Asking vet for a prescription

I work for a vet & we add about 35-40% on to preventitive care treatments like flea spot-ons etc. Prescription drugs we add about 15% onto, primarily because we don't want our clients to buy drugs from the internet as we see so many problems resulting from inferior quality/out of date/just plain fake internet purchased drugs. For somedrugs, such as warfarin, ibuprofen & valium we charge less than an NHS prescription price even though the drug is exactly the same as human grade-qulaity & dose (by law we cannot full human prescriptions though!). We don't sell cheap flea treatments, only behind the counter ones; Advocate, Stronghold, Frontline & Programme, as in our experience these are the only ones that work, cheaper ones are a total waste of money. In our area we are seeing a upsurge in cases of lung & heart worm, both of which are mostly fatal unless caught very early, so we are recommending Advocate spot-on flea treatment, which prevents against both of these in addition to fleas, right now.

However, (and I know this isn't going to be a popular view) I would like to remind everyone that vets charge big prices because they have big overheads & provide some services for which they don't get paid : treating/euthanising diseased/injured strays/RTA's; tracking down owners of lost pets; treating wildlife (beacuse the RSPCA always refer people to their local vet!) etc. All of these are potentially expensive actions which everyone expects a vet to provide and swallow the cost themselves and quite frankly someone somewhere has to pay, so services, including repeat medications & preventitive treatments, tend to be higher priced accordingley. If people keep using their vet for essential services but use the internet for others, eventually the cost of vaccinations & consultations will go through the roof to keep the vet in business & provide these assumed free service.

That said, you are quite at liberty to ask for a prescription, and by law the vet must provide in within a reasonable time frame (we have a 3 working day turn-around) and again by law it must be free of charge. We do however, keep a note on file of who receives written prescriptions and we do not ever offer those clients discretionary discounts or payment plans.

HTH;)

Lillibet wrote: »

I work for a vet & we add about 35-40% on to preventitive care treatments like flea spot-ons etc. Prescription drugs we add about 15% onto,
HTH;)

Well my vet charges more than 15% on prescription medication. They charge about £42.00 for an 80ml bottle of Metacam. I can purchase it on line for around £18-20 so of course I purchase it on line. And I buy it from a reputable company (PetMeds).

Lillibet,

WHile I appreciate your honesty and this isn't meant to be rude, it's about time vets started to realise that they are running a service based business.

The everincreasing consultation charge should over most of the overheads and then, vets/ practice managers should look at increasing their turnover by competing with some of the internet prescription suppliers.......afterall, they don't have every customer already paying a consult and they have to cover their costs ( warehouse, staff, website, postage) but still manage to undercut my vet by 30 - 50% sometimes more!!! Metacalm is a prime example as Jenny W says.BTW, I've bought everything from wormers to prescription meds online for about 8 years now and I've only once had a problem with short dated goods, returned and refunded , no problem. I have never had a problem with fakes or poor quality but then I research my suppliers!

While I understand what you are saying about "charity" work, I've recently discovered that in my area, now that the council is responsible for strays 24/7 and the police refuse to deal with them is that a big vet chain acts as a holding and treatment centre out of hours for all animals including wildlife and charges the council for this service. Now if you ring any of the local vets about a stray, RTA etc they refer you to them. They are also the out of hours service for 95% of the vets in this area and are the reason I am on the point of changing vets to the one (large) practice that does look after it's own out of hours service.

It's a shame as I've used these vets for many years and most of the time I'm happy with the vets themselves but their attitude when you ask for a prescription and their lack of admin particularly when you are referred or use the out of hours service is appalling...on more than one occasion I've paid for two lots of identical tests because they are poor at communicating with other providers that THEY have referred me to.....and when you query the bill politely you'd swear that you were asking them to take the money out of their own pockets!!!!

I do understand the principles of running a service business and IMO until many vets realise that that is what they are doing and start to behave accordingly they will continue to feel hard done by when their customers pick and chose the service that they want their vet to supply but that won't help them in the long run.

