The Costs You Can See and the Ones You Cannot
The most visible cost of understaffing is lost appointments. When a DVM slot is vacant, those appointments do not get seen. That revenue is gone. Clinic owners generally understand this number, even if they underestimate it.
What they tend not to account for are the costs that accumulate more quietly: the skilled technician who starts looking for other jobs because every shift feels overwhelming. The client who waited three weeks for an appointment and found a different clinic. The senior associate who is covering twice their usual caseload and starting to make the kind of errors that tired, overextended clinicians make.
Turnover Is the Most Expensive Understaffing Cost
Recruiting and onboarding a new veterinary professional typically costs 50 to 100 percent of their annual salary. For a DVM, that can mean $80,000 to $160,000 in direct and indirect costs when a vacancy is filled. For a skilled LVT, the number is lower but still significant when you factor in recruiting fees, training time, and the productivity gap during onboarding.
Understaffing drives turnover. Turnover is expensive. Relief coverage prevents the understaffing that triggers the chain.
The Math in Plain Terms
A relief DVM covering one day per week for three months costs a fraction of what it would cost to replace a burned-out associate. A relief LVT covering two shifts per week through a busy season costs far less than the revenue lost when your DVM cannot see their full caseload without adequate tech support. The math almost always favors investing in relief coverage over absorbing the cost of understaffing.
Ready to take the next step?
Do not let understaffing become your most expensive operating decision. Contact Your Neighbor Vet at 425-448-8882 or yourneighborvet.com and let us help you build a coverage model that protects your team and your business.
Related reading: The Real Cost of a Staffing Gap · How Relief Vets Help You Grow Revenue Without Adding Overhead