Thrilled with Open Dental

[jclaydds]

I have never been very patient. For example, When I order something, I am tempted to pay a bit more to get it shipped a little quicker. Consequently, my lack of patience tempts me to look at new Open Dental Version releases and I have a hard time resisting updating to a new beta version. I usually make myself wait a week or two after a beta version is released to update. I have used Open Dental now for 2.5 years and have never had more than a few minor annoyances when updating to a beta version. I remember another user saying on the forum -- somebody has to be "beta testers" for them.

Well, we got bit by a bug yesterday. Updated to 7.5.7 on Monday night and had some issues with the insurance plans being detached from patients first thing on Tuesday morning. We couldn't access multiple patient's accounts. Only happened to 2000-3000 patients in my database. The purpose of this posting is to let all of you know what happened next. I called Open Dental Support right away. Somebody is there at Open Dental at 5:00 am west coast time to accomodate those of us on the east coast. My last practice management software company was also based on the west coast. With them, I had to wait to 11:00 am east coast time before anyone would even answer the phone. Open Dental should be commended for the hours they are willing to be available to help. I had one occasion a year or so ago that I had a problem and they answered the phone on a Saturday -- Unbelievable!

Well, the support person instantly recognized that we had a pretty big problem. I provided her some info on the errors and she got a copy of my database. It wasn't long before Dr. Sparks was directly involved and I was on the phone with the big cheese himself. He grabbed a copy of our most recent backup and he went to work on figuring out a fix. Dr Sparks had someone call me a little later on Tuesday to let me know that he was continuing to work toward a fix and this was his #1 priority and would continue to be until he had the issue resolved. Happily, less than 36 hours after I realized we had a major problem on our hands, the fix was ready. I received a call at 8:30 pm tonight telling me what to do. An update to the latest version and running a tool to fix the issue and my database is happy again. I am sure I have no idea or appreciation for the amount of work it took to make this happen so quickly. By the way, we had several accounts that we couldn't access but we were able to use all other functions of the program (chart, appointments, Tx Plan, etc) with no problem so we were able to work on Tuesday-Wednesday with little inconvenience.

We have all heard that you "get what you pay for" From day one, I have felt that Open Dental is the exception to that -- you receive much more than what your pay for. I have always thought that Open Dental is one of the best bargains I have ever ran across in my 28 years of dental practice. I remember emailing Jordan Sparks before I ever decided to use Open Dental and asking him "What's the catch?" How can you offer a program this good for what you are going to charge me? After 2.5 years using the program, I just know I am thrilled with Open Dental and the support they provide their users.

Well, I just want to give a well deserved thank you to Dr. Sparks and the entire Open Dental Team! And if Dr Sparks decides to raise his ongoing monthly support fee, I would happily pay it but I probably have made a lot of enemies on this forum.

Jeff

[jordansparks]

Bugs of this magnitude are soooo embarrassing. Thank you for being patient. We do learn from each of these situations, by the way.

[drtech]

I couldn't agree more about the responsiveness from the Open Dental team in all support issues and beta bugs. Most users never even experience these problems sense they are not beta or test users, but even if you do, your support is phenomenal. There is nothing out there as great as Open Dental where you actually get changes that help dental practices day to day and the software grows in useful features every month or so.

I remember the 12 years we used Dentrix and NEVER ONCE was one of our suggestions ever incorporated. Then to top it off, when I upgraded their software, I ran into server and database problems almost every time!

Great job Jordan and the Open Dental Team.

[Smilesbypayet]

While I am not a beta user (too new to dive in that much, although eventually I probably will), I just want to say THANK YOU also for the fabulous tech support you provide. You guys/gals know your stuff and work on whatever the problem is until it's fixed properly, unlike the "biggies." I had Eaglesoft for 10.5 years and have never had such help. There is still so much to learn/do with the software, but it's so encouraging to know in general terms that there is so much there!