[Geo_Ipe]

Originally Posted by raptor_diwan

Even though there are ads with cricket players endorsing the company, it is still not a guarantee of their legitimacy.

Off topic:
Cricket players will endorse my dog as the best dog in the world if I pay them a load of money - that is their level of integrity! Only we, the general public are to be blamed if we associate legitimacy of the product/service with seeing a cricket player in an advertisement!

[raptor_diwan]

Thank you to the bhpian who helped me in this case and wishes to remain anonymous. I also turned to Twitter and other social media platforms to express my concerns, and eventually, after 7 months, My Cousin received a response for her email. It is quite baffling that it took them this long to respond to their queries. Although she was informed that she would receive a refund within 20 days, she received a call from a person who conveyed the message to her. However, due to the 7-month response time, I deem the 20-day refund commitment untrustworthy.

I will update the status as soon as refund is processed. While reading through a few Quora reviews, I stumbled upon comments from some of the individuals who have allegedly been swindled. It is quite shocking that these people have not received payments or treatments for over a year. I hope whoever is in charge of this will respond to everyone and not just to those who use Twitter & influence.

Originally Posted by SmartCat

One idea that might work is negative online publicity wherever they have presence

Raise your issue in comments. If you keep raising your refund issue in every post, it will eventually reach the top management.

​Thank you for the suggestion. I followed it and reached out to them regarding the refund. They responded by stating that it will be processed within the next 20 days. I received a written email from them with the same information.

[SS-Traveller]

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

...mission critical professionals.
...laziness that causes a person to select a doctor of all professionals via a damn anonymous internet site and to trust it enough to pay in advance before you are even examined.

This is a fallout of the Covid-19 period, when everyone and everything went online, including doctor (and even cardiology) consults without the doctor ever examining the patient clinically.

Thus said a famous orthodontist!!! Well said SS-Traveller

Just to clarify, I'm not an orthodontist. I specialize in the subject of oral pathology, have taught the subject for nearly 20 years (and quit teaching in 2016), and I've been a general dental practitioner for over 31 years, including in my own clinic where my wife and I have practised for over 25 years till the present time. We do deal with orthodontic cases on a regular basis, with a consultant orthodontist taking care of our patients, but I believe the ultimate responsibility for the outcome of the treatment lies not only with the orthodontist, but with me as the point of first contact for the patient.

Aggregators...

One more clarification. Toothsi is not an aggregator. They are in the business of bringing clear aligner technology in the field of orthodontics to the customer/patient, bypassing the orthodontist as an intermediate specialist who determines whether such technology is appropriate treatment for a patient, or not.

The original companies that started the technology of clear aligners are Invisalign and ClearPath. Invisalign have a huge presence worldwide, with a gigantic advertising budget to make customers ask for Invisalign treatment from the dentist. See their ad on a bus in Australia.



Invisalign is hugely expensive, partly because you are paying for those ads, and partly because they only provide you their services through Invisalign-certified orthodontists, who pay a substantial sum to undergo that certification - and obviously mark up treatment costs to recover that amount.

Based on this tech (which is basically a computer-generated system for moving teeth using CAD-CAM-based 3D-printed aligners which selectively and progressively place a light force on the teeth to make them move, changing the aligners every 1-2 weeks to the next in the series), there are now dozens of companies in India which provide this service. Most operate through dentists, some prefer orthodontists to select their cases for them, and some like Toothsi bypass the dentist/orthodontist altogether, depending on their own panel of dentists (who never examine the patient clinically) to determine how to treat. The results achieved by most of them are iffy, and often further refinements are required to achieve reasonably good results. Clear aligners are good for simple cases, but useless for even slightly more difficult ones - but who is to determine whether a case can be corrected with aligners or needs conventional?

Given the lax laws protecting patient interest in India, more and more of these clear aligner companies are setting up centres here, giving poor result outcomes and getting away with it. Some defraud people outright (such as the case with the OP). In this confusion and advertising onslaught, the orthodontist and his conventional braces have taken a back seat in the minds of the people who need their opinion and expertise the most - the patient with crooked teeth.

[Torq]

Originally Posted by SS-Traveller

consultant orthodontist


One more clarification. Toothsi is not an aggregator. They are in the business of bringing clear aligner technology in the field of orthodontics to the customer/patient, bypassing the orthodontist as an intermediate specialist who determines whether such technology is appropriate treatment for a patient, or not.

The original companies that started the technology of clear aligners are Invisalign and ClearPath. Invisalign have a huge presence worldwide,
Given the lax laws protecting patient interest in India, more and more of these clear aligner companies are setting up centres here, giving poor result outcomes and getting away with it. Some defraud people outright (such as the case with the OP). In this confusion and advertising onslaught, the orthodontist and his conventional braces have taken a back seat in the minds of the people who need their opinion and expertise the most - the patient with crooked teeth.

Invisalign, or Aligntech USA is the original patent holder. Clear path was just another toothsi like Co that came in market, and left the dentists and patients hanging out to dry midtreatment.
These diy aligner Cos have seriously screwed up a lot of patients' dental health. ( Look up SDC, smile direct club USA) Even toothsi for that matter doesn't hold up on any standard of care. Bypassing orthodontist is one thing, but bypassing dentists to provide Complex orthodontic treatment at home is quite beyond anyone's reach, esp when the scanning and initial planning is done by graduates of science or commerce stream!

[akhil_007]

Our family dentist told us the exact same thing as SS-Traveller. He also added that Dentists/Doctors running their own clinics are under pressure to stay on top of things and be visible across social media/products. If they do not have presence in digital media/products like Invisalign/Practo, first time patients assume they are no good.

