What does an optician do?
An optician is a medical expert specializing in people's various visual conditions. Opticians analyze eye examinations and the grade of patients' vision from the optometrist or ophthalmologists' prescriptions and design appropriate lenses to improve their sight. One of the most crucial responsibilities of an optician is to ensure that the patient is comfortable with the customized lenses. Otherwise, the optician must perform adjustments as needed. Opticians also recommend styles to the patient and provide instructions on how to properly clean and maintain the eyewear.
Optician responsibilities
Here are examples of responsibilities from real optician resumes:
- Manage appointments and appointment reminders, checking in/out patients, check insurance eligibility.
- Maintain coating quality using adhesion testing and spectrophotometers, and manage coating hues and reflectance adjustments.
- Show manual dexterity, hand eye coordination and precision to work with different types of lenses and tools.
- Assist patients with frame selections and lenses that are best suit for their lifestyle, Rx and price needs.
- Produce forms for the authorization of insurance benefits and eligibility for incoming patients.
- Prepare work orders and instructions for fabricating patients prescriptions and verify Rx are finished to specifications.
- Dispense eyewear and troubleshoot issues.
- Assess incoming prescriptions against ANSI guidelines.
- Help Dr with phone calls and billing.
- Set employee's schedules, maintain payroll budget.
- Update patient demographic information using MaximEyes EMR software.
- Perform lab duties and assist with pre-test functions.
- Complete appropriate math formulas to confirm doctor's prescription.
- Operate various equipment and perform pre-test diagnostic tests i.e.
- Control equipment that coats lenses to alter their reflective qualities.
Optician skills and personality traits
We calculated that 31% of Opticians are proficient in Patients, Customer Service, and Basic Math. They’re also known for soft skills such as Business skills, Communication skills, and Customer-service skills.
We break down the percentage of Opticians that have these skills listed on their resume here:
- Patients, 31%
Produced forms for the authorization of insurance benefits and eligibility for incoming patients.
- Customer Service, 23%
Verify Eligibility and Benefits Order Entry Assist Patients in Frame Selection Patient Teaching Scheduling Customer Service
- Basic Math, 5%
Use basic math to correctly add up copayments for exams and materials.
- Patient Care, 5%
Facilitated Ophthalmologists and Optometrists with various aspects of patient care including prescription management and verifying insurance eligibility and claims.
- Math, 3%
Worked as a Math teacher in Pakistan (have reference letter)
- Work Ethic, 3%
Fostered a positive and pro-active work ethic to promote staff teamwork and morale which included mentoring apprentice opticians.
Common skills that an optician uses to do their job include "patients," "customer service," and "basic math." You can find details on the most important optician responsibilities below.
Business skills. To carry out their duties, the most important skill for an optician to have is business skills. Their role and responsibilities require that "opticians are often responsible for the business aspects of running an optical store." Opticians often use business skills in their day-to-day job, as shown by this real resume: "worked with compulink business systems to submit orders and insurance claims. "
Communication skills. Another soft skill that's essential for fulfilling optician duties is communication skills. The role rewards competence in this skill because "opticians must listen closely to what customers want." According to an optician resume, here's how opticians can utilize communication skills in their job responsibilities: "facilitate communication between doctors and patients to ensure the highest level of patient care. "
Customer-service skills. This is an important skill for opticians to perform their duties. For an example of how optician responsibilities depend on this skill, consider that "because some opticians work in stores, they must answer questions and know about the products they sell." This excerpt from a resume also shows how vital it is to everyday roles and responsibilities of an optician: "conducted retail sales and general customer service responsibilities, including engaging and interacting with customers in order to manage insurance claims. ".
Dexterity. A big part of what opticians do relies on "dexterity." You can see how essential it is to optician responsibilities because "opticians frequently use special tools to make final adjustments and repairs to eyeglasses." Here's an example of how this skill is used from a resume that represents typical optician tasks: "heat, shape, or bend plastic or metal frames to adjust eyeglasses to fit patients, using pliers and hands. "
The three companies that hire the most opticians are:
- Warby Parker147 opticians jobs
- Shopko Optical92 opticians jobs
- Walmart76 opticians jobs
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Compare different opticians
Optician vs. Contact lens fitter
An optometric technician is responsible for performing administrative and clerical tasks to assist patients with their vision problems and needs. Optometric technicians work in the laboratory, constructing glasses and lenses according to the ophthalmologist's advice. They clean and inspect vision equipment and ensure that the facility is well-maintained. An optometric technician must have excellent communication and organizational skills, especially in responding to the customers' inquiries and concerns, manage information on the database, and release customers' orders.
There are some key differences in the responsibilities of each position. For example, optician responsibilities require skills like "patients," "customer service," "basic math," and "patient care." Meanwhile a typical contact lens fitter has skills in areas such as "emr," "treatment options," "a-scan," and "epic." This difference in skills reveals the differences in what each career does.
The education levels that contact lens fitters earn slightly differ from opticians. In particular, contact lens fitters are 2.0% less likely to graduate with a Master's Degree than an optician. Additionally, they're 16.3% more likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.Optician vs. Dispensing optician apprentice
Each career also uses different skills, according to real optician resumes. While optician responsibilities can utilize skills like "patients," "basic math," "patient care," and "strong customer service," dispensing optician apprentices use skills like "schedule appointments," "troubleshoot," "customer complaints," and "order entry."
Dispensing optician apprentices earn similar levels of education than opticians in general. They're 2.0% less likely to graduate with a Master's Degree and 16.3% less likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.Optician vs. Licensed dispensing optician
The required skills of the two careers differ considerably. For example, opticians are more likely to have skills like "basic math," "strong customer service," "math," and "work ethic." But a licensed dispensing optician is more likely to have skills like "ansi," "patient history," "customer complaints," and "scheduling appointments."
Licensed dispensing opticians typically earn similar educational levels compared to opticians. Specifically, they're 0.6% more likely to graduate with a Master's Degree, and 0.4% more likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.Optician vs. Optometric technician
Even though a few skill sets overlap between opticians and optometric technicians, there are some differences that are important to note. For one, an optician might have more use for skills like "basic math," "math," "work ethic," and "strong work ethic." Meanwhile, some responsibilities of optometric technicians require skills like "excellent organizational," "pre-test," "multitasking," and "patient flow. "
In general, optometric technicians hold similar degree levels compared to opticians. Optometric technicians are 0.1% less likely to earn their Master's Degree and 0.8% more likely to graduate with a Doctoral Degree.Types of optician
Updated January 8, 2025
