Not all pharmacy point-of-sale systems are created equal. In general, point-of-sale and inventory systems are commonly built specifically for an industry, providing businesses with the tools necessary to operate their type of business.
A point-of-sale system used in a restaurant would likely not offer the features needed to run a pharmacy, and vice versa. Retail independent pharmacies have specific needs; from submitting ID information for controlled substance prescription pickups to tracking and managing pseudoephedrine sales, independent pharmacies require very niche options in their POS.
Here are the top 5 must-haves in your pharmacy’s point-of-sale system.
1: Inventory Management
A comprehensive inventory management system is arguably one of the most essential features a point of sale can offer. Inventory can be a retail store’s most considerable overhead. In a community pharmacy, especially where you’re managing not only front-end inventory but also drugs, it is essential to control your OTC inventory.
Datascan Pharmacy Software’s point-of-sale system keeps track of a physical perpetual inventory, allowing you to see the exact quantity of an item you have on hand. Our point-of-sale software also helps you manage desired stock quantities by setting reorder points on all items.
Our pharmacy point-of-sale system includes EDI, which allows full electronic ordering with your pharmacy wholesalers. This system also helps you easily update inventory and costs when you receive an electronic response from the wholesaler on what is being shipped to you.
Through point of sale and inventory systems, you can print various reports to better analyze your inventory as a whole, by department or category, or even for a specific item.
2: SIGIS Certification
Pharmacy point-of-sale systems are built with pharmacy needs in mind. Patients picking up prescriptions or purchasing over-the-counter items often want to use their flexible spending or health savings card to pay for their copayment or qualified items, and your pharmacy point-of-sale system must be able to handle that.
To set up your pharmacy to accept FSA and HSA cards, you must be registered with SIGIS, and your point of sale software vendor must also be a SIGIS-certified vendor. Retail point-of-sale systems not registered with SIGIS prevent pharmacies from accepting FSA and HSA cards at the point of sale.
3: Integrated pseudoephedrine tracking
Pharmacies’ needs and ability to track and certify pseudoephedrine product sales are unique. Pharmacies must validate sales on pseudoephedrine items and track the customer’s information. Your pharmacy point of sale system from Datascan Pharmacy Software is fully integrated to track pseudoephedrine sales in real-time, validate the purchase, and inform cashiers if the patient is eligible to purchase the item.
It also logs sales and retains customer information. This is an essential feature for your pharmacy point-of-sale software to offer, something a retail point-of-sale and inventory system would be unable to manage.
If your state requires reporting of PSE sales, Datascan Pharmacy Software’s point of sale also fully integrates with NPLEX for automated electronic reporting.
4: Signature capture and workflow integration
When patients come to pick up their prescriptions and the cashier scans the barcode, there is a lot of “talk” between the point-of-sale software and the pharmacy system. Simply put, the point of sale and inventory system software is not just reading an item code and spitting out a price but communicating with your pharmacy system to ensure the patient’s prescriptions are ready for pickup.
In addition, the point of sale’s integration with the workflow will check to see if a patient or linked family member has other prescriptions waiting somewhere in the workflow. Patients can also sign for prescription pick up, HIPAA, and accept or reject counseling, all stored in the point of sale and pharmacy software.
Not only does this keep your pharmacy compliant with state laws, but it also gives you the ability to easily track and look up if a patient’s RX was picked up and track RXs that have not been picked up for quick communication to those patients. Lowering re-stock rates of prescriptions forgotten about by patients helps build compliance, star ratings, reimbursements, and overall sales.
5: AR Tracking and PCI-compliant credit card storage
The ability to securely store customers’ and patients’ credit card and billing information is typically on pharmacy owners’ point-of-sale wish lists. Creating customer house charges or AR accounts is a widespread community pharmacy need not all retail systems can accommodate.
Datascan Pharmacy Software’s point of sale and inventory system not only allows you to create AR accounts for customers but also helps you link family members to the account so you can easily track their purchases on their monthly statements.
Pharmacies servicing Long-Term care or Assisted Living Facilities can create AR accounts for facilities while linking patients or customers to the account. Pharmacies can choose to print and mail statements or email them to customers instead.
Datascan Pharmacy Software’s point-of-sale system will also allow the pharmacy to store PCI-compliant, encrypted credit card information. Stored credit cards can be used for individual sales at the point of purchase or applied to end-of-month AR statements. Proper credit card encryption ensures your pharmacy complies with PCI standards. Datascan Pharmacy Software has even set the system up so you can automatically charge cards on file for monthly statements when they come due.
Regardless of what pharmacy management software you use, having a pharmacy point-of-sale system that can “tie” into it, share data, and not operate separately is key to running an efficient pharmacy.
Kevin Minassian is the President of Datascan Software. Under his leadership, the company rapidly expanded to provide pharmacy management software on a national level. Over the last 15+ years, he has ensured that Datascan has continuously evolved to offer innovative solutions for independent pharmacies while still offering world-class customer support. He is passionate about helping independent pharmacies to remain competitive, achieve success, and offer the very best service to their communities.
