Mistaken identity at chemist - would you complain?

[wallpoppy]

Earlier today at Boots - took my hair products and chocolate to the counter so I could get a box of Nurofen+ and pay for it all together- the pharmacy assistant sort of looked at me for a moment and then said sorry, no, you were just in here yesterday for the same thing, I can't sell you any more.

I was definitely not in yesterday for the same thing, the last time I bought a box of Nurofen + was probably two years ago, if not longer. I actually joked at first- oh yeah I do have a chocolate addiction but I definitely wasn't in here yesterday- but she just said I'm really sorry, codeine is an addicting medicine and we have to be careful.

So I got serious and said "I understand, but you have mistaken me for someone else, I was not here yesterday and I haven't purchased this medication recently - I am very responsible, and I just take one or two doses once every few months when I have an extremely bad endo flare-up. Can I please complete my purchase?" and she sighed and looked over to the pharmacist, who had heard all the exchange. He was polite but said that he had to back up his staff and if she said she sold these to me yesterday then there was nothing he could do.

So I just huffed, said fine, she's completely mistaken but fine, and I paid for my other stuff and stopped at another Boots on the way home where I completed my drug purchase with no bother. But it was so embarrassing (other people standing around the whole time witnessed it). Should I complain? On one hand, it feels like a one-off weird experience that I should just forget about, but on the other hand I feel a bit hard done by! What would you do?

@Floraflower3 then why is every cashier at Sainsburys/Tescos/Morrisons not grilling customers about their purchases? If they are that dangerous why are they even available to buy off the shelf in the first place? Should we only employ shop assistants with pharmacy qualifications? The man was a cashier not a pharmacist or pharmacy assistant. He has no more right or to my medical information than the butcher or florist and likely no more knowledge about medications than them either.

@Sapphirejane because it’s a pharmacy not a supermarket and there should be more safeguards.

When I worked for a different pharmacy chain, even the counter assistants received training, especially about red flag symptoms that need to be referred to the pharmacist. I obviously wasn’t there so don’t know if they were in training or not.

It would be interesting to see the data on the number of medication related admissions where an OTC drug was implicated.

Sapphirejane

Floraflower3 then why is every cashier at Sainsburys/Tescos/Morrisons not grilling customers about their purchases?

Because - as has been said - supermarkets don't sell anything containing codeine.
Codeine can potentially cause addiction.
Pharmacies based within supermarkets can sell it, but are under the same rules as, say, your local Boots.
You'd have to "complete your purchase" (to coin a phrase) at the pharmacy counter.
The supermarket cashier wouldn't be involved.

And, no, I don't suppose the cashier at Boots had "special qualifications". That's why they checked with the pharmacist.
And why you can't buy codeine, for example, during the pharmacist's lunch break.

@Floraflower3 I would say that Boots is a shop like any other of which some contain a pharmacy. Just like some supermarkets contain pharmacy departments. It doesn’t give any justification to cashiers demanding sensitive medical information before selling off the shelf medication. If they are that dangerous they shouldn’t be sold off the shelf. Behind the counter medication I understand some discussion being required with a trained person but not bloody Piriton and some Ibuprofen Lysine.

@LaMarschallin - my post wasn’t about codeine?. I was using my experience of Boots customer service to highlight how crap any response is likely to be.

I had pretty much the same experience. I requested they check the cctv as I was in a lot of pain due to endometriosis and the nearest pharmacy was miles away. It was a totally different person who had bought it. The one and only similarity between us was that we are both black. It's quite a white area too. Basically a "you all look the same" incident.

Having been on the receiving end of an extremely unpleasant reaction to codeine (long story I won't bother you with), I'm inclined to think that medications containing it should be prescription-only.

I certainly would not complain. Supply of codeine is strictly limited thank god, pharmacists operate under strict regulations and professional ethics. The person who served you was being responsible and presumably acting in good faith - the pharmacy could lose their registration if they were found to be knowingly serving double rations of codeine based drugs. We really don’t need to go the way of the US with rising levels of opioid abuse.

Now that people have given up on GP appointments and A&E much of the workload and frontline pressure is now falling on pharmacies and they are experiencing rising levels of abuse. They are under funded and struggling. Despite the fact they stayed open throughout the pandemic, took on new roles and health services and met communities needs.

