Prescription Ordering Is Changing | Patient-Led Ordering

What is changing

Your surgery is moving to Patient-Led Ordering

Your GP surgery and the local Integrated Care Board are introducing Patient-Led Ordering (PLO). Pharmacies will no longer order repeat prescriptions on a patient’s behalf as routine. Instead, patients order their own medication when they need it.

The aim is to cut medicine waste. A great deal of medication is dispensed every year and never used — ordering only what you actually need keeps that money inside the NHS.

If you can use the NHS App

You will need to order your own prescriptions from now on. It takes about a minute once you are set up.

Download the NHS App and log in
Choose your repeat items and order
Keep Sandwell Pharmacy Group as your nominated pharmacy
We dispense and deliver exactly as we do now

If you cannot

Some patients are exempt, and we can keep ordering for them. This applies where managing your own ordering would not be safe or practical.

Answer the questions below
Tell us which circumstances apply
We check it and continue ordering where appropriate
We will ring you if anything needs confirming

Worth knowing

Why we would rather keep ordering for the people who need it

Patient-Led Ordering makes sense for most people. But where a patient genuinely cannot manage their own ordering, pharmacy-led ordering is not just a convenience — it prevents real problems, and that is why the exemption criteria exist.

Fewer gaps in treatment When we track the cycle, the request goes in at the right point every month. Missed orders are the single most common reason someone runs out.

Medication stays aligned Items ordered together arrive together. Once a repeat list drifts out of sync, patients end up collecting something different every fortnight.

Fewer emergency supplies Running out means an urgent request, an emergency supply, or a trip to an out-of-hours service — all avoidable, and all a burden on the patient.

Less to keep track of For carers, and for anyone managing several conditions at once, one less thing to remember every month genuinely matters.

None of that changes who qualifies — the criteria are set by the ICB, not by us. But it is why we would rather you told us than quietly struggled on.

Patient-Led Ordering

Three questions · about two minutes

Questions people are asking

Why can’t the pharmacy order for me any more?

It is not our decision. Patient-Led Ordering is a change brought in by your GP surgery and the local Integrated Care Board, and it applies to every pharmacy in the area, not just us. We would happily keep ordering for everyone if we were able to.

Do I have to change pharmacy?

No — and please don’t. Only the ordering step changes. Keep Sandwell Pharmacy Group as your nominated pharmacy and everything else carries on: we dispense, we check, and we deliver free across West Bromwich exactly as before.

What if I don’t have a smartphone?

You can order through the NHS website on any computer, or by using your GP surgery’s own online service. If none of that is realistic for you, that is exactly what the digital exclusion criterion in the form above covers — tell us and we will look at continuing to order for you.

I order for my mum — does she need to fill this in?

Fill it in with her details rather than yours, and mention in the last box that you order on her behalf. Carers can be given proxy access on the NHS App so you can order for her from your own phone — ask her surgery, or ask us and we will explain how it works.

What happens if I do nothing?

Once PLO starts at your surgery, nobody will be ordering your repeats — not us, and not you. That is how people end up running out. Two minutes now avoids it.

Will my medication be delayed?

Not if you order in good time. Allow a few working days between ordering and collecting, as your surgery still has to approve and issue the prescription. Order when you have about a week left rather than on your last few tablets.

Is my information safe?

Your answers come straight to the pharmacy team and are stored on our secure system. We use them to work out how to manage your prescriptions and, where relevant, to confirm arrangements with your GP surgery. Nothing is shared beyond that.