staff to floater

[ancienbon]

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I am currently a staff pharmacy now. I would like to go back to floating...By the way i was a floater before promoting to staff pharmacist. The reasons i want to go back to floating are as follows:
1)2 hours drive(commute) , gas is killing me. 2)Crappy perfomance review by rx managers. 3) better flexibility as a floater.
Anyone knows the procedures to move from staff to floaters? The pros and cons?
Thanks

 

[crossurfingers]

I've never done it but my guess would be to talk to your pharmacy supervisor about it. Take some time to think about though. Grass always looks greener on the other side. Would you still be guaranteed your hours? How far away are the stores they will send you to float at? You may also have to work nights and 12 hour shifts (if you don't already). Also, you may also have to work more holidays than if placed at a regular store because they could send you to a 24 hour store on Thanksgiving and Christmas.

I know you are really upset about your performance review, but it's not better as a floater. You will get dinged on percentages of the district as a whole. If the whole district is down on PSC or customer service then you will see that reflected on your review. Also, in my district every pharmacy you float at fills out an evaluation of the day you were there and they forward it to the supervisor. Like what the wait times are, how many vaccines you did, PSC's that were sold, rx's verified for other stores, etc. Mediocre reviews are the norm here no matter how hard you bust your ass it seems. If you can't accept that, then you should probably start looking to get out of retail.

 

[ancienbon]

I've never done it but my guess would be to talk to your pharmacy supervisor about it. Take some time to think about though. Grass always looks greener on the other side. Would you still be guaranteed your hours? How far away are the stores they will send you to float at? You may also have to work nights and 12 hour shifts (if you don't already). Also, you may also have to work more holidays than if placed at a regular store because they could send you to a 24 hour store on Thanksgiving and Christmas.

I know you are really upset about your performance review, but it's not better as a floater. You will get dinged on percentages of the district as a whole. If the whole district is down on PSC or customer service then you will see that reflected on your review. Also, in my district every pharmacy you float at fills out an evaluation of the day you were there and they forward it to the supervisor. Like what the wait times are, how many vaccines you did, PSC's that were sold, rx's verified for other stores, etc. Mediocre reviews are the norm here no matter how hard you bust your ass it seems. If you can't accept that, then you should probably start looking to get out of retail.

Thanks so much for your advice. It is so true. I guess that i got to suck it up for now, as i have heavy student loan... I also realize that no matter how well you have been doing, if there is a day you dont sell the psc cards, you will receive an angry email.. I know that walgreens does not care about how great a pharmacist you are, how many errors you prevent, they only care about the botton line... They don't know there is an independent pharmacy nearby or a walmart where customers can get a drug for 4 dollars without buying a random psc saving cards for 20 dollars.They want you to do blood pressure screening while the patient can do it themselve at publix/cvs. Of course i dont mind doing it and talking to them about the result but i dont have adequate staffing in the pharmacy.

 

[BidingMyTime]

I am currently a staff pharmacy now. I would like to go back to floating...By the way i was a floater before promoting to staff pharmacist. The reasons i want to go back to floating are as follows:
1)2 hours drive(commute) , gas is killing me. 2)Crappy perfomance review by rx managers. 3) better flexibility as a floater.
Anyone knows the procedures to move from staff to floaters? The pros and cons?
Thanks

I think you should consider crossurfingers advice, think long and hard before going back to floating. Also consider the possibility that you might not ever be offered another store in that district. But if you decide to do it, I would think it would be very easy to go back to floating, undoubtedly there is a floater in your district that would be thrilled to swap places with you. While a 2 hour commute isn't fun, there is a lot to be said for having a regular schedule.