I would complain because:
a) people who are in pain should not be punished because OTHER PEOPLE misuse drugs
b) she misidentified you anyway
c) women with endo are treated really poorly by the system, with an average of 7 years for diagnosis and often little support when they get the diagnosis. If you were getting proper support from your doctor you would not have to buy the medication without prescription
d) what if the next chemist you go into misidentifies you, and the next, until you run out of chemists? Then you have to get an emergency prescription/OOH appointment where you will be accused of wasting resources (which is rubbish, see a) and c))

I might complain, not because of the refused sale, but to point out how the refused sale illustrates the flaw in the system.

Unless they are going to require id and track customer purchases across pharmacies, people can buy as much as they want.

Personally I wouldn't complain about them not serving me or believing me when I said it wasn't me. I work in healthcare and some patients go by multiple different names in order to get more meds etc. People can be sneaky.

If I really wanted to complain though, then I would give some feedback that if they are concerned a customer is addicted to codiene, then the pharmacist should be talking to them privately about it and providing something like a leaflet to signpost them to some help.

Boots? Is that Your standardised UK policy? Me thinks not.

The pharmacies do talk to each other in the area if they have concerns about a certain patient trying to buy inappropriate amounts or combinations of drugs.

I think you should complain. It's a very poor system open to all manner of mistakes. How does this work with twins or brothers or sisters who look genuinely very alike, for example? (It doesn't.) How does it work if the pharmacist isn't good at recognising people / is somewhat faceblind to passing acquaintances (like I am)? (Again it doesn't.) And as others have illustrated, certain groups of people with protected characteristics, or other characteristics such as (perceived or actual) social class for example, that might already affect access to healthcare, are often more likely to become victims to this type of mistake due to bias. Also the pharmacist ought to have gently asked you to come into the consulting room or similar to check a couple of things with you, not humiliate you in front of other customers, IMO.

It’s annoying and a daft policy to do it based on assistants remembering when someone was last in, but I doubt I’d complain as they were just trying to do the right thing (badly).

I would complain as she embarrassed you in front of other customers. I would be asking to see CCTV of her selling you drugs the previous day.

I agree with this. She accused you of being a drug addict and dishonest and sly.

She needs to be disabused of her delusion.

I’m damned if I’d have bought anything there. She didn’t handle it well and she’s downright dangerous if she’s going to imagine things.

Not same story but kind of related though. A fairly good friend I’d known since beginning of high school (I live in USA), called me and said she’d passed me on the road and saw me driving into a male coworker’s neighborhood. She said it was me and my car, as if she’d caught me cheating on my husband which I’ve never ever done or thought about doing, which she well knew. I was nowhere near that neighborhood and hadn’t even taken my car out that day and told her that, that it must have been someone who looked like me, yet she acted like she didn’t believe me. It really bothered me.

Years before, a mutual friend and I got pulled over by the police and accused of having a gun in the car. Turns out my “friend” called the police concerned that we had a gun in the car. She told us that since our mutual friend was upset at her boyfriend, she thought we might have a fun with us??? I have never owned a gun and never will, neither did our mutual friend. I never did figure out her reasoning for that. Oh well. Op, some people are so sure of themselves they’ve created their own reality, sounds like that pharmacy worker decided she’d seen you and that was it.

🙄

unfortunately you don’t have any right to buy a pharmacy only medication, they can and should refuse you if they believe in good faith you’re not not using codeine correctly. Lots of people addicted to otc codeine and lots of adverse outcomes so the control has got a lot stricter.

I would politely complain. It may not get you anywhere, but you have a valid complaint and should be heard. It is embarrassing to be treated like a lying drug seeker who abuses opioids when you have a pain problem. The look of contempt in the eyes of the person behind the counter is enough, in itself, to ruin your day. They need a better system than you look a bit like someone else!

Definitely complain, they should have gone and checked cctv if they were so concerned

I’m allergic to ibuprofen, should that also be prescription only because I had a reaction to it? 🙄

how does that work? How do they get around the NHS patient identifying number? Assuming you’re in the UK of course, you might not be!