Here is the latest Analyst User Newsletter, featuring the best tips and updates for users of our platform…

 

November 1st advance payment to rise by 15p per item

Community pharmacy contractors will receive an increase in their November 1st advance payments of 15p per prescription item, the Department of Health (DH) has confirmed.

PSNC had been seeking urgent intervention to offer some relief for contractors, and this measure has been taken in recognition of the extraordinary cashflow challenges highlighted.

The increase has been confirmed for one month only, and full and final payment for services provided in September will be reconciled as usual at the end of November. This means that contractors will not receive any additional funding overall, but the impact of the reduction expected to be seen in the November 1st payment, following Drug Tariff price reductions put in place from August, will be smoothed out.

PSNC Chief Executive Sue Sharpe said: “The pharmacy minister has responded to PSNC’s request for urgent measures to offer contractors some relief and this unprecedented action will help many pharmacies to manage the cashflow crisis over the next few weeks. We are grateful for this positive response.

“We remain concerned though that there will be pharmacies for which this is too little, and that it may be too late. The impact of the imposed funding cuts is to discriminate against smaller urban pharmacies, many of which serve the most disadvantaged communities. We hope we can work with the minister and with NHS England to review policies in the light of evidence not available when they were formed in late 2015. This most recent decision gives us hope that we will be able to restore the constructive relationships that underpinned our work before 2015.”

 

Hints & Tips

Postcode look-up: Enter a postcode in the top line of the address on the patient details tab and click on the open book icon next to it; the address will appear for you. (Don’t forget to add the house number once the address has been correctly identified!)

Inbound orders: Do something with inbound orders to prevent the purchases screen from becoming overloaded with order history. If you haven’t got time to book them in, set the auto-accept by clicking on Admin ǀ System ǀ Configuration ǀ Miscellaneous Tab and set the Automatic Order Completion to ‘Cancel’, clear demand.

Patient searches: Use ‘CTRL & A’ to search for patients, -this is particularly useful when performed from within another patient’s dispensing screen.

 

Single Activity Fee to increase to £1.29 per item

The Single Activity Fee (SAF) will increase to £1.29 per item from November 2017, the Department of Health (DH) has confirmed.

The 4p increase has been agreed following work undertaken by PSNC which revealed a need to address an under-delivery on fees due under the Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework (CPCF) for 2017/18.

This will be kept under review and further calibration to the fees considered as necessary, as more data becomes available.

The SAF change to £1.29 will be reflected in November’s Drug Tariff.

In terms of payments, community pharmacy contractors will first see the increased SAF coming through on the FP34 Schedule of Payments due on 1st February 2018. This is because the advance for November prescriptions will be based on October’s average item value (AIV) which is calculated using that month’s fees.

PSNC’s Funding Team is in the process of updating its income tables and cashflow calculator to reflect this and these will be available shortly here.