Mail Order

Working in a brick and mortar pharmacy I occasionally interact with a customer who participates in mail order. Mail order means instead of picking up prescriptions at a brick and mortar location the customer receives his or her prescriptions directly in the mail. Admittedly mail order is out of my range of expertise, yet I felt obligated to address mail order as increasing numbers of customers interact with mail order pharmacies.

To address my lack of expertise I ventured out and asked a handful of questions about the process to a gentleman who was polite enough to provide insight in to his mail order experience.

This particular person has been using mail order for the past three years through his insurance. Initially the insurance offered the option of either mail order or the ability to fill at a brick and mortar pharmacy. However, his insurance no longer allows him the ability to fill at a brick and mortar store under his coverage and now requires him to use mail order.

The Process

• He must either have his doctor call in his prescriptions directly to the service or he may mail a hard copy of the prescription.

• Pending any problems the prescription arrives directly in his mailbox within a few days.

Once a prescription has been established for something such as a maintenance medication such as blood pressure he can go online and request the next refill or sign up to have the medication automatically filled and sent to him without prior consent. If the prescription has no remaining refills the mail order service will request a new prescription from the doctor and fill once the service receives the new prescription.

While the service provides the convenience of not physically going to a brick and mortar store shortfalls still remain. For example, mail order service cannot provide quick enough service to fill emergency prescriptions. Emergency scripts must be filled promptly and in the case of the person I spoke with his insurance will not cover any scripts filled at a brick and mortar location. Therefore, if he wants the prescription immediately he must have it filled at a brick and mortar pharmacy and pay for the entire cost of the drug out of pocket with no reimbursement from his insurance.