Our fee structure will change from 1 November 2025:
We will cease routinely offering bulk billed consults to existing patients who are children – instead, a $15 discount will apply to our Standard Fees.
We will cease routinely offering discounted fees to patients with a concession card – instead, our Standard Fees will apply.
Our Standard Fees will not be increasing at this time.
Opportunities for bulk billed care
Despite no longer routinely bulk billing children, our regular patients may sometimes be able to access bulk billed care – this includes:
Routine immunisations booked into Vaccine Clinics
GP Chronic Condition Plans (which can be reviewed every 3 months, meaning patients with a chronic condition can have up to 4 bulk billed consults per year to get scripts, referrals, etc)
6-Minute Phone Consults, which will generally be bulk billed from 1 Nov (provided the consult was booked in accordance with our guidelines)
Why don’t the doctors at North Brighton Medical bulk bill all consults?
Medicare funds GP consultations in a way which clearly incentivises quantity over quality.
This is best illustrated by the fact that the same Medicare rebate ($65.75) applies for a consultation that takes 6 minutes as it does for a consultation that takes 19 minutes, even though the latter is more than three times as long.
Most fully bulk billing clinics have appointments that are 10 minutes or shorter, so they can see more patients each day. They often squeeze in additional patients throughout the day, meaning patients regularly wait 30 minutes or more to see their doctor.
If a doctor bulk bills, they will make twice as much money seeing 8 patients in an hour for 7 to 8 minutes each than they will seeing 4 patients an hour for 15 minutes each.
However, our doctors do not think that they can provide proper care to patients in only 7 or 8 minutes – it’s simply not enough time to listen to the patient describe their issues, ask follow up questions, do a thorough examination of them, make a proper diagnosis, discuss the various treatment options and their pros and cons, and answer any final questions the patient has.
Some consultations are less complex, and don’t need a full 15-minute appointment, such as immunisations and requests for repeat prescriptions. For these consults, we are happy to bulk bill, because the Medicare funding is sufficient.
For longer consultations, the Medicare funding is simply not sufficient – we couldn’t afford to pay our rent, staff and other overheads if we bulk billed everyone all the time while still making sure we allocate sufficient time to each patient.