TDK conference 2017

The veterinary practice, as an undertaking, needs an efficient practice-management to run it efficiently, and its fundamental question is, if the practice was a solo or a joint business. The aim of our study was to survey and compare the characteristics of the solo and joint veterinary practices in Hungary.

We made a questionnare, which was available online between 26.02.2017 and 09.04.2017. The quiestionnare consisted of two main sections, one for the owners and other one for the employed veterinarians. The owner section contained 41 questions, the employees’ one 30 questions. We surveyed the socio-demographic traits of the respondents (age, sex, location of the practice), income, costs, legal forms, owner distribution of their practices, and the number, work and leisure time of the vet employees. 108 practice owners and 36 employed veterinarians filled the questionnare, so altogether we had 144 respondents.

68.5% of the vets have a solo practices, while 31.5% of them own a joint business. According to the responses in Middle-Hungary (Budapest and Pest county) can the largest number of joint practice be found. Most of the owners aged between 30 and 50, for solo practices 59.5% of them, and for joint businesses 70.6%. 29.7% of the surveyed solo practices are owned by females, while 58.8% of the joint businesses. 52.7% of the solo practices are mixed ones treating farm and hobby animals, as well, and there are only two businesses (2.7%) that deal with farm animals exclusively. More than 58% of the joint vet businesses serve small animals only. The sole proprietorship is the dominant legal form for the solo vet practices (60.8%), while amongst the joint businesses the limited liability companies are the most popular ones by far (70.6%).

Regarding the financial issues the joint businesses have higher average annual gross income (32.35 million HUF/year), average annual total cost (~19.06 million HUF/year) and average yearly profit (13.29 million HUF/year) than solo practices. Surprisingly the owners of the joint businesses have less leisure time, than the vets running solo practices.

Nevertheless the owners of the joint businesses would rather stick to this kind of business form (75.7%), while more than a quarter of the solo practice-owners (26.1%) would go for joint business in the near future.