Selecting the Best Pharmacy To Meet Your Needs

When Interviewing a LTC Pharmacy

Introduction

• First introduce your company to the pharmacy and talk your overall operations and expectations of a pharmacy.
• Allow the pharmacy to ask questions about your organization.
• Ask the question:  Why is your pharmacy the best pharmacy for our group?

Market Position

• Ask the questions:  Who is your competition?  How do you compare against your competition?

Customer Service and Quality

• Ask the question:  What does your error rate look like and what are you doing to proactively reduce errors?
• Ask the question:  What is your pharmacies philosophy on customer service towards your customers?
• Ask the question:  What is the most common complaint that you receive?  Let them answer, then ask:  What are you doing to resolve this complaint?
• Ask the question:  How do you troubleshoot problems?  Can you give me some examples of problems that you have help other customers resolve.
• Ask the question:  How do you proactively reduce delays in providing medications to our facility or group?

Services, Offerings and Packaging

• Ask the question:  What other services does your pharmacy offer your customers to help them to be successful?
• Ask the question:  How will you continue to provide solutions for our organization in the future?
• Ask the questions:  What type of packaging do you offer?  Do you offer “cycle “fill”, “on demand” or both?
• Ask the questions:  What technology do you offer?  If yes, how does that work and who pays what?
• Ask the question:  Do you offer consulting services?  If yes, how do those services work?
• Ask the question:  Do you offer equipment for the facility to use?  If so, what is offered and under what conditions?
• Ask the question:  Is there a contract involved to use your pharmacy services?  If so, what are the terms for both parties?

Delivery and After Hours

• Ask the questions:  Do you offer delivery?  If yes, how often do you deliver?  What are your cut off times for delivery?
• Ask the questions:  How do you handle orders that are received after pharmacy hours?  Do you have after hour services?  If yes, how does the after hours services work?

Overall

• Is the pharmacy interested or seem interested in your business and your success?
• Do they understand your company needs and which services are important to your organization and why they are important?
• Are their answers genuine, accurate and based on facts?
• Ask for references, especially those that have recently started using the prospective pharmacy.
• Ask for a detailed implementation plan.
• What is the transition timeline?
• What is required to make the switch or start using the selected pharmacy?

When Selecting a Retail Pharmacy

• Are you able to find company reviews?
• Which services are important to you and do they have those services?
• Is the pharmacy location convenient or do they offer delivery or mail order services?
• What does the pharmacy do that makes them desirable to customers?
• Do they contract with your insurance?
• What is their cash pricing like?