Pfizer cuts discounts from January 1

Another interesting move from Pfizer - the "nail in the pharmacy coffin" experts. Clearly, its a move to squeeze every penny out of the patented products before their forthcoming demise. With Xalatan coming off patent in the New Year, Lipitor in May and not long after Viagra and Boehringer stealing a march on them with dabigatran (Pradaxa), its not surprising. Playing devils advocate - It makes sound commercial sense on their part. However, cnce again, the loser is pharmacy, despite Pfizers deluded claims that we all love the company and sponsoring the odd event, will compensate for everyting. Anyone who attended the Pharmacy Show in October would have noticed two things about the Pfizer stand. Firstly, it was by far the biggest and secondly it was by far the emptiest! Good job the employees manning the stand had their mobile phones to play with! In fairness, we have seen similar reductions in discounts from other manufacturers as they moved to dtp, but unfortunately for Pfizer, they will always be blamed more the others as they set the whole proverbial 'dtp ball in motion'. Pharmacists showed their feelings towards Lipitor and Pfizer when Teva briefly launced the generic. Sales of the generic exceeded £20m in one day. It is clear to see what an extra 1% will mean for Pfizer.
However, the PSNC must now be seen to be acting in the ineterests of all contractors. This can all be offset with the appropriiate adjustment in discount clawback. As contractors, we have seen signifcant reductions in discounts due to dtp, from ALL those manufacturers who have made that move, but we have not seen corresponding reductions in discount clawback. NET EFFECT = FALL IN INCOME.
PSNC - the ball is now firmly in your court.

Totally agree with R Cygan. Our average clawback is over 10.25% how does that equate to a fair return when on most DTP lines pharmacy contractors are actually making a loss as apposed to a profit?? This move by Pfizer is certainly a nail in the coffin but I don't mean pharmacy I mean in the hearts and minds of pharmacy contractors and their already sparse support towards Pfizer.

"Mr Wilson (Pfizer) also stressed that the company was "committed to continuing to support community pharmacy"."
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Cynical B******t methinks.

Its a shame we cannot opt to decline the offer of discount from pfizer, and simply endorse the script DNG. At least that way, as Dhanoa states, we wouldnt be on average 2.75% out of pocket everytime we dispense one of these pfizer products.