Dentist alleges he is owed £241K by NHS
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- Published: Tuesday, 28 October 2014 07:29
- Written by News Editor
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A Lancashire dentist claims he has not been paid since March this year. Ramyras Gaiziunas, from Lithuania, says he is owed £250,000 by the NHS. The 59-year-old’s surgery has more than 6,500 patients on the books and has been in contract with the NHS since 2006. He says he has had this amount taken away in clawback.
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His contract with the NHS stipulates that he must complete 10,662 units of dental activity every year. The contract is worth around £294,000 annually. But from 2010 to 2013 he did not meet these targets – owing he says, to a flaw in the electronic filing system. He was supposed to submit the claims within two months of completing them, but sent 3,000 off on March 31 after discovering the fault.
He told a local newspaper: “Each year we had clawbacks. We survived but I thought something was not right and started to look into it. We found treatment plans that had not been completed so we completed them. All it took was to tick a box as the work had already been done, and then we submitted them. It was a mistake with the software. Doing that meant we met our yearly target and had not under-performed. All they needed to do was reimburse that money.”
He told the paper that some of the work he completed contained patient charges which means some of them pay for part of their treatment. He said these charges were then additionally taken back by the NHS, even though it belongs to the surgery. He said: “The NHS started then to take a further £99,227.80 from us in NHS charges, in the end we were left with nothing. They have not paid for the treatments at all and they are taking the money that patients have paid to us. It is wicked.”
He has lost his car and also says he cannot pay his rent, feed his family or send money back or visit his daughter in Lithuania who is suffering from leukaemia. He said: “They owe me and they are still wanting money - they want another £57,000. The dental labs are going to stop doing work for us because we owe them money, but how can I pay them? Without the lab, I cannot produce enough work to meet this year’s target so next year there will be more clawbacks – it will be massive again.”
A spokesperson for NHS England in Lancashire, said: “We are aware of an ongoing issue at Ashurst Dental Practice. We are sorry for the length of time it is taking to reach a resolution with Mr Ramy Gaizunas and any inconvenience this may have caused. We take very seriously all complaints made by our independent contractors, but cannot offer further comment at this time whilst a resolution is sought.”
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