A verbal patient nomination is not enough; a written nomination is best as it provides an audit trail

Andy Charlesworth, Numark’s IT Services Manager, reminds independents how to cope with EPS

Smartcards

Ensure there are a number of smartcards in each pharmacy. You do not want to be sending patients back to the GP practice because you don’t have a smartcard.

Tokens

Carry sufficient stock of dispensing tokens in the pharmacy so you don’t run out. Consider how many e-prescriptions you receive on an average day.

Nominations

• Make sure you register patients’ nominations on your PMR system; nomination on paper is not sufficient.
• A verbal patient nomination is not enough; a written nomination is best as it provides an audit trail.
• Where another pharmacy has registered a patient nomination without the patient’s consent, you should encourage the patient to complain formally to NHS England. They need to do this in writing to NHSE, who will deal with every complaint seriously – as long as it comes directly from the patient. Check that the patient has sent the complaint in – do not take their word for it!

Prescription tracker

Use this functionality to check the status of a prescription.

• If the prescription has not been sent to the spine, contact the surgery.
• If the prescription has been retrieved from the spine by another pharmacy, contact the other pharmacy to ask them to return it to the spine. If the pharmacy won’t do this, ask the patient to complain to NHSE.
• You should never have to send the patient away.

Not dispensed items

Mark as such on the e-prescription; do not return to the spine or another nominated pharmacy can pull them down.

Claims

Everything needs to be recorded on the EPS module within the PMR system to ensure correct payment.

• You must record patients’ exemption status or the prescription will be levied.
• Endorse on the e-prescription, not on the paper token.
• Ensure claims are sent regularly, ideally every day. You have six months from dispensing the e-prescription to making a claim. Anything after six months will not be made. Claim as you go to help with cashflow.
• The NHSBSA does not price the tokens that it receives from you. The tokens are sent to a warehouse for storage and they are only retrieved if there is an investigation.

Business continuity

If the spine goes down, contact the surgery as soon as possible to tell them to stop issuing e-prescriptions until further notice. Agree with the surgery how you will manage the prescriptions in the interim.

National incident number (NIN)

All problems should be reported as soon as possible to the appropriate helpdesk. But staff should also be aware of simple steps that can be taken to troubleshoot IT issues – see checklist for pharmacy staff on HSCIC website. When there’s a problem, your PMR system supplier should be able to field the issue, wherever the problem lies. If there is a national issue, the PMR system provider will issue a NIN.

For more information and resources on EPS, visit the Health and Social Care Information Centre’s website.