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Wednesday 19 November 2008

How much is your vet charging for prescriptions?

One of our readers has just told us that her vet has just started charging her a whopping £10 plus VAT for writing out prescriptions for her rescued Great Dane which has heart problems.
We'd be interested to hear how much your vet is intending to charge you?
For the last three years vets have been able to give clients prescriptions to get their drugs elsewhere they have not been allowed to charge for this service. But since the beginning of the month vets can now charge an admin or "medical determination fee" for writing out a prescription.
Our reader phoned the office of fair trading who told her to shop around and she phoned all the vets in her area to see what their admin fees were. Her vet was the highest, there were a few at £6 plus VAT and one very near that is only £2.50 including VAT. She said it would
be interesting to see and compare what people are paying around the country. She is in South Devon.
Many people are still not aware that they don't have to buy their medication from their vet surgery and can buy online at half the price.
So how does your vet rate? What are they charging?
Can you post where you live (by county) and the cost and whether it includes VAT.

9 comments:

  1. Sorry but don't have a price for my area, just wanted to share my experience of this. I went on the internet and pulled off approx 10 prices for the meds my dog needed, worked out the average cost and took this to my vet. He agreed to price match the average price. He did point out that he was only making aprox £2 on it but said that £2 profit was better then no profit. Perhaps it would be worth talking to your vet first, I understand that not all would be as reasonable but it's worth a try as it is a lot less hassle.

    Michelle

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  2. Have just been to my vet so asked. It is £11.75 inclusive of VAT in Holt, North Norfolk. The receptionist said they worked this out as being the equivalent cost of 5 minutes of a vet's time.
    She unconvincingly justified it as the vet having to go to the computer, spend time typing out the prescription and then printing it out using the surgery's electricity, paper and ink.
    It's been about a year since I put in a pet insurance claim but at that time my vet charged a £5 admin fee for filling out the claim form. I bet claim forms take much longer to write than a simple prescription as some of them can be quite detailed.
    It does seem to me that the prices for prescriptions are high to dissuade clients from getting their pet medication elsewhere. When you see that you can get many well known meds at half price on the internet you can see why vets don't want to lose their juicy mark up!

    Karen

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  3. my vet wants £12.00 for my prescription !!!!
    Craig robinson in Carlisle

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  4. I don't write any prescriptions these days as I only treat pets with natural medicines, but in my old practice next door to me (in Potters Bar, Hertfordshire) they are charging £10 plus VAT, which I think will be the norm for the South East and London

    Richard Allport

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  5. PS Didn't mean to be anonymous but the system wouldn't seem to accept anything else. I'm usually very un-anonymous as regular DT readers will know!

    Richard

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  6. PS didn't mean to be anonymous but the system wouldn't accept anything else at the time.I'm very un-anonymous as regular DT readers will know. I'm also very non technical which is probably why I find this blogging thing very exhausting and incredibly complicated. I'll try again.

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  7. I have been getting a written prescription for the last 5 months and have just been told that they will now charge £5 for this. I thought that was bad until I read some of the other posts!
    However I have just been reading that you can ask your vet to write prescriptions for up to 6 months. I am going to try this way.By the way, my vet are Medivet and are known for being really expensive which is why I started to buy online in the first place! Rochford, Essex

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  8. i live in ca and i pay 7.50 for my pet prescription plus i have to mail my pet prescription to the online pet pharmacy and there has been times were they did not get the mail in prescription and my vet will not honor a phone call.my pet needs his meds. there are so many vets
    that i can go to but ( they all do the same )this is a big hassle and costing me more and i am so mad where are my rights ( as well as my dogs)?

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  9. I have 6 cavaliers - 3 with eye meds ( optimmune £23.60 online and £46.50 at my vets ! ) and 3 with heart problems, so I spend hundreds of pounds every month on meds. Petplan has just let me down by stating that when my dogs reach 10, I have pay 20% of all their claims - this could cost me £1,500pa ! My vet charges £5.36 per prescription, one item only, up to 6 months supply, but when I asked if I could buy my meds online he says its a grey area ethically - in other words he does not want to lose the huge profits he is making out of me . I could save over £500 p a for ONE dogs meds, IF only he would agree. Shall I ask him for discount if he keeps prevaricating ?

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