for the past few years I have worked for a number of different dental offices in administration. When it comes to buying dental insurence things you want to be aware of is if they are PPO or DMO, DMO will only pay towards contracted dentists. Another detail to be aware of is the fee booklet. Only dentists that are contracted with an insurence company have to comply with the insurence fee schedule. for out of network dentists who still accept our insurence, you may be stuck paying the difference between thier fee schedule and your dentists fee schedule. Here is the kicker, some dental insurences will only cover certain procedures and will downgrade what they are willing to pay. For example, our offices only do composite fillings, however we have a number of patients with insurences that will only pay for amalgam fillings ( those silver fillings that used to contain trace ammounts of mercury) So not only do they get stuck with thier annual deductable and percentage co-pa, but they have to pay the difference between the amalgam and composite filling fee schedule.
Another great option is to have a flex spending savings specificlly for medical or dental. I am not sure how to set this up without an employer, but that money gets set aside specificaly for medical and dental expenses, and you don't have to worry about deductables or co-paments. If you don't need a lot of dental work and just want something for emergencies this is your best bet.
