Allcare Dental Chain Closes Unexpectedly

BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) – A New York-based dental chain unexpectedly shut down operations nationwide because of cash-flow problems, leaving patients without access to their records and offices unreachable by phone or computer.

Patients reported going to Allcare Dental insurance & Dentures offices for scheduled appointments beginning Monday only to find the doors closed in states including New York, Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio and New Hampshire.

Gabe Williams of Dayton, Ohio, said he paid more than $3,000 in advance for dental work but was locked out Monday when he showed up for an appointment that the company had rescheduled from Dec. 30.

After prepaying $750, Lynn Berger found herself in the same situation in Nashua, N.H. Allcare had called in mid-December to move a Dec. 27 appointment to Monday, saying the corporate office had decided to shut down during the holidays.

“They knew they were closing when they were rescheduling,” she said Tuesday.

Hundreds of employees, meanwhile, wondered whether they would get paid for hours already worked and whether bonuses promised before Christmas would ever arrive.

“Nobody has any answers to anything. Everybody’s lost their job so nobody can help you with anything,” said Tara Mongold, who worked at the company’s call center in the Buffalo suburb of Clarence for more than three years.

The company operated 52 locations and employed 772 people in 15 states a year ago, the New York attorney general’s office said. An employee said closings and consolidations since then had brought the number to about 38 offices at the time of the shutdown.

Allcare executives did not respond to phone messages, and the company’s primary website was down.

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