tiercel Posted December 11, 2006 Report Share Posted December 11, 2006 Received a bit of spam today from a company that I buy worming tablets off on the net. (Half price BTW). When you look on these pet medicine sites the cost of medicines and tablets to you is a fraction of what the vet charges for the same item. But what I did not know was that the vet has to by law give you a prescription for those medicines on request of one. If your animal is on long term illness then that can save you a small fortune buy faxing the prescription to the internet companies and getting your tablets etc next working day. I have copy and pasted the part of the e-mail here. You're legally allowed a prescription. Right? We'd like to hear from anyone that as had a problem obtaining a prescription from their vet. As many of you know your vet is legally obliged to offer you a written prescription at the time of prescribing medication and they are not allowed to discriminate in any way against you for wanting to save money on your pet's medication. This includes asking to see the animal more often. We would like to hear from anyone that has experienced problems obtaining a prescription and may be willing to provide some details. Initially, this is just for us to get an idea of how large the problem is but eventually we would like to use some of the comments for TV and Press coverage to help highlight the problem. Rest assured we will not disclose any information without your prior consent. Click here or call us on 0800 043 0848 to submit your details to us. Tiercel Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darebear Posted December 12, 2006 Report Share Posted December 12, 2006 hmmmmm. i didnt realise that either. thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
henry d Posted December 12, 2006 Report Share Posted December 12, 2006 Nice one,thanks for that :unsure: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
al4x Posted December 12, 2006 Report Share Posted December 12, 2006 Yes its perfectly legal. Its been a bit of a farce vets wanting to charge for a consultation for repeat prescriptions and expensive drugs. I'm lucky my dads a vet so we get most things sorted. But our local vet even tried it on and refused a repeat of a "prescription" cat food which was expensive enough without a consultation. When we buy a bag a month that was a complete joke. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cranfield Posted December 12, 2006 Report Share Posted December 12, 2006 I had a discussion with our "ex" Vet about this subject and he said that the reason the drugs were so much more expensive, was to subsidise the consultation fees, which were kept as low as possible. When I said that this didn't seem likely, he got very annoyed and said, "would you pay me £100 per hour consultation fee ?" He really got annoyed when I said , I would, as the 10 minutes I had just had would cost me £30. We changed Vets, as my wife was certain he would poison our dog in retaliation. :unsure: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pin Posted December 12, 2006 Report Share Posted December 12, 2006 In my view vets double charge anyway. You take your animal and he/she prescribes treatment / takes action then asks you to come back for which you are again charged a consultation. To me that's one consultation and a check-up, don't mind paying for a check-up but wouldn't expect to pay the same rate as a full consultation. Mind, this can mostly be ignored as long as you have pet insurance. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cranfield Posted December 12, 2006 Report Share Posted December 12, 2006 For a long time I have thought that the advent of Pet Insurance drove Vet fees up. :unsure: Its just like a car body shop in the Vets nowadays. The first question they ask is , "are you insured ?" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ziplex Posted December 12, 2006 Report Share Posted December 12, 2006 I posted some time ago about being legally entitled to prescriptions in order to buy from net based co's, and have given a few people the nod on this. From what I can gather the vet is, not suprisingly, reluctant to give the information/pres' over but it is your right. Don't know if they are legally entitiled to charge for 'scrips tho? and if so the charges may start to rise once they get asked too much. I must admit to not worrying too much as i've got insurance, but my old springers bill is like reading a licence to print money and i'm sure they make a substantial ammount of money from people with insurance and pets with ongoing illnesses, ie: busted ligament, viral bronchitis, peometra....4 years treatment approx 9.5k and counting with her recent problem, which after much investigation, has now been shown to be a trapped nerve in her spine. I am very thankful to have taken out insurance with Petplan, Petplan on the other hand may not like me or Lott's too much! Insurance companies may also wonder why claims/bills are so huge from the vets when drugs are readily available at massively reduced prices to any and all? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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