Due to the high competition in the pharmacy business, pharmacies are willing to come up with any strategies to steal each other's patients.  Even if that is for the price of losing some money initially, or permanently for that matter.  Sounds crazy, doesn't it?  The most common strategy now a days is issuing coupons for transferring prescriptions.  The best deal I have seen so far is getting a gift card worth $30 for every prescription you transfer from another pharmacy to their store.  That means, if you transfer 5 prescriptions, you make a grand total of $150.  Not bad at all!!  

Of course, where money is to be made, people become creative.  I have seen people have their prescriptions called to a pharmacy they have never been to so that they can transfer it to get the coupons.  I have also seen people transfering their prescriptions back and forth from one pharmacy to another.  Can you blame them?

So what does that mean to the pharmacists working in busy stores?  In one word, "PAIN".  Transferring prescriptions is a relatively lengthy process.  First of all, the technician needs to obtain some information on the prescription the patient wants to transfer.  Then, the pharmacist needs to call the other pharmacy.  After being on hold for a while,  the pharmacist finally obtains all the information of the transferee's prescription, such as the direction, first and last refill, all prescriber's information, prescription number and name of the other pharmacist he talked to.  Then, all this information needs to be entered in the system.  Trust me, it takes time. 

It is one thing to transfer a prescription for a legitimate reason, such as if you have moved to a new area, or if one pharmacy does not take a particular insurance.  It is another thing to keep transferring prescriptions back and forth, since you would like to make some easy money by abusing the system.  Just a few days ago, a very aggressive customer called me and asked me to call her doctor to get her a new prescription.  Of course, dear doctors do not bother calling the pharmacies any more, and simply ask their patients to have their pharmacies call them.  She then called back in one hour to check on the status of her new prescription.  As I explained to her that I had already faxed her doctor a request, she screamed at me "Why don't you also call my doctor."  So I called her doctor as well, as she demanded.  I finally got her the prescription; entered it in the system; filled it and had it ready for pick up.  Shortly after, my technician transfered me a phone call from another pharmacy.  Of course, that was another pharmacy calling to transfer the same prescription I had just spent so much time to get ready for my brilliant patient.  I told the other pharmacist, "But I just got this new prescription for my patient, and it is ready on the shelf for her."  She answered proudly, "But she has our coupon."

You will be the judge.  Is it really fair or right to go this far?  Have one pharmacy get a brand new prescription for you, so you could transfer it and cash your coupon?  At least, if you want your pharmacist to help you in your new business of cashing coupons, don't be too pushy.  Give her some time to first take care of more urgent prescriptions, and she eventually will take care of your business too. 

So I was working last night at our super duper busy pharmacy.  We close the pharmacy at 9 pm, but we usually have to stay at least half an hour longer to finish all the orders of the day.  At 8:45 pm, as we were already swamped with all the orders, the phones, and the customers’ questions, this really not very pleasant lady walked in and handed us her new prescription for a pain pill, vicodin.  "We won't be able to fill your prescription now, but it would be ready first thing in the morning" we told her.  She said, "What?  You must be joking."  I told her, "I wish I could have this ready for you tonight, but we already have at least 30 more prescriptions to fill for tonight, and we are closing in 15 minutes."  She got even angrier and said "This is unheard of.  After all, there are not too many people waiting in the waiting area."  So to make a long story short, I figured it probably takes more energy convincing her to come back tomorrow than filling her prescription right then.  Even though we were already running out of time, the prescription was dated 2 weeks ago and nothing urgent, I decided to fill her prescription right then. 

Of course, as we inputted the prescription, her insurance prompted us that she had filled the same medication at a different pharmacy recently.   So I told her, "I am sorry, I cannot fill your medication now because this is a narcotic medication and cannot be filled early.  According to your insurance you recently picked this medication up."  She looked at me with so much anger and resentment that I literally felt I may turn into a frog or something.  Finally, after a couple of minutes of staring at me angrily with really open and angry eyes, she said, "I don't have insurance."  Oops, could I have made a mistake here?  So I double checked her name and address to make sure I am looking at the Right profile.  I said, "But there is an insurance listed here for you."  She screamed, "But I don't have any insurance."  By then, it was already 9 pm.  I told her, OK, I will call your insurance right now to clarify this.

Her insurance verified that she indeed had insurance and got the same medication not too long ago from another pharmacy.  They also informed me that she was listed under her husband's name.  I told that to her.  You would think by now she would be ashamed of herself and would apologize and hopefully leave the pharmacy.  Guess what?  She said, "I don't have a husband."  So to make a long story short, she finally left with her prescription as she was screaming at us.  That left me shaking for a few minutes.   I was wondering though, how someone who is trying to break the system by lying to you could be so mean, give you such a hard time, and ruin your night with such a straight, or more accurately, mean face.  Of course, there is a 0.0000005% chance that this really is a mistake by the insurance company and in fact there are two people with the same name, date of birth, and address in the city.  But trust me, this whole thing was an act; a mean act by a very mean customer to get her narcotic med earlier than she was supposed to.