Nobody walks in asking how to finance a smile. They ask what it costs, we tell them, and then there is a pause. That pause is the real question, and it is almost always the same one: how would I actually pay for that?
Look, we know it is an awkward thing to raise. So let us raise it first. This is the honest version — what treatment costs at Docklands Dental, what tax relief you can and cannot claim in Ireland, how payment plans work here, and the part most guides leave out: what genuinely reduces the bill versus what just spreads it out.
We really love this stuff, oddly. Planning a case properly is where the money gets saved, not in a discount code. And we do not do discounts, waived fees or limited-time offers — we would rather price fairly and let you take your time.
What does cosmetic dentistry actually cost in Dublin?
Cosmetic treatment at Docklands Dental runs from €250 for edge bonding to €1,200 per feldspathic veneer, with a full Dublin smile makeover typically landing between €2,700 and €12,000.
Here are the real numbers, straight off our price list. Edge bonding and minor additions are €250. A hand-built composite veneer is €450 per tooth. A hand-layered feldspathic porcelain veneer is €1,200 per tooth, as is a hand-layered anterior crown. A milled ceramic crown, inlay or onlay is €1,050. A home whitening kit is €350, and Digital Smile Design planning is €350. A single dental implant, all in, starts at €3,000 — €1,650 for the placement and €1,350 for the porcelain implant crown on top.
Multiply those by the number of teeth involved and you get the shape of a plan. Six feldspathic veneers is €7,200. Ten teeth in composite is around €4,500. We have written the full breakdown in our guide to cosmetic dentistry costs in Dublin and a route-by-route comparison in our smile makeover cost guide.
An examination with us is €80. That is where the actual number for your mouth comes from, because a list price times a tooth count is an estimate, not a plan.
Do Docklands Dental offer payment plans?
Yes — we offer payment plans, agreed with you at your consultation once we know what the treatment involves. A €3,000 bonding case and a €12,000 arch are different conversations.
We do not publish a single payment structure, and we are wary of practices that do, because the honest answer depends on what the plan is and how long it runs. Treatment that happens in stages over eight months pays differently from treatment delivered in three weeks. What we will do is set it out in writing before anything starts, with each stage priced, so you can see exactly where the money goes and when.
What we will never do is use it as a closing tool. No pressure, no hard sell, just a conversation. If the sensible answer is to do a smaller piece of work this year and revisit the rest next year, we will say that — and we say it fairly often.
Can you claim tax relief on dental treatment in Ireland?
Non-routine dental treatment in Ireland qualifies for tax relief at the standard rate of 20%, claimed on the back of a Form Med 2 that your dentist completes after treatment.
This is the single most under-used thing in Irish dentistry, and it is worth real money. Revenue grants relief on qualifying health expenses at the standard rate of 20%. So €7,200 of qualifying veneer work is €1,440 back. On a €3,000 implant, it is €600.
Two details people get wrong, both worth knowing. First, the Med 2 is not the claim form — it is a receipt. Revenue’s own guidance is explicit that you do not send it in; you keep it in your records and make the claim yourself through myAccount. Second, you have four years to claim, so treatment you paid for in 2023 may still be claimable. Ask us for the Med 2 at the end of treatment; if your case runs across two tax years, you need a separate form for each.
We are dentists, not accountants, and your circumstances are your own — check anything that matters with Revenue or your accountant rather than taking a dental blog’s word for it.
Which dental treatments qualify for tax relief, and which do not?
Revenue’s non-routine list includes crowns, veneers, root canal treatment, periodontal treatment, bridgework and orthodontics — but not fillings, scaling, extractions or teeth whitening, which attract no relief at all.
The line Revenue draws is routine versus non-routine, and it does not match the line most patients assume. Crowns and veneers are named on the qualifying list. So is root canal treatment (€595 for an incisor, €695 for a premolar with us), periodontal treatment for gum disease, bridgework, orthodontic treatment, gold or fibreglass posts, and the surgical removal of impacted wisdom teeth. Bone grafting and bone augmentation carried out to place an implant appear on the list too.
What does not qualify is routine care: fillings, scaling and cleaning, extractions, and dentures. And separately, Revenue excludes cosmetic procedures generally, with relief available where surgery corrects a genuine health problem.
So the honest position on teeth whitening at €350: no relief. It is cosmetic and it is not on the list. We would rather tell you that now than have you discover it in April.
Does dental insurance or PRSI cover cosmetic treatment in Dublin?
Neither covers cosmetic work. PRSI Treatment Benefit pays for one oral examination a year and a contribution toward a scale and polish; insurance policies typically pay toward restorative crowns, not appearance.
If you have enough PRSI contributions, the Treatment Benefit Scheme covers a full oral examination once a calendar year and puts money toward a scale and polish. That is genuinely useful — it is the maintenance layer — but it does not stretch to veneers or bonding, and it was never meant to.
Private policies are more nuanced. Where a crown is being placed because a tooth is broken down rather than because you want it to look different, plans will often contribute under the restorative side of the policy. Where the same crown is elective, they generally will not. We can supply the treatment codes you need to make a claim; whether it is paid is between you and your provider, and we would not want to promise on their behalf.
What actually reduces the bill, and what only moves it?
A payment plan moves €9,000 across months without changing it. Treating gum disease first, or straightening before veneering, can genuinely change how many teeth need work at all.
This is the section we care most about, and almost nobody writes it, because it argues against selling you more dentistry.
