Prescription Ordering EPS

Ordering your medication has never been more easy as most prescriptions are now signed, sent and processed electronically.

This is called EPS (Electronic Prescription Service)

Q1. How does it work?

• You can choose a pharmacy or dispenser to dispense all your prescriptions. When you get a prescription, it will be sent electronically to the dispenser you have chosen. You can collect your medicines or appliances without having to hand in a paper prescription.
• You can decide each time you are issued a prescription where you would like it to be dispensed. When you are issued a prescription, you will be given a paper copy that you can take to any pharmacy or other dispenser in England. The paper copy will contain a unique barcode that will be scanned to download your prescription from the secure NHS database.

Paper prescriptions will continue to be available in special circumstances, but almost all prescriptions will be processed electronically.

Q2. How soon can I order my medication?

On average patients are provided with a 28 day supply of their medication, so the earliest you can order is no sooner than 7 days prior to your medication running out,  if they are ordered early without a good reason it could be rejected.  You may need to order medications earlier sometimes for such reasons as you are going away on holiday, there is an up coming bank holidays etc so it is important that you make your GP surgery aware of your reason to avoid your early prescription order being disregarded.

Q3. How do I order my medication?

More and more high street pharmacies are no longer providing a repeat prescription ordering service, where they would normally have ordered and collected your prescriptions directly from your GP Surgery.  There are a number of alternatives available such as

• Online – This is the best and fastest way to order using the online access service via an online app and gives you total control 24hours a day. You can request only the medication you need, track it and see when it is ready to collect from your nominated pharmacy. Online ordering of prescriptions can often be ready within 24 – 48 hours. Don’t have patient access? set it up today click here 
• Drop off your request at the surgery – Depending on what day & time requests are dropped off can determine how long it will take to issue, we need 3 working days to process your prescription so please make sure you order it in plenty of time
• Post your request – This option often takes much longer as it is reliant on the postal service and when your letter arrives at the surgery for processing. It is estimated that this process could take up to 10 days for your prescription to be ready to collect at your nominated pharmacy

Q4. What if the medication I want is not on repeat?

There may be a number of reasons and these are known as Acute Prescriptions which are medicines that have been issued by the GP but not added to your repeat prescription records. This is usually a new medication issued for a trial period and will normally require a review prior to being added onto your repeat prescription records.

Your doctor may want to monitor how you respond so that they can make any necessary adjustments until it is added to your repeat request list

• Does the dose need to be increased or lowered ?
• Are you having a reaction to it?
• Does this medication require regular monitoring such as blood pressure checks and or blood tests?

Certain Medications such as Antibiotics, Pain Relief and many more one off medications need to be assessed at each request until your doctor is satisfied that patients benefit from repeating this medication. 

To request an item that is not on repeat you can add a note with your request on Patient Access stating what you need and the reason why.  Alternatively, you can email requests to our Prescribing Team.  This Email address is for requesting non repeat items only and other requests will be ignored.  Repeat items should be requested via patient access.

Q5. What if my prescription isn’t ready?

• The practice phone lines can be exceptionally busy, please always contact your pharmacy in the first instance as they can usually help.  We would highly recommend signing up for online access as per question 3 as you can take control.  Order, track and trace your medication 24 hours a day using online access – to set it up today click here

Full details can be be found in our repeat prescribing leaflet here