location and what type of practice first. I’d have to think about it a lot more than I have taking associate jobs because unlike being the hired help, there’s no walking away from ownership on a whim. I don’t like feeling trapped.

 

[DVMDream]

If I ever go back to full time GP, it will for sure be as an owner. But If I were to go that route I’d want to stew on it first to figure out what location and what type of practice first. I’d have to think about it a lot more than I have taking associate jobs because unlike being the hired help, there’s no walking away from ownership on a whim. I don’t like feeling trapped.

What are you heading off to do? Just curious having left GP myself.

 

[Minnerbelle]

What are you heading off to do? Just curious having left GP myself.

Currently relief

 

[that redhead]

@EngrSC I had a detailed reply typed out and it’s now gone, ugh. I will try to recreate it today.

 

[Stroganoff]

@EngrSC I had a detailed reply typed out and it’s now gone, ugh. I will try to recreate it today.

The forums generally auto-save posts even before they're posted. Like refresh the thread or leave and come back and see it shows up. Is it gone gone?

If it's gone gone, I know that feel.

 

[britzen]

So much valuable information in this thread! Thanks to everyone that’s contributed.

Not to derail this thread further, but those of you that were married during vet school (@that redhead and @LetItSnow), any tips on not destroying your relationship? I’m nervous about what vet school will do to my marriage (we’ll be living separately but hopefully in the same region of the country)

Congrats on getting into VMCVM!

If you want some in-person advice/support for married life stuff once you get here, I'm happy to help! I'm also happy to volunteer my hubs to be a resource for you / your spouse if you need it.

 

[EngrSC]

Congrats on getting into VMCVM!

If you want some in-person advice/support for married life stuff once you get here, I'm happy to help! I'm also happy to volunteer my hubs to be a resource for you / your spouse if you need it.

Thank you, looking forward to meeting you and your spouse!!
Sadly my husband won’t be moving to Blacksburg with me, he’s career military. But he’s trying to get stationed as close as possible so he can visit on weekends!

 

[britzen]

Thank you, looking forward to meeting you and your spouse!!
Sadly my husband won’t be moving to Blacksburg with me, he’s career military. But he’s trying to get stationed as close as possible so he can visit on weekends!

Sounds to me like he should ask for ROTC supervisory or recruiting duty in Blacksburg

 

[EngrSC]

Sounds to me like he should ask for ROTC supervisory or recruiting duty in Blacksburg

He would rather die

 

[britzen]

He would rather die

Fair.

 

[allygator13]

Thank you, looking forward to meeting you and your spouse!!
Sadly my husband won’t be moving to Blacksburg with me, he’s career military. But he’s trying to get stationed as close as possible so he can visit on weekends!

My husband is also military! We've been dealing with it throughout our whole relationship (met between my first and second years of vet school). His next duty station will only be 4 hours from my residency location, which is the best we could have hoped for! I hope it works out for you and your husband too!

 

[EngrSC]

My husband is also military! We've been dealing with it throughout our whole relationship (met between my first and second years of vet school). His next duty station will only be 4 hours from my residency location, which is the best we could have hoped for! I hope it works out for you and your husband too!

Thank you!! My husband is currently trying to get orders to Virginia or as close to it as possible. He’s been in 13 years so home stretch! (Although he went to a retirement party for a guy that did 30 years and came home saying he’s going to do 30. I’m like please no )

 

[allygator13]

Thank you!! My husband is currently trying to get orders to Virginia or as close to it as possible. He’s been in 13 years so home stretch! (Although he went to a retirement party for a guy that did 30 years and came home saying he’s going to do 30. I’m like please no )

LOL Oh boy. Yeah mine is in it for the 20 year goal, he's 7 in so far. So once I'm done with residency he'll only have 10 more which isn't horrible I guess. At least I'll be able to follow him wherever at that point.