Should a Bilingual Dental Assistant Get Paid More?

My Aunt works in the Bay Area of California. She is a Dental Assistant to an Oral Surgeon. She has been doing this for a long time -13 years - and speaks %26amp; reads spanish (from P.R.). Basically, she is going in for her salary review today and her boss is kind of tight (I think she currently gets paid $17/hr). She wants to be paid for her bilingual efforts too, but it's been hard to research even on line. Does anyone have any good, specific information? Because she does speak to the spanish clients and explain the medical procedures and makes the sale so to speak.

Should a Bilingual Dental Assistant Get Paid More?
Ideally yes, she should get paid more. However, if she has not made this an issue before, it may be hard to make the case for bilingual pay.





When she goes in for her salary review today, have her suggest that because she is bilingual and has a long work history with the company, her salary should be on the level of other bilingual dental assistants.





Pa' lante y suerte Boricua!
Reply:It depends what county she lives in. I work for Santa Clara County and I get $130 bilingual differential. You might want to contact her HR dept or the regulations that were set for her when she initially got hired. If shes been working there for 13 years she should definitely get bilingual pay, its more work to translate and do paperwork in a another language.