P
pen22
Guest
Ex-factory prices set by Govt and suppliers, with reference to a basket of other countries.
Then a wholesale mark-up of 10% is added. That used to be 17.65% and the 3 wholesalers would give half of it as a discount to pharmacies.
The "reimbursement cost" of ex-factory +10% is what the HSE pay the pharmacy, under both the DPS and the GMS schemes.
Then the pharmacy adds a retail mark-up of:
0% - GMS scheme
20% - DPS (was 50%)
The recent RTE consumer show was about pharmacies sticking to the old 50% retail mark-up.
Pharmacies must stick to 20% mark-up on DPS, however, on private prescriptions they can charge whatever mark-up they like as these transactions fall outside of the contract between the HSE and the pharmacy.
On the topic of wholesale mark-up, the wholesalers are under no obligation to reduce their mark-up (from 17.65 to 10%) since the HSE have no dealings with them, so pharmacists are being reimbursed a cost price less than what they actually pay the wholesaler in some cases.
A number of threads on this forum have already discussed the matter extensively.