Question about pharmacy practices [feel free to answer if you've ever worked in a pharmacy]

there is no price difference where you get it (from yr end) if you're just paying insurance co-pays. also, i'm pretty sure there are generic vicodens.

you'd be surprised how many breaks you can get just by bitching it's cheaper at so-and-so.

kill Florida mail-order pharmacy KILL KILL KILL

i've learned if you ever use mail order (intentionally or not) and you ever don't get your Rx via mail, good luck ever having the mail order wing and the in-store Rx wing talk to each other.

somehow I got signed up for mail order (idk how, maybe I did it by mistake), and they sent me my blood pressure meds on 12/7 by mail. No idea how they charged me for them - they had a debit card number that has long been cancelled. and the account it's attached to is closed.

they never sent me any notification that they sent it, ,but they sent it to an old address - had I known I could have used USPS to reroute the package, but I didn't, so the current residents returned it to sender.

they got it back weeks ago, but are still reflecting that I 'got' the prescription, so the in-person pharmacies won't let me fill it there. I was on the road all day yesterday and couldn't wait on hold to talk, today I got through and finally got the number to call. 3 days with no blood pressure meds, whooooo

Not sure if there's a better thread for this, but curious...

About two weeks ago my doc sent over an updated prescription for me. It wasn't critical or anything, but after five days I was a little surprised it hadn't been filled. Called CVS and asked what's up and they were like, "oh, yeah we were waiting for you to call". Which, is new to me. Typically when a doctor sends a prescription over to my pharmacy I've never had to follow up with a call myself, it just gets filled. Kind of figured this was a one-off, but then the EXACT same thing happened to my wife the next week. So when my son had a new prescription, we just automatically called the next day and it was filled right away.

Like, if this is a new policy that the patient is expected to call in to confirm a doctor's prescription, maybe that should be somehow communicated? Anyone else experienced this?

That's weird, I've never heard of something like that. But not totally dissimilar, last Thursday I was expecting a delivery. I was tracking its progress throughout the day online, and it was getting closer and closer. Then suddenly the latest update was something like "your delivery is being held for you at the local post office." No attempted delivery, no knock on the door, no doorbell, and no note. Just skipped the delivery step entirely. Had I not been tracking it I would have had no idea it was being held for me.

At a pharmacy, though ... hmm, I could see why they might wait to fill it, but no idea why no one told you you had to call them first.

Usually when a doctor calls in a prescription it's filled by a few hours later without my intervention (unless my previous supply had more than 2 days doses per 30 days remaining, in which case they wait until 28 days since my last refill). But sometimes the pharmacy won't fill it because insurance hasn't approved it, or is awaiting me to update some (usually insurance-related) issue, or they're out of stock. Additional issues come up if it's a controlled-substance medication which an increasing number are; it can be like pulling teeth to get some controlled med Rx's filled.

I'll also note here that Costco pharmacies often have the lowest prices, and you can use the Costco pharmacy even if you're not a Costco member. In the U.S. it's illegal for pharmacies to charge membership fees, and the guard at the front door that asks for your Costco membership knows this and will let you in if you tell them you're there to pick up something from the pharmacy. Obviously Costco doesn't publicize this. My only issue with Costco pharmacies (besides the limited hours, closed Sunday) is that they don't stock some of the meds I use.

lately rite aid has greyed out the two prescriptions i most often need refills of on their website (they are, guess what, my trans medications). so i’ve been calling them in. but calling them in doesn’t guarantee a refill… i’ve had to call a day or two later, and without fail they’re like “yeah it’s not ready…. oh it’ll be ready this afternoon”. maddening. no idea what’s happening here

xp - Yeha, afaik there weren't any issues with refills or insurance on these ones. I really got the impression from the guy I talked to that they were just literally waiting for me to call to nudge it forward, almost as if they decided it's just too much work to fill all the prescriptions unless someone complained.