It also proposed increasing premises renewal fees by £21 to £262 and pharmacy technicians’ fees by £3 to £121 from July 2019, according to papers from a GPhC council meeting held yesterday (October 11).

The proposed increases follow three years of frozen renewal fees.

Under the proposals, the fee for registered pharmacies will be higher than the fee for pharmacists “for the first time”, the GPhC said.

The regulator will launch a 12-week consultation “in the coming month”, the results of which it will discuss in a meeting in March 2019, it said.

The fee increases will improve the regulator’s “efficiency and effectiveness”, as they are “integral to the management of the GPhC’s resources”, it explained.

The GPhC has an “ongoing desire to avoid significant fluctuations in fee levels in future years” for all registrants, it added.

The proposed increased fee for pharmacists will still be lower than the 2011 renewal fee of £267, it stressed.