(no subject)
why today was the most annoying day ever:
1) i had to go to driving class to learn how to drive again after a bs speeding ticket (yeah yeah i know thats what everyone says). i was late and made a spectacle of, however the class didn't end up being too bad since there was a movie, and basically the guy just kept talking about the best fines/tickets/insurance payments/summons he's ever seen. BTW if you think you're paying too much for car insurance, go talk to the guy he had who's paying $8100 a year. i learned not to talk back to a trooper, and there are people much worse off than me, woo.
2) work. this will end up being another few numbers. worked with fatty, that was enough to start.
3) customers were in rare form today. i don't know if its a full moon but i got every dumb question in the book.
4) this one will hurt my brain, and probably yours. a woman comes into the pharmacy and wants a script filled under worker's comp. she hands me her comp insurance card and i run it, comp case has been closed since 2006. now, as a backstory, every pharmacy (i think) has their own little Third Party comp carriers that mediate comp cases if the patient does not have a comp processor (which this woman did). apparently this woman has been getting it through CVS who, apparently, just bills their own comp carrier for it, and the patient pays zero, and CVS comp carrier takes care of it and mediates between them and the comp adjuster to get paid. now, since this woman had her own comp carrier, i would not put it through our own comp carrier, since i know that if i do, we will ultimately not get paid for the claim since her case has been terminated in 2006. i tried explaining this to the woman, who insisted i was wrong, and "CVS just does it and it's fine." well, thats well and good and all, since they want to eat the cost of the medication. so i explained to the woman she would have to contact her adjuster to have them re-open the case so she could get the medications paid, but she refused and said it'd be much easier to go to CVS. fine. i let her take the script back and away she went. about 2 hours later she comes back, waving a CVS receipt in my face saying (essentially) that she was right, and CVS gives it to her for no copay. I GET IT. and instead of explaining it again to her, i just told her flat out to go to CVS. if they want to bill it wrong and lose money thats fine by me. but i don't need a customer coming back and telling me i was wrong because another drug store bills her claim incorrectly. im not wrong, and i hate you.
5) we get an email from our district pharmacy manager about blah blah blah customer service, which it's becoming more and more clear that it has been YEARS since he's actually spent a day on the bench. what it boiled down to was another store received a complaint that a woman was not called because we were out of stock of her medication; to which the pharmacy replied "we have X-so-many-customers there's no way we can call them for every little thing." okay, which i agree could have been handled a tiny bit better, but goddamn it if it isn't the truth. on average, we fill 200+ (if not 300 on a monday or first of the month) prescriptions a day. around 1400 a week. we have over 1000 customers we see on a weekly basis. and its rare that they can actually take care of their own medications so we are stuck all day calling THEIR doctors for refills or problems, giving them pills to hold them over when the call in a refill with no refills (as it says on the bottle they've had for a month now) and want to pick it up in 20 minutes, while there are people already waiting in store for medicines and kids screaming for their antibiotics and so on, while we have to remember which of the blue pills that you take needs to be refilled and what of your 20 prescriptions gets filled and when and what insurance it gets billed to. any day of the week there is 1 pharmacist, and 3 technicians that cover 12 hours. so, roughly, each person is responsible for at least 50 people a day -- thats if the work is broken up evenly, which it is more often not. every time we turn around they are cutting hours and payroll, there is not overtime authorized and as a personal experience, stephanie was repremanded for being 1/10 of an hour over in payroll. 6 minutes. we simply cannot staff to be each and every person's personal assistant. i'm sorry it just can't be done. it's not hard to ask that you give us at least 24 hours advance between when you call in your prescription and when you want to pick it up. but it seems no one notices that they are low on their medication until they run out and contact us 5 days later demanding they need it in 10 minutes because they've been without for however long. okay /that rant.
6) inventory is dwindling. not just in my store, but all of ours (at least the former eckerds). what this means, in business code, is that they are manditorily controlling our inventories behind-the-scenes to make us look more profitable. as in, appear as a good business to buy.
there are rumors that we are being looked at by target.
which means, yet another buy-out.
which, in the mean time means, we have nothing in stock. im talking medications we use a ton of every day. and the worst part is that its a catch 22. our distribution center will not give us the stock, and we get penalized when we order stock from the wholesaler. however, in order to keep the quantities on hand that we need, we have to order from the wholesaler. and yet, to MAKE IT PERSONAL rite aid has vowed to NEVER BE OUT OF STOCK. well, if you can't send us what we need, how do you expect us to do that exactly? in the past few days we have run out of commonplace antibiotics, blood pressure medicions, LORTAB for one. we dispense probably about 800-1000 of those a day (i'm serious). monday we were down to half a bottle of 100. which means 50 tablets. and 2 bottles were set to come in from the distribution center on tuesday. so i had to order 10 bottles from our wholesaler.
im sure all this work talk is boring but its whats been really annoying me.
OH on a good note, i believe i have a second job secured! its a travelling phlebotomy/medical assistant position for an insurance company. so basically i go to peoples houses and collect blood samples and bp and medical histories for an insurance company. as payment i get a cut of what the insurance makes. apparently this is between $20 and $40 a person, and i guess its mostly couples so between $40 and $60 a pop for me. i work on my own time and its kind of like a commision-type job; the more people i get done the more money i make. i hope this works out for me.
i dont know why but this past month or so has been the worst month of my life. okay, maybe not of my life, but the worst period in a long time. its times like these i thank god for the drugs because i probably would have just off-ed myself (scary, but kinda true, even though i hate to think like that).
