Pharmacies

[Vagus]

How do pharmacies earn their money?
We have a pharmacy on the same site as the GP surgery, both were built at the same time. It’s quite a small pharmacy, not like a traditional chemist shop, and only sells a few things..all sorts of pain killers, vitamins, cough medicine, a few baby products.
There are always two pharmacists on duty and about five or six assistants, it’s always busy, and there are floor to ceiling shelves with bags of repeat prescriptions ready to be collected.
It just got me thinking, it must be quite an outlay in terms of salaries for the staff so how does it work? Is it all from doing the prescriptions, how much to they make per prescription?

[roadman]

ent it NHS?

[bednobs]

the government pays pharmacies based on the number presciptions they dispense.

[Vagus]

So they’re paid from central government, nothing to do with the NHS, bednobs?

[jennyjoan]

I changed from Boots (my doctor automatically sent my prescription to them during the Covid) - the service was awful and so I am now with a lovely wee Chemist near me. I used to wonder how they made their money so am glad to hear that they income from the prescriptions.

[davebro]

of course their main income will be from dispensing - how could it be otherwise?

[Vagus]

Exactly Dave. I wonder how much they get for each prescription they dispense?

[barry1010]

You may find this interesting https://www.bpsa.co.uk/pubs/understanding-pharmacy-funding

They also get paid for those prescription consultations they encourage customers to partake in, flu jabs, blood pressure checks and all those free services you used to get from the GP

[andy-hughes]

There are very high profit margins on the goods that pharmacies sell in their shops, which assists the profitability of the business.

[barry1010]

Vagus, currently £1.20 per item https://psnc.org.uk/funding-and-reimbursement/reimbursement/fees-allowances/

[barry1010]

Per standard item, you can see from the link they get much more for some items

[davebro]

https://psnc.org.uk/funding-and-reimbursement/reimbursement/fees-allowances/

If it's the top one - single activity fee it looks like £1.27 per item.

[barry1010]

They make most money from dispensing, though, which is why they are so eager to provide extras such as free delivery.

[Vagus]

That’s really interesting, thanks Barry.
I have 7 items on my eight week repeat prescription so the pharmacy will get £8.40 every eight weeks from me, so to speak. And we’ve both had our flu jabs done there too, for a number of years.
I like to think we’re helping keep them in business as they’re really helpful and have frequently gone the extra mile for various family members.

[bednobs]

im not quite sure how NHS money is distributed nowadays since i stopped working for them, but the money comes from central govt to the local Clinical comissioning groups to organise all NHS services in their area (hospitals, GP, dentist, pharmacies, mental health and so on)

[theprof]

Oh if only it were so simple. It's far more complicated than the link provided portrays for reasons such as clawback fees imposed by the NHS, Special Order item fees, Import fees, Pharmacy Contractor fees based on the number of scripts that pass through the pharmacy annually, and container fees where appropriate to name but a handful.

I'd recommend that you look at the September 2022 edition of the Drug Tariff online if you have the time to spare. It will give you the fees the NHS gives pharmacies for individual drugs (the retail cost of if you like), but you'll only get the true reimbursement figure by wading through the other sections which give you the fees for the other stuff I mentioned. Good Luck!

GP Dispensers get different dispensing reimbursements and stuff like catheters are reimbursed at at different rate. I'll leave it there.

[davebro]

I think the bottom line is that qualified pharmacists make pretty decent money & their other staff are probably paid at least as well as those in other retail environments.

[Vagus]

Errr thanks, prof, but I think I’ll leave it there for now ;o)

[theprof]

Very sensible Vagus lol