Three things genuinely reduce what you spend. The first is fixing the foundation before the finish: a €95 hygiene visit and stable gums cost a fraction of redoing veneer margins that failed because the gums were inflamed when we bonded them. The second is orthodontics. If teeth are crowded, straightening them first often means we can veneer six teeth instead of eight, and remove far less enamel from each — we set out how the sequencing works in our guide to orthodontics before veneers. We do not provide orthodontics ourselves; that is handled by specialist orthodontists at ISCD (the Institute of Specialist and Cosmetic Dentistry), where Invisalign is €2,500 to €3,500 per case.
The third is simply doing less. A great many people who arrive asking for ten veneers need whitening, two composite build-ups and an evening out of the edges. That is a few hundred euro and an afternoon, not €12,000.
What does not reduce the bill: a payment plan, a cheaper material chosen for the wrong tooth, or treatment abroad where nobody local is responsible for it in three years. Those move cost around in time or in risk. Worth doing with your eyes open, which is a different thing from a saving.
Can you phase cosmetic treatment over several years?
Yes, and it is frequently the better clinical plan. Health first, appearance second: a €95 hygiene visit and stable gums have to come before any €1,200 veneer goes near a tooth.
Phasing is not a budget compromise we invented to be nice. It is how complex cases should be sequenced anyway. Untreated gum disease, decay under a tooth earmarked for a crown, or an unstable bite all have to be dealt with before cosmetic work, or the cosmetic work inherits the problem.
A phased plan might run: examination and X-rays this month (€80 plus €30), hygiene and any fillings over the next two (€95, fillings €160–€250 each), Digital Smile Design planning when you are ready to commit (€350), then the front teeth in one block, and the less visible teeth the following year. Each stage is finished and stable in its own right. Nothing is left half-done if life gets in the way.
The one thing phasing costs you is time, and our guide to how long a smile makeover takes is honest about that.
Is the cheaper treatment actually cheaper?
Not always. A €1,200 feldspathic veneer lasting fifteen years works out near €80 a year, so the honest comparison is cost per year of service, not the number on the quote.
The research backs the longevity side of this up. A systematic review in the European Journal of Dentistry found porcelain veneers bonded to enamel achieving survival above 90% at both fifteen and twenty years, with ceramic fracture the most common failure. And a practice-based study in the Journal of Dentistry that followed 3,404 single-unit crowns recorded annual failure rates under 1% — roughly 92% to 97% still in service at eleven years.
Now the honest arithmetic, because it does not land where you might expect. A €1,200 veneer over fifteen years is about €80 a year. A €450 composite veneer that needs replacing every six or seven years is roughly €65 to €75 a year. On pure cost per year, composite often wins. It is a genuinely good-value treatment, it requires no removal of healthy tooth structure, and we place a great deal of it.
What porcelain buys is not cheapness, it is stability — it does not stain, it does not need refreshing, and it holds its surface. So the real question is not which is cheaper. It is how often you want to be in the chair, and whether the tooth in question needs adding to or covering. Our porcelain veneers cost guide and our bonding versus veneers comparison both go further into that.
What should you ask before agreeing to any treatment plan?
Ask for the written plan with every stage priced, what happens if a tooth needs root canal treatment (€595–€695) mid-way, and what maintenance costs each year afterwards.
Four questions we would want asked of us, and of anyone else:
Is every stage priced, in writing, before we start? A single headline figure is where nasty surprises live. Ask what is excluded.
What happens if something is found mid-treatment? Teeth prepared for crowns occasionally turn out to need root canal treatment. It should be priced as a possibility, not sprung on you.
What does this cost me every year from now on? Veneers and implants need maintenance. Hygiene is €95 a visit. A night guard, if you grind, is €180 to €250 — and it protects work worth thousands.
Who does what? If a specialist is placing the implants or moving the teeth, you should know their name before you agree to anything.
Come and have the money conversation properly
If you have been sitting on a number you were quoted somewhere, or you have no idea what your case would even cost, the useful first step is an examination (€80). We will look at your teeth, tell you what is actually needed versus what is optional, price each stage in writing, and set out how it could be phased or paid.
You will leave knowing what we would recommend, why, what it costs, and what the alternatives are — including doing nothing for now, which is sometimes the right answer. No pressure, no hard sell, just a conversation.
Docklands Dental
1 Forbes Street, Grand Canal Dock, Dublin 2, D02 FN53
Phone: 01 636 0192
Email: hello@docklandsdental.ie
Written by Dr. Gregg Barry, BDS (UCC, 2008), Docklands Dental, 1 Forbes Street, Grand Canal Dock, Dublin 2, D02 FN53. Published 1 September 2026.
Ready to talk through your options? You can book a cosmetic consultation online — thirty minutes with one of our dentists to look at your teeth and talk through the options and what they would cost (€80, as listed on our price list).
Frequently asked questions
Does Docklands Dental offer payment plans for cosmetic dentistry?
Yes. Docklands Dental offers payment plans, with the structure agreed at your consultation once the treatment plan is known, because a €3,000 bonding case and a €12,000 full arch are different conversations. Every stage is priced in writing before treatment starts. The practice does not offer discounts, waived fees or limited-time offers.
Does PRSI or dental insurance cover veneers in Ireland?
No. The PRSI Treatment Benefit Scheme covers one oral examination per calendar year and a contribution toward a scale and polish, but not cosmetic treatment. Private dental policies will often contribute toward a crown placed for restorative reasons where a tooth is broken down, but generally not toward elective cosmetic work such as veneers. Docklands Dental can supply the treatment codes needed to make a claim.
