How Long are Most Veterinarian Contracts?
How long are most veterinarian associate contracts? First, you need to know two things to determine what the average length of a contract is. One is how to terminate the agreement and then two, does the contract automatically renew? Let’s kind of hit all of those. There’s usually an initial term to the contract. An initial term just means the length of the contract before it either just ends, or if there’s a language, it could just automatically renew for successive terms after the initial term ends. The normal length for an initial term is somewhere between two to three years. And so, in most contracts, after that two or three-year period ends, as I said before, there’d be language that states it automatically renews for one-year terms after that.
And then it just continuously renews unless terminated by the vet. That’s a normal amount of time. If you have a five-year contract, it’s abnormal. Now, does it ultimately matter? Not really, because of this: every contract is going to have ways that the vet or the employer can terminate the agreement. There will be what’s called without cause termination and without cause termination means either party can terminate the agreement for any reason at any time with a certain amount of notice to the other party. You could be one month into your job, you hate it, maybe especially lately the lack of staffing just makes your job impossible, or maybe you’re being paid on pure productivity and the volume is just terrible, and you’re like, this is not for me. Well, in the contract, if you have without cause termination, usually, it’s somewhere between 30 to 90 days for most veterinary associates.
And so, you would just say, I’m giving you my notice, and then, let’s just say it’s a 60-day time. You’d work out those 60 days, and at the end of the 60-day period, you could leave. If you can terminate the contract at any time, for any reason, the length of the contract doesn’t really matter in some ways. So, if you had a five-year term, but you could terminate the contract with 60 days’ notice, it’s only a 60-day contract if you think of it that way. Now, what’s the benefit or I guess a better way of saying it is, many vets will say, well, when is a good time to renegotiate the agreement? Well, usually, it would be at the end of whatever year period it is. Let’s just say you’re just on a straight-based salary, you may approach the employer and say, I’ve been this productive and I believe I deserve an increase to this amount. Other blogs of interest include:
- Is 10 Miles a Reasonable Non Compete for a Veterinarian?
- What is a Draw in a Veterinary Associate Contract?
Some people are concerned if it just automatically renews forever that they’ll just be stuck with the same salary forever. You can renegotiate at any time. I mean, you could go to the employer and say, look, I’m generating $600,000 a year and I’m only making a hundred thousand. I’d like an increase. For most vets it would be somewhere between 18 to 22% of what their net collections are. And so, in that scenario, you’ll just say, look, if you don’t raise my salary, I’m going to give you notice and then leave. And obviously, they may call your bluff if you’re not actually willing to leave. But that’s a good stopping point to say to them, look, I’m worth more than I’m being paid and it’s time to renegotiate.
The average length of the contract doesn’t really matter if you’re able to terminate the contract at any point. Is there one length that’s better than another? Not really, not taking that into account. Now, there is one other type of length of term, it’s called an evergreen contract. And this is being used more and more lately for whatever reason. There is no initial term set, so it will just state the contract will continue forever until one of the parties terminates the agreement per the terms of the contract. Once again, that’s fine if you can terminate the contract without cause at any point. If it’s a contract that just goes on forever still is just if the notice period required. So, that’s a little primer on what a kind of average length of a vet contract is.
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