Have a question for you pharmacy interns:
have you guys/girls seen a decrease in the hours your store is giving you recently? if yes how have you dealt with it? (ie. switched stores? went to a different chain? etc)
Yeah, for sure. I'm with Target, and our store fills 1300 a week. We went from 155 technician hours, to 150 hrs, and most recently we're down to 142 per week.
Target's Rx hours are based on store performance, not necessarily Rx volume (even though it does play a factor). We're in a smaller (read: not a Super Target) store that doesn't stay as busy as the bigger ones; in fact, our pharmacy typically comprises anywhere from 10% to 15% of the store sales in a given week. This is a rare occurrence (at least in the RDU market). We are carrying the store.
Another store of the same size in our district that does a similar volume to us has 168 tech hours per week, but they are in a much wealthier area and probably do about 5-8% of store sales in a given week.
As far as "maintaining" hours: I work ~30 hrs on any given week. I've managed to keep my head above water (in terms of not losing too many hours), but I also work my @$$ off every time I'm back there, so my boss realizes that she absolutely needs me back there. If push comes to shove, I'd float to other stores if necessary...but since Target doesn't really offer anything special to their interns (other than the potential for a job after graduation -- no mileage for helping out at other stores, no benefits, no accrued vacation time), if I lost more than 8 hours a week, I'd probably hand in my 2 weeks' notice.
After I'd found another job, that is.
