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I love my job most of the time. But it does have its moments . . .
You were a pain in the ass as a child, I'll wager . . .
If I look in my computer and see that your scripts are not ready yet, I'll politely ask you to have a seat or tell you to feel free to shop around, and when they're ready, I'll call you to the front right away. You won't need to stand in line again. But this woman . . . just. Didn't. Get it. She had seven scripts for herself and two for her husband to be filled. Yet she insisted on sitting fretfully on the bench for a few minutes, waiting until the line was starting to wind into action alley, then get up to go stand in the back of it, huffing and puffing and doing the pee-pee dance. The first time I saw her doing this, I called back in my sweetest voice -
“I haven't forgotten about you ma'am, I just checked on your order, and they're getting to it as fast as they can.”
She sighed dramatically and sat back down. The third or fourth time she got in line and approached my counter to see if her meds were ready, I told her that the Pharmacist had them in his hand at that very moment.
“But that's what you told me fifteen minutes ago!”
Well yes, that's because he had them in his hands fifteen minutes ago, too. You have NINE scripts needing filled. He can't just grab random drugs off the shelf, willy-nilly and sling them into bags. I once again promise her that as soon as they're ready, I'll let her know. She sits back down, whining loudly about how she doesn't understand why this is taking so long and that she has sick people waiting for her in the car. I keep checking in on the order and breath an inward sigh of relief when they go from being in visual/verify to 'READY'. I turn around to go get them, but the pharmacist on duty is already coming out from behind his counter, a bulging bag of medications in hand. Praise be to Eru, this woman's behavior did not go unnoticed and I now have backup! He can be a little crotchety, but he's pretty good with talking to people, bedside manner, as it were. He explains to miss ants-in-the-pants that the reason the meds took so long is that he noticed one of them was going to cost her over $800 and he'd been on the phone with various companies for at least half an hour so he could get the price honed down to $40. Did she thank him for his trouble, maybe give some exclamation of understanding? Nah, this is customerssuck.
“Oh! Well I wouldn't have bought it if it was THAT much. I would have told you to take it off.”
She then proceeds to open the bag of scripts, take each and every last bottle out, and grill the Pharmacist on all of them, causing the line to back up even more. I wonder what happened to those 'sick people waiting in the car'. A cashier from up front arrived at that moment so I could go to lunch, so I don't really know how long it took the poor pharm to get rid of this person, but my nerves had had enough of her at that point. I can't make the RPh work faster. Getting in line over and over and acting like a damn child on a long road trip (Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet?) is not going to get you your meds any faster. I realize it's a pain in the butt having to wait, but really, we can't rush this process.
You didn't just pull that card on . . . yes you did
Wherein RPh mentioned above shows just how crotchety he can be. Last night, a patient shows up at 8:50 with scripts to drop off, and she wants them tonight. We close at 9. At this point, there are only three people working in the pharm; me, one tech, and one RPh. Strike one, lady comes to me at the register instead of the drop off window. I tell her that if she just steps on down to drop off, Tech will be with her in a moment. He was currently on the phone with a patient that had called a few minutes before Last Customer arrived. A moment later, she calls out to me from drop off, asking is he ever coming? And this is making a really bad impression on her as a first time customer. Oh, woe is us, a first time customer.
I explained once again that as soon as he's finished taking the phone call, he'll be right with her, which he was. I'm not gonna go wring the phone out of his hands, slam it onto the receiver, and demand that he go take care of her because she's speshul.
It's 8:52 now, and he's trying to take her information down and process the script as fast as he possibly can without being rude, and asks Crotchety if we 'have time for one more?'. RPh sighs and reluctantly says “Yeah . . . but tell her not to go anywhere, because we WILL close at 9. She has ten minutes.” He said this in a very loud, carrying voice as well. I was tickled. He and tech rush to fill the scripts and it's 9:01 when RPh staples the bag closed and slings it over the counter at me. He told me to watch my head and closed the grill separating the pharmacy from the registers directly after. I ring Last Customer out, and she then proceeds to ask me all kinds of questions that I can't really answer, asking what time do we open in the morning and can she ask them then, and so on, and so on. Paying no mind to the fact that she's been told multiple times we're closed at 9PM. I guess the closed grill and lights out in the back didn't clue her in, either. I finally got her to go away, told RPh and tech to have a good night, and left for the weekend. I mean really . . . REALLY? I'll never understand what makes people think it's OK to try and force a place to stay open past closing. Sure, it's a Volde-Mart and the place is open 24 hours, but not certain areas, and Pharm is one of those areas. Ugh.
