To think GPs shouldn’t charge for these letters?

There is no need for a letter. Nobody should be asking for the letter. The information should be on the dispensing label. This is an example of an old tech solution being safer and more reliable than a letter download from a protected database. The label stays with the medication which should stay with the person. It says who prescribed it and to whom and what the medicine is.

There is no safety or security issue for the airline or travel destination in an individual carrying small amounts of personal medication. This is a complete non issue requiring no solution.

The NHS has a summary care record which can be accessed by a defined list of organisations legitimately involved in patient care. That’s not airlines. Because they don’t need the information.

I'm now feeling very grateful to have a (wonderful) GP who charges £10 per letter. I have always been happy to pay the fee, but I'll be even happier to pay it in the future knowing now what some GPs charge!

If the problem is the GP’s time, perhaps the answer is that it shouldn’t need to be a doctor who does it. The letter isn’t saying that the medication is appropriately prescribed. It’s just saying that on x date your medical records showed that y medication had been prescribed for you until z date. That’s a clerical confirmation, not a medical one.

YABU

This is not an NHS service- the contract with the GP surgery does not cover the cost of letters such as these, so it becomes a private service and you have to pay for that.

GP’s are not obliged to provide these letters at all because they are not obliged to provided private services at all.

Would you work for free? Do you think resources provided for NHS work should be spent on private work? It might only be one short letter for you, but there are so many of these sorts of requests coming in every week that it would soon add up when you consider admin costs/time etc.

£55 is relatively low cost when compared to how much a comparable professional letter would cost (my solicitor recently charged me significantly more than that for a brief letter).

If you want your GP to do private work for you, you’ll have to pay the going rate or take the risk of not having the letter you want.

Just forge a letter. It's not difficult.

I take similar injections for Crohn’s and have been travelling by air with them for years and never once taken a letter from my GP. You can print off a list of medications from your medical records on the NHS app. Similar for EpiPens - we always take them too and no one’s ever asked for a letter

I think a lot of people don't realise that the NHS, Doctors , hospitals and pharmacies work differently in different areas. They are not joined up, nor do they all use the same computer systems.
It's not just a juggernaut, it's hundreds of them.

You are projecting here. The OP asked about the charge specifically.

Its information online in the patient records. Again - self service for standard requests from records has been around in the rest of the world for 30 odd years.

The OP is receiving the medication directly from the hospital and those labels don’t contain all the required info (I’ve had this experience myself).

Most of the airline requirements are set by the receiving country, especially where a medication used here is restricted in the country you visit. I’m quite sure airlines are over cautious on this - but their business requires careful compliance.

The real point is that NHS staff are spending ludicrous amounts of time and cost generating totally standardised copies of existing information across a range of requirements. If they modernised then it wouldn’t matter if an airline or another country was overly zealous because the OP could download a headed letter just as she can for a bank statement. Its the same mentality which operates 30 year out of date appointment systems and lack of inter trust/department/practice communication. Its a massive time waster for staff and patients.

The surgery does not have the information because the medication is prescribed and dispensed by the hospital team via a private pharmacy company. That’s why the letter is so expensive.

You’re asking the GP to write a letter for you about a medication that they aren’t even involved in prescribing to you. Frankly I’m amazed they even agreed to do it at all!

The cost of this should fall to the airline if they won’t accept a clinic or pharmacy letter. It’s not the job of the NHS to supply additional reassurance to private businesses like airlines, so you aren’t “already paying for it”. It’s not a health need. The airline is the one putting you out of pocket, not the GP.

That is an actual change though which requires generation of new documents and validation for fraud etc - there is some actual work to do (although £19 is over egging it unless they still have a manual check). Downloading a copy of your documents etc presumably has no charge?

In this case all that is required is generation of a form letter taking existing information from the patient record. It could be done via the NHS/health record apps just as generating a bank statement is done via banking apps with no work for anyone in the surgery.

The issue is that there is no need for a letter. The prescription details are on the dispensing labels. The airline should not stop you bringing prescribed medication on the plane. If they are insisting on letters then it is an entirely manufactured problem. They provide details of what you can’t bring in luggage as a condition of travel and it doesn’t include medication. They are entirely linked to airline safety.

Customs and security officials will be looking for things like illegal drugs. They aren’t looking for personal medication for a 2 week trip with a dispensing label on it.

This is why the NHS isn’t put a requirement to produce these letters into the GP contract. It is a redundant use of their expensive time. The organisations and people asking for this are creating a problem that doesn’t need government or NHS intervention.

GPS are businesses holding a contract to the NHS to see patients. They need to make a profit to run said business. Providing a letter is an extra, that’s the going cost now

Does the GP actually have anything to do with this particular medication? It sounds like it’s the same as some of DS where it is controlled and prescribed by the hospital?

My GP charges me £70 for any letter.
I needed letter confirming my dd condition for toilet card for her school.
Each September I’m charged £70.
Few months ago I needed a letter for work to confirm my health chronic condition. . £70 too.

I didn't say I had an issue paying for a letter. I don't mind at all. I mind about the inefficiency of producing it when I am.paying.

I mind that 56 day prescribing wastes my time when it is unnecessary.

Nobody needs to “draw up” anything. Have you never used a modern business system with self service?

The alternative is the tax payer paying for your holiday letter. That doesn't seem fair does it? Agree that the cost seems excessive but it's private work really.

And he draws them up for free?

Can’t cost more than a few pounds to do it.

You’re paying for the GP’s time.

I can download a copy of documents my solicitor has drawn up for me.

That is because they work in the 21st century not in the era of quill pens.

This is not a weird or unusual or bespoke request - its a bog standard scenario to set up on self service (like most of the rest of the world does). Its no more difficult technically than reordering a prescription online but without the requirement for any follow up activity on the surgery side or pharmacy side.

Edit to add- a better analogy would be online banking where you can generate and download copies of bank statements where 20 years ago you had to pay a fiver for a copy to be manually produced.

A bespoke letter from a solicitor would be more akin to the specific detailed referral to a consultant (which can also be largely automated these days).

You are ignoring the fact that requests of this type should not be done manually.

How about we use horse drawn ambulances? Would it be acceptable to say “well this is what we have, deal with it” when every normal business and healthcare system is using modern vehicles?

This is the equivalent in business processes. You are complaining about the workload mucking out the horses when the rest of the world discovered the internal combustion engine last centure.

the letter is chargeable because the GP is a private business
GP is a private for profit business isn't NHS