Mail Order Drugs and Optum Rx

[TXiceman]

What kind of success have you had getting mail order drugs when on the road?

 

We make it a point to order our 90 day refills when we know where we will be on certain dates. Even when giving the mail order Rx the address we want the drugs sent to, they will still mess up and send them to an older address. We tell them to delete any previous addresses in the system and to use the new one as a one time shipment.

 

Do others use and have problems with Optum Rx?

 

Ken

[dzwiss]

"Do others use and have problems with Optum Rx?

 

Ken"

 

I have had good success with Optum RX. I do my reorders on line to various addresses. If you get a new prescription from your doc and he calls it in you may have to call them and tell them your current shipping address.

[TXiceman]

We do call them and tell them to hold shipment until we can give them an address. Yet they ship to an old address. I do most of my reordering by the website. The problem tends to occur when we have the DR send in a renewal Rx. So we call and tell them to HOLD, but they ignore our request.

 

Ken

[Barbaraok]

We just have refills sent to our regular Escapees address. Escapees sends me an email when packages arrive, then we have them sent on to us with our mail, to where we are at for the coming week. 3 days later (at most) the meds are there. We use Express Scripts and haven't had a problem. In the winter, we set up a temporary address with our address here in Mesa, no problems.

 

Barb

[dzwiss]

With Optum RX, in your profile, you have a preferred address, which should be your domicile address, and a preferred shipping address. Your preferred shipping address will most likely be where you last had a delivery. My preferred address is Livingston, I have a list of 4 possible shipping addresses on file which I can highlight depending on where I am. I think I will make sure my shipping address is my Livingston address when I go to the doctor if I am not at a location that will accept mail. Once you figure out their quirks, they are very dependable, but as with anything there is a learning curve.

[Vladimir]

I use Costco pharmacy and fill the entire years prescription at one time. This means I buy it on my own without the insurance. However, the price for 1 year paying for it myself is still cheaper than filling it every 90 days through insurance.

 

Be sure that the Dr. writes that you want to fill a one year supply at one time on the prescription. When I went to pick up mine, that assumed that I had a year prescription to be filled every 90 days. Then they would not fill it right away since they did not have enough on hand!!

 

BTW a years supply of Atorvastatin 40 mg was $86.08 at Costco. $454.00 at Wal-Mart. and are you ready for this....$5,000 at Shopko. All prices were paying outside of the insurance.

[rynosback]

I am not sure who you have as a carrier. We have Caremark. We can pick up our 90 day supplies at any CVS in the country. So no need to have anything mailed to us. If we needed to, I think I would have Caremark mail it to our CG directly.

[Velos]

We too have found med's to be less when we pay cash then the hassle of insurance. Many times there is a discount when you buy a years supply. Here are several sites where you can compare med prices: https://www.google.com/search?q=RX+price+comparison&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

 

Some Dr's wont write a prescription for a year, because of Fed regs and/or they make money from the office visit to write the prescription. On the benefit of the doubt side they want to see you to make sure you are well and there are no changes to doses needed.

 

The only caveat to large cashes of med's is making sure they are stored properly ie not to hot, cold, wet etc.

[Kirk W]

Some Dr's wont write a prescription for a year, because of Fed regs and/or they make money from the office visit to write the prescription.

What you don't seem to understand with those of us who use Express Scripts or similar mail order services is that we still see the doctor only one time each year, who then writes one prescription for a 90 day supply of each medication which is to be refilled three times or a total of 1 year. That is a pretty standard practice today with the very common use of mail order pharmacies for maintenance medications by major insurance underwriters. The service was not developed for the RV community, it just serves us well and the doctor still gets paid only one time. On the other hand, there are drugs which are restricted by federal law and the doctor will be prosecuted if they write a prescription for a period that exceeds the DEA rules. Most doctors do not like that any better than their patients do as most of them have no need to pad things in order to get more patient visits for greater income.

[sandsys]

Not all mail order prescription services are equal. I have mostly heard bad things about Optum Rx. Although people seldom mention the good things so my view may be distorted.

 

Linda Sand

[bigjim]

I get whichever one my health insurance decides I get. Last year or two it was express scripts and I had minor issues with them and heard than many more folks had issues but I certainly can't confirm that. They mostly worked pretty good for me and most of what caused me grief was the result of my primary and his nurse. This year we have CVS/Caremark and I have had some problems but again most of it was caused by my primary and his nurse. I do find their online information confusing. I may try getting my 90day supply at the store next time if possible as rynosback has done. One issue is where I am now there plenty of Walgreens but a lot less and more distant CVS stores.

[ronmon]

I've had nothing but great service from OptumRX for the 3 years I've used them. However, USPS's handling has been unusual a couple of times. On one order (following via USPS tracking) it originated in Kansas City, went to Winston-Salem NC then to Phoenix then to Raleigh NC where I live in a Raleigh suburb. Another order left Kansas City, arrived in Kernersville NC them to somewhere in Ohio where it sat for 8 days until my local postmaster called & was told "yes, it's been here on the sorting table for several days, should I put it back into the stream?" DUH!

Ron

[TXiceman]

With Optum Rx, we always call after we have had a DR renew or send in a new prescription and provide an address to send the medicine. About twice a year, they do not follow instructions and either send to the wrong address or do not send them at all. Previously we have had a mail order through Walgreens and they were flawless...never missed a beat.

 

With Optum we have gotten agents that were argumentative and we have to wait for a manager to get the mess straight. I wish we could find a plan that would let us pick up 90 day supplies at CVS or Walmart, but so far we have not found one.

 

Ken

[whj469]

Have any of you used Welldyne for mail order meds? They are our new med supplier since

9-1-2015 when I changed health insurance providers for the company that I am the CEO.

They seem to be prompt.