You were a pain in the ass as a child, I'll wager . . .
If I look in my computer and see that your scripts are not ready yet, I'll politely ask you to have a seat or tell you to feel free to shop around, and when they're ready, I'll call you to the front right away. You won't need to stand in line again. But this woman . . . just. Didn't. Get it. She had seven scripts for herself and two for her husband to be filled. Yet she insisted on sitting fretfully on the bench for a few minutes, waiting until the line was starting to wind into action alley, then get up to go stand in the back of it, huffing and puffing and doing the pee-pee dance. The first time I saw her doing this, I called back in my sweetest voice -
“I haven't forgotten about you ma'am, I just checked on your order, and they're getting to it as fast as they can.”
She sighed dramatically and sat back down. The third or fourth time she got in line and approached my counter to see if her meds were ready, I told her that the Pharmacist had them in his hand at that very moment.
“But that's what you told me fifteen minutes ago!”
Well yes, that's because he had them in his hands fifteen minutes ago, too. You have NINE scripts needing filled. He can't just grab random drugs off the shelf, willy-nilly and sling them into bags. I once again promise her that as soon as they're ready, I'll let her know. She sits back down, whining loudly about how she doesn't understand why this is taking so long and that she has sick people waiting for her in the car. I keep checking in on the order and breath an inward sigh of relief when they go from being in visual/verify to 'READY'. I turn around to go get them, but the pharmacist on duty is already coming out from behind his counter, a bulging bag of medications in hand. Praise be to Eru, this woman's behavior did not go unnoticed and I now have backup! He can be a little crotchety, but he's pretty good with talking to people, bedside manner, as it were. He explains to miss ants-in-the-pants that the reason the meds took so long is that he noticed one of them was going to cost her over $800 and he'd been on the phone with various companies for at least half an hour so he could get the price honed down to $40. Did she thank him for his trouble, maybe give some exclamation of understanding? Nah, this is customerssuck.
“Oh! Well I wouldn't have bought it if it was THAT much. I would have told you to take it off.”
She then proceeds to open the bag of scripts, take each and every last bottle out, and grill the Pharmacist on all of them, causing the line to back up even more. I wonder what happened to those 'sick people waiting in the car'. A cashier from up front arrived at that moment so I could go to lunch, so I don't really know how long it took the poor pharm to get rid of this person, but my nerves had had enough of her at that point. I can't make the RPh work faster. Getting in line over and over and acting like a damn child on a long road trip (Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet?) is not going to get you your meds any faster. I realize it's a pain in the butt having to wait, but really, we can't rush this process.
You didn't just pull that card on . . . yes you did
Wherein RPh mentioned above shows just how crotchety he can be. Last night, a patient shows up at 8:50 with scripts to drop off, and she wants them tonight. We close at 9. At this point, there are only three people working in the pharm; me, one tech, and one RPh. Strike one, lady comes to me at the register instead of the drop off window. I tell her that if she just steps on down to drop off, Tech will be with her in a moment. He was currently on the phone with a patient that had called a few minutes before Last Customer arrived. A moment later, she calls out to me from drop off, asking is he ever coming? And this is making a really bad impression on her as a first time customer. Oh, woe is us, a first time customer.
I explained once again that as soon as he's finished taking the phone call, he'll be right with her, which he was. I'm not gonna go wring the phone out of his hands, slam it onto the receiver, and demand that he go take care of her because she's speshul. It's 8:52 now, and he's trying to take her information down and process the script as fast as he possibly can without being rude, and asks Crotchety if we 'have time for one more?'. RPh sighs and reluctantly says “Yeah . . . but tell her not to go anywhere, because we WILL close at 9. She has ten minutes.” He said this in a very loud, carrying voice as well. I was tickled. He and tech rush to fill the scripts and it's 9:01 when RPh staples the bag closed and slings it over the counter at me. He told me to watch my head and closed the grill separating the pharmacy from the registers directly after. I ring Last Customer out, and she then proceeds to ask me all kinds of questions that I can't really answer, asking what time do we open in the morning and can she ask them then, and so on, and so on. Paying no mind to the fact that she's been told multiple times we're closed at 9PM. I guess the closed grill and lights out in the back didn't clue her in, either. I finally got her to go away, told RPh and tech to have a good night, and left for the weekend. I mean really . . . REALLY? I'll never understand what makes people think it's OK to try and force a place to stay open past closing. Sure, it's a Volde-Mart and the place is open 24 hours, but not certain areas, and Pharm is one of those areas. Ugh.
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