CVS pharm tech: having trouble with promise times

[robin2nightwing]

So I've been working for a month and I noticed that I am having trouble with promise times. When a person drops off a rx, I usually tell them we will have it ready in an hour (depending how busy the store is). However, what if the person's RX was on hold and I had to submit it again, what is the wait time on that? 30 min, an hour? Does it also depend on the medication such as BP vs vit d. Or controlled, narcotic vs non controlled.

I just feel like I've been getting a bunch of different answers or maybe I just need practice. Thanks in advance!

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[Kelp103]

If I'm understanding your question correctly... Wait time according to CVS is always 15 minutes. Of course, if your store is busy and they have 15 hospital prescriptions that is not reasonable.

I normally just say "When would you like to pick this up?" If they say right now, okay, 15-20 minutes, otherwise whatever time they say. If they won't give a time (it's rocket science for some people) I just tell them I'll have it ready in an hour or 2 hours or at 5pm (depending on how busy the store is).

There shouldn't be a problem. It doesn't matter if it's a new script or on hold. Unless your store has some weird policies which they should be able to express to you.

 

[melby59]

Any new prescription you receive or type up from "on hold" you should put in for 1 hour unless the patient is waiting in the pharmacy, then do 15 minutes. Any CII, whether the patient is waiting or not, do for 45 minutes or longer- based on how backed up your pharmacist is with narcotics.


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[ldiot]

If it's at the drive through 1 hour. If they complain about you can ask them to pull around in 30 minutes and tell them that you will jump it up in the line or something as long as you know it will be done. If they are in the store ask them if they want to wait. If they want to wait it's 15 minutes otherwise put in either 1 hour or whatever time they tell you. If they are on the phone you can ask them when they want to pick it up or just tell them 1 hour.

I personally found that instead of saying "okay we'll have this ready in an hour" saying something like "is an hour okay?" usually makes people less prone to flipping out.

At the end of the day just use common sense. There's no magic formula, just be realistic with the wait times and try to make the customer happy. If you are swamped or down a person and a person hands you 6 prescriptions you aren't going to give them a 15 minute wait time. If you are sitting around bored and someone hands you a prescription for a zpak you aren't going to tell them 1 hour.

We don't really add any extra time for narcotics as opposed to any other prescription. I know in my store if we were giving 45 minute wait times to people who wanted to wait in the store there would be problems and complaints but every location is different I guess.