To think Pharmacies shouldn't shut for lunch anymore

This!

As others have said ,the pharmacist is often the only one avaliable .Surely they deserve a break? I think one hour for lunch /rest is acceptable .

They're all different companies through. It would be a bit weird for boots to phone up asda and say "when do you want to go for lunch?" It's not just the pharmacists themselves all the other staff would have to have lunch at the same time because, as explained they can't do much without the pharmacist being there.

Apart from which most people want their lunch at lunch time, not at 11am or half two so there's only so much staggering you can do.

Agree they should clearly have their opening hours accessible online though, no excuse to not do this in 2024.

Imagine the shit they'd get if they were open but couldn't hand over medications?
People are not always reasonable. They'll accept a closed for lunch sign far more easily than walking in to an open pharmacy and being told come back later.

But most pharmacies only have one pharmacist so how do you suggest they get a break?.

It saves people coming on Mumsnet complaining that they went to the Pharmacy and the assistant refused to sell them XYZ as the Pharmacist was on their lunchbreak.
How do you expect the Pharmacist to have their break if there's only one of them?

If they are run by diffeeent companies they are not going to nothing doing this

My local pharmacy is open from 8am until 11pm. If we go when the pharmacist is on a break we need to wait but some people don’t seem to understand that and kick off massively. It also causes a bit of a backlog in medications needing to be dispensed.

I often wish it would shut between certain times so it would give the staff a better break schedule and that way we would know what times to attend.

A lot of people are not aware that it’s not simply prescriptions that can’t be given out when the pharmacist is not there (even if already bagged up) but also any medicine kept behind the counter that has a P in a square on the back of it. This covers a lot of seemingly mundane things which the staff are allowed to sell without consulting the pharmacist, as long as she or he is on the premises and working.

I had a Saturday job in a pharmacy decades ago. We stayed open when the pharmacist was out for lunch but we were much more limited in what we could sell.some people were fine about it but we did get aggro from others. Easier to avoid the aggro by shutting completely.

Some people don't like being told to come back. They kick off or will insist on wating.

Just waited 10 mins for our pharmacist to finish his lunch before dispensing - Lots of staff there but only one pharmacist.
He works really hard so definitely don’t begrudge him his lunch when he can grab it.

My local pharmacy stays open but doesn't dispense over lunch. Still sells things that don't need a pharmacist. Closed Saturday and Sunday though.

You wouldn't be happy here then, OP. Our (only) pharmacy closes for lunch and isn't open at all at the weekends. We just have to plan more, register with a pharmacy further afield or get prescriptions delivered.

If only we could phone them to ask...

This here.

This.

The only place that gets more unnecessary and uncalled for online/facebook abuse than the pharmacists in our neck of the woods is the GP Surgery.

Something incredibly entitled and unreasonable comes over people when it comes to healthcare.

It’s usually to do with the Pharmacist as they’re entitled to a lunch break and staff can’t dispense without them. I understand your frustration - the pharmacy near me opens at 9am (after I’ve started work) and closes for lunch 13:00-14:15 (when I get my lunch break) and then closes at 17:30 (I’m usually on the nursery run at that time). If it’s not urgent I have to wait till Saturday and I just plan picking up my repeat prescriptions around those times and reorder in plenty of time. If I’m poorly unexpectedly and need a prescription asap, I ask the prescribing GP to send it to the bigger pharmacy further away which opens 8am-6:30pm and has no lunch break, so I have more options for picking it up. A lot of large pharmacies or those attached to larger medical centres have longer hours and don’t always close for lunch as they have more than one pharmacist.

As others have said need a pharmacist to be on duty. Given how busy they are I wouldn’t be surprised if they were also doing behind the scenes work such as urgent prescriptions or calls as part of the time they are closed.

The other staff need a break too - it's probably rather more efficient for them all to have their lunch break at the same time, and easier for people to remember when they're closed than when the pharmacist is there. It also reduces the chance of stroppy customers spotting them eating their lunch in the back and trying to insist that their lunch is interrupted.

I understand why it's necessary for smaller ones running with a single pharmacist. The part that annoys me is that they don't stagger with other pharmacies in the area and update their websites/Google to show the closed times so you can choose the right one. It's total guesswork when they decide to take the lunch break.

Most companies don't require a pharmacist on duty in order to go about their core business.

Dont know why they don’t just allow people to pick their own and self check out 🤣🤣🤣🤣

Honestly they need a qualified professional to dispense prescription medications, and that individual needs a lunch break!!!

Have your prescription re-routed to a bigger pharmacy then. As others have mentioned, a small local is not going to employ an additional pharmacist just to cover lunch break.

Because it’s their shop and they want to?