Penalty Charge Notice: NHS Prescriptions - wrongly given, what do I do???

sheramber

have claimed and paid for the prescription,


I bought a prepayment card on the date I collected my prescription


This is confusing. Why did you sign and pay if you had just bought a prepayment card?

What is the exact timeline?

When did you sign and hand in the prescription?

When did you collect the prescription?

At what point did you purchase the prepayment card? Before you signed and paid or after you signed and paid?

circes

I paid when I collected the prescription. I have now got a letter from the pharmacy confirming that yes I had paid and collected when I said and is shown on my receipt; and that the claim was made to the NHS in August! So something's gone wrong somewhere.
I've forwarded the letter to the NHS and just waiting to hear from them.

Did you get your PCN resolved Trinidadone?

trinidadone

circes wrote: »

I paid when I collected the prescription. I have now got a letter from the pharmacy confirming that yes I had paid and collected when I said and is shown on my receipt; and that the claim was made to the NHS in August! So something's gone wrong somewhere.
I've forwarded the letter to the NHS and just waiting to hear from them.

Did you get your PCN resolved Trinidadone?

Thanks for the update, so you paid for the prescription in August, and received a penalty charge notice in November? but unless we are mistaken you also said you had a pre-payment card around the same time, which suggests you paid twice in that case, is this correct?

Yes something has gone wrong, when you received the PCN, why did it say you had received the charge?

I paid by card, I had to wave through my transactions on my online ststement> I printed it off, i blacked out all of my other transactions, and sent them a copy to prove i paid on the day. Days later, no apology or explanation, other than the fine had been quashed and I should ensure I complete part two and part three of the prescription, what ever that is!!! To be honest, i did not like the wording of the standard letter, but i got the fine quashed.

circes

I just paid the once when I got my latest prepayment card in August, and got the PCN last week stating I picked up a prescription and claimed under a prepayment card in July. The letter from the pharmacy gives dates and the refences they sent the claims on, and they weren't July, a valid prepayment card was held on all occasions. I am really very annoyed to put it mildly,

trinidadone

circes wrote: »

I just paid the once when I got my latest prepayment card in August, and got the PCN last week stating I picked up a prescription and claimed under a prepayment card in July. The letter from the pharmacy gives dates and the refences they sent the claims on, and they weren't July, a valid prepayment card was held on all occasions. I am really very annoyed to put it mildly,

you said above you had a prepayment card in august, when exactly did it start? also, you ignored my question, what was the reason on the PCN?

WTF64

Seems to be a common thing at the moment. My daughter has just received her second PCN for alledgedly not paying for a prescription due to not having an exemption certificate.
1 - she has NEVER had an exemption certificate.

2 - bank records show the payments were made, one by her and one by me when I collected the prescription for her.

Each time the NHSBSA are called, the nice lady there says that as long as there is a receipt with matching amounts to the alledged non payment and is within the vague dates given on the PCN, then they will look into it. First one, the other day, came back as cancelled once the proof was emailed to them.Today we have a fresh one, so another email and attached proof of payment has beeen sent.
I asked the NHSBSA how this was happening. She explained that its an 'automatic' process whereby they select a prescription to check at 'random'. I told her that it was odd that my daughter has been chosen ' at random' twice in a couple of weeks and prhaps she should buy a lotto ticket. I argued that my daughter is being targetted, not randomly selected. Silence on the other end of the phone.

Then the nice lady seemed to suggest that the pharmacy was at fault, that maybe they signed a box on my daughters behalf? I have now asked for copies of the prescriptions to be sent to me so I can 'discuss' them with the pharmacy.
The whole thing stinks, the NHSBSA were set up to recoup the losses incurred by the NHS by people not paying for or getting prescriptions fraudulently. Hmmm, so the £8.80 for a prescription goes back to the NHS, then the £100 on top? ( not sure why yours was only £44 on top trinidadone?) Where does that go? If it costs £100 to send a PCN, I want a job there.

trinidadone

Interesting reply, I am really sorry to learn your daughter has received a PCN wrongly for a second occassion. Would you believe it, I too have now received a PCN wrongly. I called up the call centre, and I was told I needed to proved I had actually made payment as the box on the back of the prescription was somehow marked - not by me. If I am making a full payment then there is no need to tick any box.

The problem I have had is trying to locate proof from a bank account closed last year, let alone passing security on the phone!! I actually managed to get the bank to send me the statement, i then blacked all my details out, except my name, address and the proof i paid by card. I sent the NHSBA a stick !!! letter with the statement.

I got a response telling me, like you that the pharmacy is at fault.

I have since stopped using the pharmacy in question, and now got a Pre-payment card to prevent any further wrongful fines.

I was charged £44.00 plus 8.80 as 44 quid is the fine for one item, and 8.80 is the actually cost of the prescription, its more if you have two or more items on the prescription.

I have received a response, but it does not state the pcn is cancelled, even though i have provided prrof, so i have escalated my complaint, to ensure i receive a response stating the pcn is cancelled.

I do not agree with this system at all, and it has cost me time and energy to address.

pmduk

The penalty notices are five times the prescription costs with a maximum of £100.

WTF64

Youre right, my mistake. Each prescription is £8.80 , there were 2 on the first one so £88 fine on top of the 'non paid' prescription. The second one was 3 items, so the max of £100 was issued on top of the prescription costs. They've tried to con nearly £250 out of my daughter in two weeks. Money-spinner or what?



Trinidadone, my daughter was told that she could just say she paid cash if she couldn't find a receipt and that would suffice. (I would imagine that they would then have to go back to the pharmacy and check for cash transactions on that day to see if one matches....if they could be bothered?)
Seems like they are just issuing these PCNs willy nilly and at least some of them will pay up.

WTF64

My daughter has just had an email saying this second PCN has been cancelled and to remind her (rather condesendingly) to make sure she ticks the correct box in future and to keep her receipts. Clearly it was her fault all along....naughty, naughty.



They ignored her plea to stop harrassing her with threats and demands for money.


They won't send a copy of the prescriptions, but they did mention that the pharmacy sent in a 'batch' of prescriptions in November that were dispensed in August, so nice and quick on Lloyds behalf there. Have asked how my daughter has been selected 'at random' twice from this massive batch of paperwork.