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NOW UPDATED FOR 2006!
The most recent benchmarking data for Chiropractors is now available, both in print and in downloadable PDF format, with your purchase of the Chiropractors Business Benchmarking Guide. (NOTE: 2006 updates not yet available in online HTML subscription version of this guide - please call MAUS Sales Centre on 1 300 300 586 for further info.)
This Small Business Profile presents the results of a survey of Chiropractors for the financial years up to June 30, 2004. The survey was based on 22 practices.
Managing the number of consultations per chiropractor is a key focus in this sector. This can be done by efficient rostering of patients and by making sure the practice is open during hours that suit the customer mix. That of course, is after the principals have profiled the practice in key areas, eg local businesses or sports clubs and so on.
Practices delivering higher profits have achieved much higher personnel productivity, their non-salary expenses are lower, they have also retained more of those profits in the practice and so rely less on outside debt.
Survey Results
These are the results of a survey of chiropractors. These results should not be considered to be representative of all chiropractors in Australia. However, they will allow business owners to identify strengths and weaknesses in the ability of their practice to generate revenue, control expenses and earn sufficient profits. This is done by identifying these elements of business performance and comparing them with benchmark performance levels currently being achieved by the sample of practices in this survey.
Most of the firms participating in the survey were from the eastern states of Australia. New South Wales was the most heavily represented area, while there were no firms located in Tasmania, Western Australia or Northern Territory in our sample.
Practices from smaller regional cities and towns (population below 20,000) represented 41% of the entire group while another 33% of practices were located in metropolitan areas. The remaining were practices based in larger regional cities and towns (population above 20,000).
Around 93% of participating practices rented their premises and 80% of those who rented were located in street-front premises.
The following table will give you a snapshot of the variance in results found in your industry for various Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). Each KPI (shown in rows) should be considered independently of each other. For example, a business with a high percentage gross profit would not normally also have a high relative percentage of their income spent on wages.
For each KPI, the table shows the average, high and low results found in the business surveyed. The KPIs should not be 'added together' under the high and low columns as they do not necessarily relate to the same business.
The KPIs show the 4th highest and 4th lowest actual result for each performance indicator. The range of values shown therefore covers the middle 75% of reported results.
| Indicator | Average | Low | High |
|---|
| Total Income | $216,358 | $93,789 | $309,385 | | Other Depreciation, Lease and hire Purchase | 4.20% | 1.13% | 8.62% | | Wages & Salaries (staff only, not
principals) | 17.64% | 12.18% | 27.72% | | Rent of Premises# | 7.13% | 3.85% | 13.06% | | Staff On-Costs, including professional Development | 3.68% | 1.77% | 5.45% | | Drugs, Supplies and Consumables | 3.51% | 0.35% | 7.60% | | Vehicle Operating Costs | 3.79% | 0.00% | 7.29% | | Net Profit (bps*) | 46.47% | 34.15% | 57.28% | | Average Consult Length (minutes) | 21 | 10 | 30 | | Average Number of Consults per Chiropractor
per Week | 103 | 50 | 188 | | Consultation Time as a Percentage of 38 Hour
Week | 80% | 66% | 105% | | Opening Hours per Day | 8.07 | 7.00 | 10.00 | | Opening Days per Week | 5.03 | 4.50 | 5.50 |
# calculation
excludes those firms who owned their own premises *(bps) before
principals' salaries and benefits
So, how does your firm 'stack up' against these averages? These results will give you an idea of where your practice falls in relation to the sample and give you a better understanding of your relative strengths and weaknesses.
The remaining expense items each represented less than 3% of total income on average; however some practices reported some larger results for such items as:
- All Insurance of up to 6.80%;
- Interest, Bank Charges etc of up to 10.04%;
- Other Occupancy Costs of up to 7.69%;
- Repairs, Maintenance, Hire of Plant & Equipment of up to 4.86%;
- All Other Expenses of up to 8.49%.
To summarise this, larger practices had:
- Higher profits per principal;
- More consultations per week, and higher amounts of face-to-face consulting time;
- Better productivity per chiropractor and per person;
- More support staff per practitioner leading to higher staffing costs, but enabling the higher personnel productivity to be achieved;
- Lower non-salary overheads;
- Higher levels of ownersapos; equity;
- Lower asset productivity.
The more profitable practices:
- Were larger;
- Had higher personnel productivity levels resulting in part from apos;more patient hoursapos; in the week ;
- Had more support staff per practitioner;
- Spent lower percentages of income on many of their practice overheads;
- Had lower asset turnover.
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