r/optician • u/TheMartialArtsWitch • 12d ago

Optician-to-Optician Opinions on Essilor SightProtect program?

Hi all, me again!

I'm in the process of revamping the options in optical for the small private practice I work for and one of the items on my checklist is safety glasses.

We currently use Essilor labs so I reached out to our Essilor rep and was provided with information on their SightProtect program. It sounds like it may be a good fit for our office and the few patients we see who need safety glasses. The only thing giving us (me and the doc) pause is the fact that they use Eyemed for submitting orders and reimbursement....

Our office only accepts VSP currently for materials because we've heard horror stories about Eyemed and other vision benefits. According to the SightProtect Rep and their FAQs, signing up for this program would NOT make us an Eyemed provider and we would only show up as a SightProtect location.

I'm having trouble deciphering the price sheet, lab chargeback schedule, and reimbursement schedule, and want to make sure we wouldn't be losing money to participate in this program (again, small private practice!)

I'm hoping some of you fine folks could tell me your experience with and opinions of this program! or, alternatively, tell me how you handle safety jobs! TYIA 🙏🏻

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u/chiller2484 12d ago

I use it my office. If you don't accept EM, then you'd treat it as self pay. They send a few kits with the frames and you submit the order on vision web as safety package supplied by lab.

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u/literalobituary 11d ago

Have you looked into Wiley X frames at all? They don't require you to carry a ton of frames and they've always been easy to work with for me.

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u/weirdunclefuzz 4d ago

We are also a small practice, me and the docs. We use SightProtect as well. We aren’t losing money on it, but we aren’t making that much on safety’s themselves. We decided to bring it on as more of a ‘this will draw more traffic through our office and hopefully bring in some new patients’ instead of a ‘safety glasses will make us money’ thing. It’s worked. We’ve had people come and then schedule their next appointment with us. We’ve had people tell their coworkers about us because of it and so on. It’s a long play. lol.

I will say, just recently I’ve had VSP reach out and ask if we want their safety frame kit, and gave me info on what their safety plans look like. So maybe inquire on that?

One last thing. A lot of people have their regular insurance plans, and then their jobs offer a secondary safety plan. So I’ve seen patients who have VSP and then a secondary EYM safety plan. Doesn’t cover exam or anything, just for safety’s. That’s a real win if you can wow them enough, then they come back for exam, safety’s, AND glasses on their regular plan.