Can I Get a Refund on a Plastic Surgery Booking Deposit?

Hello, this is Director Jo Hyun-woo.

Today, I’d like to talk about something a little different, rather than surgery.

It’s about booking deposits. Through my blog and YouTube as well, some people ask questions like, “I couldn’t get my deposit back at another clinic...” and so on.

So today, I’d like to talk about booking deposits.

In plastic surgery clinics, I understand that surgery booking deposits are usually about 10%.

Of course, this varies by clinic, but because of the nature of cosmetic surgery, many people want their surgery on a specific date.

Usually, as the surgery date gets closer, it becomes difficult to schedule another surgery on that same day. That is why a surgery booking deposit is collected.

Then how is this deposit refunded?

In the past, when things were handled in an ad hoc way, there were quite a few disputes about this.

Sometimes deposits that involved a large amount of money were not refunded at all, and sometimes the full amount was replaced with another procedure regardless of the surgery date.

So the Korea Consumer Agency established general refund rules.

In general, if a dispute arises:

If you cancel 3 days before the scheduled surgery date, 90% of the deposit is refunded; 2 days before, 50% is refunded; 1 day before, 20% is refunded; and cancellations on the day of surgery are not refunded at all.

For example, if the surgery costs 5 million won and the deposit is 500,000 won, then if you cancel 1 day before the surgery, only 100,000 won would be refunded.

Usually, unless there is some other special agreement, the general refund rules seem to apply.

However, there are exceptions. If you agreed to and signed something regarding this deposit, then in principle, those terms apply.

If you signed a contract that says, “The deposit is non-refundable in full until 1 week before the reservation date, or 2 weeks before,” then that clause applies according to court precedents.

That is because some places have a 20% deposit, and the period during which the deposit can be refunded may also be longer.

To make it a little easier to understand, this also applies in cases such as booking airline tickets or hotels that are non-refundable.

There are general refund rules, but because you agreed to the clause that says refunds are not available, you cannot get a refund even if your schedule changes.

For plastic surgery as well, if the patient’s schedule is very full or if a reservation is made urgently during peak season, signing such an agreement may leave you responsible in some cases. So before making a surgery reservation, it would be best to carefully check the deposit refund policy and then decide.

These days, clinics are required to clearly explain the deposit refund policy before taking a deposit.

If there was no other special explanation, you can think that the refund rules from the Korea Consumer Agency above are the general standard.

Please be sure to check carefully before deciding on surgery so that you do not experience any disadvantage.

Thank you.