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Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Open Letter To Our Warehouse Tote Packers

Dear Warehouse Tote Packers,

I am sure you are aware that the products you delicately smash into overfilled totes can be quite pricey to replace. Some of my greatest finds include sticking my hand in the "lotioned" tote. Nothing makes my heart sing with joy more than a hand full of slimy unknown cold semi-solid.

I also am quite overcome with emotion every time a bottle of Tussionex ruins an entire controlled substance tote. There is a significant amount of paperwork involved with that one, not to mention the tedious hours spent trying to wipe sticky yellow goo off bottles of pills in the hopes that the interior has not been breached and the medication inside is dispensable.

I implore you to stop smashing Spiriva. It looks like Banner went all gamma ray and let the Hulk smash the boxes into an atrocious cardboard mess. It is a travesty to try and reshape these boxes which many times have to be abandoned so that the inhaler inside can be put in a plastic bag and labeled for dispensing.

I am not complaining for complaint's sake. I express my deep concern at what the patients think about our operation. I would much rather be seen as an outfit that cares than one that lets a clown in a paper hat toss out drugs like confetti. I am also concerned at the exorbitant cost to replace what is damaged and the dent it puts in our retirement match at the end of the year. I don't know about you but I do NOT plan on working until the day I die.

Let's all do our part to keep this ship from sinking.

Sincerely,


Big N Tasty RPh

13 comments:

Brandy said...

Makes me so glad I come from the vet med side. We repackage almost everything anyways so we could hide damaged bottles and boxes.

I would look at my pharmacist funny if I got weird packaged stuff but I would probably assume the warehouse messed it up.

Anonymous said...

I'm so glad that chemos now are placed in zip-locked baggies before tossing into the totes. Another gripe. The warehouse sends a container the size of house (slight exaggeration), for some individual bottles (not even controlled substances), so there are twenty totes to dig through first thing on arrival to find the drug the patient has been waiting all night on, since there's no list of which container has the drug.

LilMsHppyPillz said...

I've opened totes and been greeted by a strange tobacco odor. After removing all the usable product from said tote, I found 3 cigarette butts and a dead cockroach. Ewwwwww! I had the photo tech come and take a pic with the passport camera for proof. I gave the pic to my DM, who "lost" it. I sent the tote back, butts and bug and all.

Anonymous said...

Also, don't forget how they send all of the packing trash to the stores instead of throwing out at the warehouse. And my personal favorite, the care with which they use their case cutters. It really is easy to sell the merchanise that has been sliced with razors.

Term Papers said...

It looks like Banner went all gamma ray and let the Hulk smash the boxes into an atrocious cardboard mess.

Term papers said...

I am aware that the products I delicately smash into overfilled totes can be quite pricey to replace. Some of Your greatest finds include sticking Your hand in the "lotion ed" tote. Nothing makes your heart sing with joy more than a hand full of slimy unknown cold semi-solid.

Steph said...

Ugh! Thank you for this! I was unpacking an order the other day where every single box was crushed. Today I filled some singulair granules and the whole damn box was just shredded. It's ridiculous.

The little tech that does... said...

Wish I could say things were different here, but same thing. Like you said, we look like clowns trying to compensate for their bad packing jobs.

Unknown said...

This post gave me flashbacks...not only to my more recent retail days but to the days of growing up in a drugstore. Back then, the totes were not the lovely plastic jobbies they are now...they were cardboard. Always yummy when a gallon of cough syrup breaks. *sigh*

Pharmacy School Admissions said...

It seems like marking a box 'fragile' is an invitation for my package to be thrown around.

TheLittleFlower said...

I've actually taken pictures and emailed them back to the warehouse. Bottles of insulin with packages soaked by cold packs just look awful to dispense to patients. Believe it or not, they started putting the cold packs in plastic bags after I contacted the right person. Sometimes things do get done......

Just a little snarky said...

Doesn't anyone complain to the warehouse supervisors about this? Why not complain to the super's boss or regional manager? Include pictures to the RM and cost to replace the meds. High costs will make most managers jump.

Big 'N Tasty RPH said...

We fill out claims for the damaged merch that the district office sees but so far still getting mangled packages.