I've been a pharmacy technician for over five years, and each day brings something new to the counter. Some days you'll have toothless people spitting on you while you try to tell them they can't get their pain pills for another three days, and some days you'll have little boys telling you that you're going to be their wife. Here are the top ten things that your pharmacy technician wants to tell you, but can't:
Your jokes are not funny
In a way that's similar to the "Oh, it didn't scan, it must be free!" joke that regular retail workers face, your pharmacy technician gets the crudest, rudest, and stupidest jokes on a regular basis, and they have to politely laugh at them. I personally don't carewhere your sprained ankle came from, and no, I don't want to tell you how to use your Viagra - we have a male pharmacist that will gladly help you with that.
I don't make the prices
Yeah, I know, I wouldn't pay $798 for a pain pill either. Surprisingly, though, I don't pull these prices out of my rear end. If you have a problem with it, call the customer service number on the back of your insurance card so they can explain your plan's benefits to you more thoroughly than the paperwork they sent you will.
My job entails a little more than "just counting pills" or "slapping a label on it"
I spend eight hours a day billing insurances, calling doctors, providing customer service, answering phone calls, organizing, restocking, counting pills, and stuck on hold with a number of third parties; please don't belittle me by making my job seem like a cake walk.
You cannot "borrow" pills
You ever tried "borrowing" a cheeseburger from McDonald's without paying for it first? Yeah, probably not going to happen. Also not going to happen with your medicine; sorry.
I will not break the law so that you can have your medicine
I really do understand that it's a huge inconvenience that your doctor didn't sign your Percocet script, but I literally can not do anything about it since it's illegal to dispense something without a doctor's signature on it.
If your script is from April and it's now August, don't get angry that we don't have it in stock and you have to wait a day
I know you keep telling me that you direly need this medication, but the script is five months old and we don't regularly stock it. I'll gladly check other pharmacies, but maybe you shouldn't wait until the last minute...
Do not get mad at our wait times
I'm busy trying not to kill you or our other customers by doing my due diligence on each script. Do not yell at me because it took a little longer to get your script filled: I had to call your doctor and tell him you're allergic to penicillin because he wrote a script for penicillin. He changed it, so now you won't die. YOU ARE WELCOME.
You're pronouncing all of those medication names incorrectly...
Just sound it out, it's okay, I have faith in you.
I do not have a time frame for your doctor's response on your refills
If you had taken care of your own medications like the adult that you are, you wouldn't be in the predicament. Can I call your doctor? I'd love to. But if you'd call your doctor as many times as you call your pharmacy, you'd have your medications by now.
I do not want to talk politics, illnesses, and I sure as heck don't want to see the rash on your butt
Please don't talk about ObamaCare, the presidential election, your recent onset of vomiting and diarrhea, or the rash that has appeared out of nowhere - I do not get paid enough to deal with any of those opinions or issues...
But let me grab the pharmacist for you.