Should a longevity clinic offer free consultations? Offer a free 15-minute discovery call with a coordinator, but charge for the 60-minute physician consult and credit the fee to the program. In our worked example, a $250 credited fee that costs 30% of bookings pays for itself if paid consults close at 27.1% against 25% for free ones, before counting 30 freed physician hours.
The short answer from LeadsNow AI: A longevity clinic should keep a short free call for fit and charge for physician time, crediting that fee to the program, once the program costs more than about $3,000 and no-shows run above about 10%. LeadsNow recommends deciding with the break-even arithmetic below, because the right fee depends on how many bookings it costs you, not on what other clinics do.
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Rules of thumb
- Price the no-show before you price the consult. Cost of one no-show = consult minutes × physician hourly cost. At 60 minutes and $300 an hour (assumptions), every 100 free bookings at a 23% no-show rate idles $6,900 of physician time.
- 23% is the outside reference point, not your number. A 2018 systematic review of 105 studies put the average no-show rate across the studies at around 23%, covering all medical specialties. Nobody publishes a longevity-specific rate.
- A fee has to earn back the bookings it loses. If a $250 fee costs you 30% of bookings, paid consults must close at 27.1% to match free ones closing at 25% (worked table below).
- If the fee costs you 45% of bookings, it rarely pays. The break-even close rate jumps to 35.2%, a 10-point lift a fee alone seldom buys.
- Credit the fee and put a deadline on the credit. HonorHealth Concierge Neurology credits its $1,000 second-opinion consult to the first year if the patient upgrades to an annual membership within 30 days.
The Consult-Fee Decision Framework: free call, credited consult or paid assessment
The Consult-Fee Decision Framework picks one of three first steps from three inputs: the program price band, the length of the first clinical conversation, and your measured no-show rate. The price bands are adapted from the three tiers on our longevity clinic pricing guide (an assessment under about $3,000, an annual membership of $4,000 to $15,000 a year, a concierge or family membership from about $10,000); to keep the rows apart, the table treats anything above $15,000 a year as the concierge tier. The thresholds are our decision rule, not a measured industry benchmark: treat them as starting points and move them with your own data.
| Program price band | First conversation | No-show exposure (your own rate) | First step to offer | Fee to test (assumption band) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Under about $3,000 (assessment tier) | 15-20 min, coordinator or nurse | Any | Free discovery call | $0 |
| $4,000-$15,000 a year (membership) | 45-60 min, physician | Under 10% | Free discovery call, then free physician consult | $0, revisit quarterly |
| $4,000-$15,000 a year (membership) | 45-60 min, physician | 10% or more | Free discovery call, then paid consult credited to the program | $150, $250 or $500 |
| Above $15,000 a year (concierge or family) | 60-90 min, physician | Any | Free discovery call, then paid consult credited to the program | $250, $500 or $1,000 |
| Any band, first visit includes labs, imaging or testing | Half day or more | Any | Paid assessment sold as its own product | Priced as a product, not a consult |
The free discovery call stays in every row: it is cheap staff time, and it is where the screening on our page about how longevity clinics screen members begins. The fee goes on the expensive step, not the first one.
How it works
How to decide on a longevity consult fee
Measure no-show cost
Multiply consult minutes by physician hourly cost and your no-show rate. That is the time a fee would protect.
Keep discovery call free
A 15-minute coordinator call covers fit and the program price range. The fee goes on the physician step.
Test a credited fee
Charge a consult fee credited to the program for eight weeks. Book consults within seven days.
Compare to break-even
Plug bookings lost and attended-consult close rate into the worked table. Keep the fee only if you clear break-even.
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FAQ: free or paid longevity clinic consultations
Should a longevity clinic offer free consultations?
Offer a free short discovery call, and charge for the physician consult once programs pass about $3,000 and no-shows pass about 10%. Credit the fee to the program so patients who join pay nothing extra.
What is the average no-show rate for medical appointments?
A 2018 systematic review of 105 studies put the average no-show rate across the studies at around 23% (Dantas et al., Health Policy, via PubMed). No public source reports a longevity-specific rate, so measure your own.
How much should a longevity clinic charge for a first consultation?
No public benchmark exists. Published US examples include a $175 consult credited to the first treatment and a $1,000 consult credited to a membership within 30 days. Test $150, $250 or $500 against your program price and booking loss.
Should the consult fee be credited to the program?
Yes, in most cases. A credit means the fee only costs patients who decide not to join, which keeps the filter on intent without taxing the people you want. Put a deadline on the credit, such as 30 days.
Does charging for a consult improve close rates?
No public study measures this for longevity clinics. In the worked example, a fee that costs 30% of bookings needs paid consults to close at 27.1% against 25% free. Test it on your own enquiries for eight weeks.
Free vs paid longevity consult: the worked break-even
A paid longevity consult beats a free one when the revenue from fewer, better-attended consults matches the revenue lost from the bookings the fee scared off. Every input is a labeled assumption except the 23% free no-show rate (the review average cited above). Replace each with your own last 90 days.
