Vet charges for prescriptions

sheramber

It is up tot eh vet how long he issues a prescription for. Initially he will want to make sure the medicine and dosage are correct and there are no problems with it.

After the initial period he may be prepared to issue a linger prescription but again it is his decision how long is appropriate.

My vet works on a 3 month limit , There is a notice up in waiting room advising this.

strapkass

Our cat is on Vidalta for Hyperthyroidism. She has been on the medication for a year now. Our last three month prescription was £9.00. Today it's £14.10. That's an increase of almost 64% in three months at a time when interest rates are low, inflation is at 2.5%, RPI is 4.1% and wage rises are all but frozen. When I asked for an explanation I was told that the owners had increased prices across the board in keeping with general price rises and that a 64% increase in their view was the norm.

teddysmum

Vets should only prescribe for up to 3 months ,under Cascade rules and my vets charge per script and not it's contents. Some online chemists,like Animed Direct will accept a long term script and let you buy in monthly amounts until the listed amount is purchased.


However,since the lovely days when vets couldn't charge for a script,so huge savings were possible, costs quickly rose from an initial £5,to (the last time I looked,about a year ago) charging £30 for the first,then about £18 for repeats.

sheramber

If your vet requires to see your pet before issuing another prescription then you may also have a consultation charge on top of the prescription charge.

Flugelhorn

strapkass wrote: »

Our cat is on Vidalta for Hyperthyroidism. She has been on the medication for a year now. Our last three month prescription was £9.00. Today it's £14.10. That's an increase of almost 64% in three months at a time when interest rates are low, inflation is at 2.5%, RPI is 4.1% and wage rises are all but frozen. When I asked for an explanation I was told that the owners had increased prices across the board in keeping with general price rises and that a 64% increase in their view was the norm.

That's carbimazole - price for human version tends to fluctuate wildly - would be better if they maybe blamed the cost of the drug rather than an increase across the board

sheramber

The vets also have fuel bills to pay, insurances ( how many people are complaining about insurance costs going up?) to pay and ongoing training to cover. Machinery, like xray machines need servicing and replacing regularly.

Business rates have increased.

They also need to factor in unpaid bills.

So a bit more expenses than just wages, inflation and interest rates.

nicter

We pay for a monthly prescription from our vet that costs £13.00 ( they wont do more than a month) and buy fortekor from Animed
We save £11 a month this way which over a year amounts to a fair saving

Half_Full_Gavlaa

Anyone else struggled with repeat medication costs for their pets? or found a cheaper way around and managing to spend less?

Cheers

Tadorne

krlyr wrote: »

[...]

The charge has no specified amount either. It must be "reasonable" and a vet cannot discriminate against a customer who asks for a prescription, but there is no cap.

Hi Krlyr, Thanks very much for this info. Could you let us know whose rules you are quoting when you say that a vet cannot -- i.e. is not allowed to -- discriminate against a customer asking for a prescription? is this a DEFRA regulation? This is really important to me because vets seem quite often to refuse to write a prescription at all for people with pet rabbits. According to some of the members on a facebook rabbit group I belong to, some vets say they'll only write prescriptions for breeders.

Katiehound

Tadorne wrote: »

Could you let us know whose rules you are quoting when you say that a vet cannot -- i.e. is not allowed to -- discriminate against a customer asking for a prescription? .

Not Krlyr here! but I seem to think it was a ruling by RCVS some years ago- to stop vets from making a profit/ charging unreasonable amounts for writing prescriptions.

My friend had a cat that simply hated going to the vet ( and was a nightmare to get into a cat carrier) but they insisted that they see her once a year before issuing Frontline.