Why transparent pricing matters across borders — and how to read a quote

A single number on a sales page is not a price. It is a marketing artefact. A real quote is itemised, comparable, and stable enough to base a decision on. This piece explains how EuroClinics structures every quote we surface, why every line item exists, and what to ask before you commit a single euro.

The five-line standard

Every bundled quote on EuroClinics is broken into the same five lines. We refuse to publish quotes that cannot be expressed this way.

1. Procedure fee. The surgeon's or specialist's professional fee. Includes the operating slot and post-op rounds within the planned admission window.
2. Facility fee. Operating theatre, in-clinic recovery, nursing, in-patient days, in-house pharmacy and consumables.
3. Anaesthesia. Anaesthesiologist fee plus consumables. Itemised because patients with comorbidities frequently incur higher anaesthesia costs and we need this transparent up-front.
4. Follow-up. Pre-arranged check-ups inside the standard recovery window, including teleconsultations.
5. Coordination. EuroClinics' fee. Always flat, always identical regardless of which clinic you pick from the three we surface.

Travel, accommodation, insurance and visa support are surfaced as separate optional lines. They never get folded into the headline price because that obscures comparison across destinations.

EUR-first, local-second

Every price is shown in EUR with the EU-average central-bank reference rate of the day, and in the local currency in parentheses. Local currency exists for two reasons:

• So you can verify the quote against the clinic's own website if you choose to.
• So the actual amount you will be billed (clinics invoice in local currency, your bank converts) is documented in case of a card-rate dispute.

The EUR figure refreshes daily from the European Central Bank reference series. Locked-in prices do not float between quote and payment — once you accept a quote, the EUR amount you saw is the EUR amount you pay, even if the FX rate has drifted.

What the comparison line actually means

Most of our destination pages compare an EU-average baseline price to the bundled EuroClinics price. The baseline is not a marketing number. It is computed from the most recent OECD healthcare cost statistics and the procedure code-mapping that the European Health Insurance Card system uses. Where the OECD figure is older than 24 months, we apply medical-CPI deflation specific to the destination economy.

Why care? Because a "save 60%" badge on a website that benchmarks to an undefined or inflated baseline is just a sales claim. The baseline matters. Ours is reproducible — every comparison line links to the underlying calculation page.

What is not in the headline

Five categories of cost are always excluded from the headline number and surfaced as separate optional lines:

• Flights. We integrate with Skyscanner for an indicative quote. We do not earn commission on flight bookings — the click goes through our partner reference, not an affiliate link.
• Travel insurance. Critical for any procedural trip. We surface three options, never bundle.
• Complication contingency. Roughly 2–3% of bundled patients incur an unexpected additional cost (extended stay, secondary procedure). We disclose the clinic's policy on this up-front and explain whose insurance responds.
• Hotel upgrades. The standard included stay is a private recovery room or a 4-star hotel within walking distance of the clinic. Upgrades are paid separately.
• Visa / consular fees. Where applicable, surfaced country-by-country with a link to the official portal.

Why our coordination fee is flat

Lead-generation marketplaces charge clinics a per-patient referral fee — frequently 8–15% of the procedure value. That fee is, of course, baked back into the patient's price. The marketplace has a structural incentive to surface the clinics that pay it the most, not the ones best suited to the patient. We have refused to operate this way since launch.

Our coordination fee is €99 for elective procedures and €0 for emergency second-opinion enquiries. It is identical regardless of the clinic the patient chooses, fully refundable if you do not proceed, and pays for the operations cost of building the comparison: shortlist generation, document collation, document translation, and the 90-day follow-up window.

Reading a quote

Before you accept, check three things:

1. The five lines above are present. If anaesthesia is not itemised, ask why.
2. The follow-up window is explicit — number of consultations, in-person vs. remote, and the cut-off date.
3. The complication policy is written down. "We will discuss this on a case-by-case basis" is not a policy.

If any of the three are missing or vague, reject the quote and ask for a re-quote. Good clinics will respond within a day. Clinics that cannot are clinics you should not engage with regardless of the headline price.

Get three real itemised quotes for your procedure — start a request.