Trailing Thoughts

As many of you know, I work as an intern in a large chain pharmacy here in Toledo. Not mentioning any names, the pharmacists were complaining about what this company calls “customer complaints”. For instance, about a week ago a lady came in for her prescription refill. Unfortunately, because of the federal laws, a prescription is good for a year… not that if it was written in febuary it is good for all of febuary, like this lady thought. It was written on Febuary 11th, 2003 therefore it is good until Feb. 11th 2004. This lady got into a huge argument that we were withholding something within her right, to get her prescription, because it was “good for all of febuary”. Not only did this lady think this and refused to take no for an answer, she had a new prescription for it in her hand, but she refused to let us fill the new one. We told her we cannot that it is against the law and she was unhappy with our answer and called the customer call center and a few days later, the pharmacist recieved a request to call the customer and apologize, but he refused. This is not a customer complaint, but a customer ignorance…. it is against the law for a pharmacist to fill a prescription over a year old… I could see if we were overly rude to the customer for her to be upset, but we were not… in reality, with the management of the company asking for the pharmacist to apologize for doing the job legally is underminding their position in the pharmacy. Retail pharmacies have the bottom line to make money, not serve the customers ( you see this in the way management values the job performance of the pharmacist) as it is legally and patient focused.
Here is just 1 more example of customer ignorance being given as a customer complaint. A customer came into the pharmacy wanting a refill on a prescription, but it was too soon for the insurance to pay for it. Now, as it turned out, the customer lost 10 pills and needed them until she was able to get her next refill and decided to overpass the insurance and pay cash for 10 pills. A few days later, it is time to refill the prescription, and with this being her last refill, she only had 20 pills left. She claimed that we are cheating her out of 10 pills, and that each refill, she is entitled to having 30 pills. We tried to nicely explain that when she took the 10 pills, she took from the total amount of pills given by the doctor, and that 30 minus 10 equals 20… but she refused to listen to reason. We even offered to call her doctor to get a new prescription to get 30 pills, but she did not want to get her doctor involved ( her words). She calls the customer call center and again there is a request to apologize to this customer. Again the pharmacist refused to apologize because in legality, the pharmacist did the correct action. We are not sure what happened, but management overstepped the pharmacist, and made the phone call themselves…. again underminding the way the pharmacist practices.
Notice the mention of customers. In retail pharmacies, there is more a focus on dollars than care, otherwise we would have our customers be referred to as patients, not customers… The customer is not always right. A pharmacist needs to use their judgment when it comes to issues, otherwise they could be causing a case against their license. We were trying to brainstorm what to do when customer complaints are really just customer ignorance and customers trying to “throw their weight around”. A few ideas we came up with is just refusing to apologize for issues where the pharmacist is right. Unfortunately we know management goes above their heads and apologizes anyways. Another idea is that everytime a customer abuses the pharmacist or the pharmacy staff, is to call the customer call center and put your own complaint that the customer is abusing the pharmacy staff. We are not sure of how management would react to that. And one more idea is to get management say that it is their policy to break the law and require pharmacists that work for them to do this becuase the customer is always right and that all customer asses should be kissed and have management sign it and have it witnessed. If they do this, atleast when they want you to do something stupid, you have it in writing that company policy requires it.
The profession of pharmacy is unfortunately treated like it is a business like McDonalds. Pharmacists are not compensated for their knowledge ( one of the only medical fields like this) and they are the most regulated by the government. Customers pull up in the drive through and expect their “order” to be ready in just 2 minutes. It is a scary thought of what this profession will turn out to be in 20 years, because the policy of (retail) pharmacies is to increase the buck and the customer is always right, not serve the customer as a patient focus on what the pharmacist’s knowledge of medicinal therapy and what is best for the patient while staying within legal rights.