1) i had to go to driving class to learn how to drive again after a bs speeding ticket (yeah yeah i know thats what everyone says). i was late and made a spectacle of, however the class didn't end up being too bad since there was a movie, and basically the guy just kept talking about the best fines/tickets/insurance payments/summons he's ever seen. BTW if you think you're paying too much for car insurance, go talk to the guy he had who's paying $8100 a year. i learned not to talk back to a trooper, and there are people much worse off than me, woo.
2) work. this will end up being another few numbers. worked with fatty, that was enough to start.
3) customers were in rare form today. i don't know if its a full moon but i got every dumb question in the book.
4) this one will hurt my brain, and probably yours. a woman comes into the pharmacy and wants a script filled under worker's comp. she hands me her comp insurance card and i run it, comp case has been closed since 2006. now, as a backstory, every pharmacy (i think) has their own little Third Party comp carriers that mediate comp cases if the patient does not have a comp processor (which this woman did). apparently this woman has been getting it through CVS who, apparently, just bills their own comp carrier for it, and the patient pays zero, and CVS comp carrier takes care of it and mediates between them and the comp adjuster to get paid. now, since this woman had her own comp carrier, i would not put it through our own comp carrier, since i know that if i do, we will ultimately not get paid for the claim since her case has been terminated in 2006. i tried explaining this to the woman, who insisted i was wrong, and "CVS just does it and it's fine." well, thats well and good and all, since they want to eat the cost of the medication. so i explained to the woman she would have to contact her adjuster to have them re-open the case so she could get the medications paid, but she refused and said it'd be much easier to go to CVS. fine. i let her take the script back and away she went. about 2 hours later she comes back, waving a CVS receipt in my face saying (essentially) that she was right, and CVS gives it to her for no copay. I GET IT. and instead of explaining it again to her, i just told her flat out to go to CVS. if they want to bill it wrong and lose money thats fine by me. but i don't need a customer coming back and telling me i was wrong because another drug store bills her claim incorrectly. im not wrong, and i hate you.
5) we get an email from our district pharmacy manager about blah blah blah customer service, which it's becoming more and more clear that it has been YEARS since he's actually spent a day on the bench. what it boiled down to was another store received a complaint that a woman was not called because we were out of stock of her medication; to which the pharmacy replied "we have X-so-many-customers there's no way we can call them for every little thing." okay, which i agree could have been handled a tiny bit better, but goddamn it if it isn't the truth. on average, we fill 200+ (if not 300 on a monday or first of the month) prescriptions a day. around 1400 a week. we have over 1000 customers we see on a weekly basis. and its rare that they can actually take care of their own medications so we are stuck all day calling THEIR doctors for refills or problems, giving them pills to hold them over when the call in a refill with no refills (as it says on the bottle they've had for a month now) and want to pick it up in 20 minutes, while there are people already waiting in store for medicines and kids screaming for their antibiotics and so on, while we have to remember which of the blue pills that you take needs to be refilled and what of your 20 prescriptions gets filled and when and what insurance it gets billed to. any day of the week there is 1 pharmacist, and 3 technicians that cover 12 hours. so, roughly, each person is responsible for at least 50 people a day -- thats if the work is broken up evenly, which it is more often not. every time we turn around they are cutting hours and payroll, there is not overtime authorized and as a personal experience, stephanie was repremanded for being 1/10 of an hour over in payroll. 6 minutes. we simply cannot staff to be each and every person's personal assistant. i'm sorry it just can't be done. it's not hard to ask that you give us at least 24 hours advance between when you call in your prescription and when you want to pick it up. but it seems no one notices that they are low on their medication until they run out and contact us 5 days later demanding they need it in 10 minutes because they've been without for however long. okay /that rant.
6) inventory is dwindling. not just in my store, but all of ours (at least the former eckerds). what this means, in business code, is that they are manditorily controlling our inventories behind-the-scenes to make us look more profitable. as in, appear as a good business to buy.
there are rumors that we are being looked at by target.
which means, yet another buy-out.
which, in the mean time means, we have nothing in stock. im talking medications we use a ton of every day. and the worst part is that its a catch 22. our distribution center will not give us the stock, and we get penalized when we order stock from the wholesaler. however, in order to keep the quantities on hand that we need, we have to order from the wholesaler. and yet, to MAKE IT PERSONAL rite aid has vowed to NEVER BE OUT OF STOCK. well, if you can't send us what we need, how do you expect us to do that exactly? in the past few days we have run out of commonplace antibiotics, blood pressure medicions, LORTAB for one. we dispense probably about 800-1000 of those a day (i'm serious). monday we were down to half a bottle of 100. which means 50 tablets. and 2 bottles were set to come in from the distribution center on tuesday. so i had to order 10 bottles from our wholesaler.
im sure all this work talk is boring but its whats been really annoying me.
OH on a good note, i believe i have a second job secured! its a travelling phlebotomy/medical assistant position for an insurance company. so basically i go to peoples houses and collect blood samples and bp and medical histories for an insurance company. as payment i get a cut of what the insurance makes. apparently this is between $20 and $40 a person, and i guess its mostly couples so between $40 and $60 a pop for me. i work on my own time and its kind of like a commision-type job; the more people i get done the more money i make. i hope this works out for me.
i dont know why but this past month or so has been the worst month of my life. okay, maybe not of my life, but the worst period in a long time. its times like these i thank god for the drugs because i probably would have just off-ed myself (scary, but kinda true, even though i hate to think like that).