Anyway, sorry about the rant, none of it was personal:o it's a subject that really winds me up

frivolous_fay

I hope you still feel able to ask for a prescription as IMHO a 100% mark up is just plain greedy:mad:

Funnily enough Lillibet, I was talking to a large animal vet today as we were trying to persuade a little pony that being treated up was a good idea;) and I asked him if a lot of his customers asked for a prescription. He said "not many as we have dropped our prices to just a little above what the internet places charge and we tell anyone who asks that" and even though most horses are insured for vet bills the excess is usually higher (£125) than pet insurance so most of the time you don't claim for minor things.Also horse insurance only covers the 1st 12 months of an illness so after that you pay for meds/treatment yourself and the vets found that it was better to take a smaller profit on meds than none.......I appreciate that large animal and pet practices are different but not that different!!!

As far as consultation and operation prices rising, well in my experience they have way above the retail price index....why? Staff aren't getting big pay rises, rents and rates haven't gone up that much.....

Personally I have no problem paying the true price for a service, what I object to is the padding of bills and as a customer I will search out the best price for an identical product be it meds or even something like my utilities. If the internet pharmacies can supply the product at £x and still make a profit why can't my vets do similar? After all, these products all come from the same companies no matter who is selling them? Surely a 20% profit on a product is better than 0% profit? I understand about fake/poor quality products being available but if you do a bit of research you should be able to reduce the risk of that happening? Caveat Emptor (sp) and all that?

I sat in my vets not that long ago waiting to be slotted in as an emergency appointment and in an hour reckoned that 2 vets saw 25 patients, even if some of them were repeat appts at *only* £22 time that makes a lot of cash over the counter ( I have seen it a lot busier!) and that didn't include any ops, home visits or the previous 4 hours of surgery time. Now if they can't cover their running costs for 3 vets ( no out of hours costs remember, in fact they get a payment every ime one of their patients uses the O.O.H provider) and 3 nurses plus a receptionist then they are not running their business properly!!!! IMO, the food and med sales should be the bonus not the essentials of their costs. Also if vets wish to do charity or no charge work there is an option to ask people to contribute via a collection tin rather than compell them to through their charges....most pet owners are a soft touch when it comes to an animal needing help and would happily puta few quid in a tin:D but at least they have a choice then!

I often wonder if vets have got used to insurance companies paying bills without question and got used to a certain level of profit without having to consider their day to day running costs as carefully as any other service providers but as horseowners have now discovered that will not go on forever and I think that pet insurers are now beginning to query what they see as unreasonable costs and fight back a little.....

Again, most pet owners will do anything for their animals whether they can really afford it or not and if charges rise excessively at one practise will move to another....the irresponsible won't pay regardless of the price sadly, but having a pet is something that can cost a lot and people have to realise that is their responsibility to either insure or be prepared to self fund.....not expect other customers either through their ever increasing premiums or their own self funding to subsidise them. I know that appears harsh but I don't ask others to pay my bills and I'm happy to contribute IF I have the option and can afford/wish to when a vets choose to help an animal that doesn't have funding for whatever reason.

Doctors who charge for a private prescription are usually NHS.....therefore funded by the state and us through N.I contributions so not quite the same scenario;)

Slightly off topic, sorry op

Not every vet is charging like that, I personally think that is more than a bit cheeky - we aren't charging anything at the moment but are looking into the situation. I don't mind providing a free prescription for someone who is coming in for regular checkups but I object to providing a free prescription for 2 worm tablets or a 3 pack of flea treatment so someone can save less than a couple of pounds. For the time it takes me to do it, it is costing me more to write a prescription that it is saving the person getting it. We are looking in to how legally we can charge if someone just walks in but not charge if they have an appointment.
Other than that, most vet organisations are advising charging based on time and using the standard consultation charge as a basis. If it takes 5 minutes to write, print and sign the prescription, charge the same as 5 minutes of consultation time. For us, about £10 would be right but that would be for all items, not per item.