My dentist has a dedicated team to handle patients coming via Practo/Invisalign etc. Invisalign have even put a hoarding in the clinic as my dentist is pretty famous even before all these "inventions". Having said that, he doesn't advocate/push for Invisalign primarily because
1.The results are not as good as the company claims
2.Costs a truckload of money
3.Dentist's credibility is on the line

As far as BYJU's/WhiteHat etc is concerned, I receive calls occasionally. I interrogate the caller to the extent where I question his education and aptitude :P. That ends the story

Bottomline: Online Ads should be used only for information gathering. Make decisions with Specialists, especially for financial and health related matters.

[SS-Traveller]

Originally Posted by akhil_007

...Practo...

Practo is different, it is a subscription-based online / app-based platform for patient appointments and digital record-keeping. As someone who has digital records available for the last 23 years, I have chosen not to enrol with Practo only because the records are stored on their servers, and (1) I would be denied access once I choose to discontinue subscription (and I would be at their mercy for whatever pricing they want to impose in future), and (2) I would be giving complete access to my confidential patient data for them to put to whatever use they like. I would be doing grave injustice to my patients if I allowed that.

Originally Posted by Torq

Invisalign, or Aligntech USA is the original patent holder. Clear path was just another toothsi like Co that came in market, and left the dentists and patients hanging out to dry midtreatment.
These diy aligner Cos have seriously screwed up a lot of patients' dental health.

Thanks, yes, ClearPath was a me-too company copying Invisalign, but they were one of the early stealers of Invisalign's technology. They still did get good results in the initial times.

I'm glad you as an orthodontist decided to speak your mind. Most choose not to speak up negatively about clear aligners on a public forum.

[RaghuVis]

Looks like I dodged a bullet!

I had an in-house demo session with Toothsi as my cousin has taken up their 1-year treatment plan and was quite happy with it. The session was a bit underwhelming as he was over-enthusiastic to explain things but did not clarify the doubts. I just wanted to understand what the fuss is about and he was not aware of that. He thought I want to remove the gap between my couple of teeth. He kept on telling me that he can make my smile beautiful again and not like how it is now! (Mind you I have never stopped smiling with an open mouth just because I had some gap here and there ). Anyways, he left giving me a 4-hour deadline for the 50% discount that he was so generously giving me. I decided to NOT move forward with the treatment plan. I informed him the next day accordingly.

This was mid-December. It has been 5 months now and every 2 days, I get at least 2 calls from Toothsi asking me to reconsider. During the first few calls, I was polite enough to explain my decision. Despite assurances that they won't call me again, it has been happening for months now. Thanks to True-caller, I don't take them anymore (they keep on calling from different numbers)

I cannot in good conscience suggest Toothsi to anyone when they cannot even honor my request to not call me.

[Stribog]

Originally Posted by frewper

When a startup is able to sign India's (one of) most expensive cricketer and actress together but are not able to take care of a customers needs, what the heck are they doing anyways.

Gone are the days when starting a venture meant catering to customer needs in order to make a profit. When you gained a customer you had them for life and the customer meant something to you.

Now a customer is just a statistic.

Customer Acquisition, Customer Retention are all stupid buzz work to hide your inefficiencies to an investor. Now its more like take the money and vanish. If the customer gives up to get the money back, then you consider that a profit.

Startups and cash burn, name a more iconic duo!

Byjus signed on Messi as a sponsor, was one of the sponsors of the Qatar World Cup and at the same time are bleeding cash and at last count have laid off some 4,000 employees.

[V.Narayan]

Maybe the Doctors and Dentists of the forum can opine on this:-

If you set up a hospital or even a nursing home there are dozens of Govt approvals to seek and comply with; there are inspections to contend with; the qualifications of your medical staff are scrutinized. And God forbid if you have an ultrasound machine you are monitored to death. And all these approvals have to be framed and prominently displayed.

Thus, I am curious what Govt approvals have companies like Toothsi received, if any? It would be most useful if someone could throw light on this. I am completely removed from the online healthcare business but this got me thinking. If they have not received any approvals then someone may want to ask this question on social media {Twitter?} and bring them to book. Social media seems to be the only forum they fear so hit them where it hurts I'd say. And if celebrities like Viraat Kohli {not sure who the lady is} are endorsing their medical product for a large fee then what homework did his lawyers perform on Toothsi, if any, before signing up? If the honest public like the OPs friend are getting rooked, then these chumps deserve to be hauled over coals.

[raptor_diwan]

My cousin received an email confirming the initiation of a refund on May 10, and today she received the refund. However, I am disappointed to discover that 10k has been deducted. Despite receiving an email stating an approved amount of 54k, she only received around 42k. I have reached out to them again via email, seeking an explanation or clarification regarding this deduction, or if there was any mishandling involved. I am uncertain about how this company's refund process works. I hope to receive a positive response from them and will update the thread once the issue is resolved.

[montsa007]

Originally Posted by raptor_diwan

My cousin received an email confirming the initiation of a refund on May 10, and today she received the refund. However, I am disappointed to discover that 10k has been deducted. Despite receiving an email stating an approved amount of 54k, she only received around 42k. I have reached out to them again via email, seeking an explanation or clarification regarding this deduction, or if there was any mishandling involved. I am uncertain about how this company's refund process works. I hope to receive a positive response from them and will update the thread once the issue is resolved.

Attachment 2458255

Feels good to see the fight paid off .
The Toothsi ad came up on my spouse's phone constantly while she was watching some mythological serial on hotstar, made me wonder how exactly the concept will work, as 2 of my cousins have braces applied & are very particular about eating habits & regular checkups. Now I know, Toothsi is something I should not recommend to anyone.

[raptor_diwan]

Finally, after numerous follow-ups, emails, and multiple tweets, the issue has been resolved, and all the payments made have been refunded.

Thank you, everyone!