Assumptions: 100 consult bookings a month under a free policy; a 60-minute physician consult; physician time valued at $300 an hour; a $10,000 program; 25% of attended consults sign; a $250 fee credited to the program, so only patients who do not sign pay it as extra revenue; paid consults no-show at 5%; the fee costs 20%, 30% or 45% of bookings.
| Line | Free consult | Paid, 20% fewer bookings | Paid, 30% fewer bookings | Paid, 45% fewer bookings |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bookings a month | 100 | 80 | 70 | 55 |
| No-show rate | 23% | 5% | 5% | 5% |
| Consults attended | 77 | 76 | 66.5 | 52.3 |
| Physician time lost to no-shows | 23 h ($6,900) | 4 h ($1,200) | 3.5 h ($1,050) | 2.8 h ($825) |
| Physician hours booked | 100 | 80 | 70 | 55 |
| Programs signed at 25% | 19.3 | 19.0 | 16.6 | 13.1 |
| Program revenue + uncredited fees | $192,500 | $204,250 | $178,719 | $140,422 |
| Close rate needed to match free | 25.0% | 23.4% | 27.1% | 35.2% |
Read the bottom row first. At a 20% booking loss the fee wins even with no change in close rate. At 30% it needs a two-point lift, which is plausible if the fee filters out people who were never going to pay for a self-funded program. At 45% it needs a ten-point lift, and the fee is probably wrong. The 30 freed physician hours are 30 more consults to sell, or 30 hours back for members.
The one number to measure before you decide is the booking loss, and you can only get it by testing. Run the fee for six to eight weeks on new enquiries, keep the discovery call free, and compare bookings and attended-consult close rates against the previous period. Our page on longevity clinic consultation conversion rate sets out how to count close rate on attended consults with a fixed 30-day window.
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What do US clinics charge for a first consultation?
US clinics that publish a first-consult fee price it as a credit toward later care, and no source we found reports a typical longevity consult fee or how often clinics charge one. These are the published examples we verified on November 3, 2026:
- Longevity Centers of America (Greenville, South Carolina and West Palm Beach, Florida) announced in an April 16, 2026 press release a $175 physician-supervised initial consultation, with the full fee applied to the first treatment. That is the clinic’s own announcement.
- HonorHealth Concierge Neurology in Arizona, a health-system concierge service rather than a longevity clinic, lists a $1,000 one-time second-opinion consult, credited toward the first year if the patient upgrades to an annual membership within 30 days, alongside an individual membership at $10,000 a year and a couples membership at $15,000 a year. The same page offers a free consultation to discuss which package to choose (HonorHealth memberships page).
HonorHealth’s page is the clearest public version of the framework above: a free conversation about options, a paid clinical consult, and a credit with a deadline. Set your fee as a share of your own program price, not by copying either number.
How much does a no-show cost a longevity clinic?
A longevity clinic no-show costs the physician’s hourly cost times the consult length, plus the program revenue from whoever could have taken the slot. At $300 an hour and 60 minutes, one no-show idles $300 of physician time; 23 no-shows a month idle $6,900. If the slot could have gone to another patient who signs at 25% on a $10,000 program, each empty hour also forgoes $2,500 of expected revenue.
The Dantas et al. review found the average no-show rate across specialties was of the order of 23%, lowest in Oceania (13.2%) and highest in Africa (43.0%). It also found long lead time and prior no-show history were the determinants most often reported. A consult booked three weeks out is more likely to be missed, whatever the fee.
A fee is not the only lever. Shorter lead times, confirmation calls and reminder texts cut no-shows without costing bookings, and you should try them before a fee if your no-show rate is near 10%. LeadsNow’s own show rate varies by offer and reminder cadence, up to 93% on our best-performing accounts, which is why we treat reminders as the first fix and the fee as the second. Our AI appointment setting page describes how booking and reminder follow-up are run.
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How to introduce a consult fee without losing good patients
A consult fee loses the fewest good patients when it arrives after a free conversation, is credited to the program, and is stated in writing before booking. The steps, in order:
- Keep the first call free and short. 15 minutes with a coordinator: goals, location, the program price range and whether the clinic fits.
- Name the fee and the credit in one sentence. For example: “The physician consult is $250, credited in full to your program if you join within 30 days.”
- Write the cancellation and refund terms down. Say how much notice is needed to reschedule and what happens to the fee after a late cancellation. This is general information, not legal advice; check your state’s rules on medical fees with your own counsel.
- Book the consult inside seven days. Lead time drives no-shows in the Dantas review, so a fee on a slot three weeks away is doing work a sooner slot would do for free.
- Measure two numbers for eight weeks. Bookings per 100 enquiries and attended-consult close rate. Plug both into the worked table and keep the fee only if you clear the break-even close rate.
In house, this takes a same-day coordinator, a booking tool that takes payment, and a monthly read of the numbers. Where the gap is volume, see our guide to getting patients for a longevity clinic.
When is a free longevity consultation still the right call?
A free physician consultation is still the right call for a longevity clinic when it is filling a new panel, selling an entry assessment under about $3,000, or already running a no-show rate under 10%. In each case the bookings a fee would cost are worth more than the physician hours it would save.
A new clinic has no hours to protect, so a fee only slows the learning. An assessment is often the first purchase itself, so a consult fee is a second toll on a small sale. And at a 5% free no-show rate, the free column of the worked table would lose only 5 hours a month. Those clinics should keep it free and watch the no-show rate monthly.
Sources
- Dantas LF et al., No-shows in appointment scheduling: a systematic literature review, Health Policy 2018 (PubMed abstract): 105 studies, average no-show rate of the order of 23%, Oceania 13.2%, Africa 43.0%, lead time and prior no-show history as top determinants.
- HonorHealth Concierge Neurology, Memberships and consultations, read November 3, 2026: $1,000 second-opinion consult credited within 30 days; individual membership $10,000 and couples membership $15,000 a year; free consultation to choose a package.
- Longevity Centers of America press release, April 16, 2026: $175 initial consultation applied in full to the first treatment.
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