Request

Please could I request the following information Under the Freedom of Information Act: 1. How many paper prescriptions are sent in to NHSBSA each month from community pharmacies? 2. How many dispensing community pharmacies are there? 3. How much in total does it cost the NHSBSA to handle these paper prescriptions? Please could you provide this information by email, preferably in a spreadsheet.

If it is not possible to provide the information requested due to the information exceeding the cost of compliance limits identified in Section 12, please provide advice and assistance, under the Section 16 obligations of the Act, as to how I can refine my request.

You clarified your request on the 14 May 2024 as follows:

What time period would you like the data for?

The last financial or calendar year (whichever is more readily available). If possible it would be good to get every year from 2015 too (again, either financial or calendar year will do).

What is meant by 'How many paper prescriptions'; are you looking for the number of items on the prescription or the number of forms?

If it's possible, could I get both? Otherwise, just the number of forms will suffice.

Please can you provide more details on what specific costs you are looking for.

I'm just after the total cost of processing the forms, including labour costs, printing, postage, etc.

Response

Question One:

I can confirm that the NHSBSA holds the information you have requested, and a copy of the information is attached.

Please read the below notes to ensure correct understanding of the data.

NHS Prescription Services process prescriptions for Pharmacy Contractors, Appliance Contractors, Dispensing Doctors, and Personal Administration with information then used to make payments to pharmacists and appliance contractors in England for prescriptions dispensed in primary care settings (other arrangements are in place for making payments to Dispensing Doctors and Personal Administration). This involves processing over 1 billion prescription items and payments totalling over £9 billion each year. The information gathered from this process is then used to provide information on costs and trends in prescribing in England and Wales to over 25,000 registered NHS and Department of Health and Social Care users.

Data Source: ePACT2 - Data in ePACT2 is sourced from the NHSBSA Data Warehouse and is derived from products prescribed on prescriptions and dispensed in the Community. The data captured from prescription processing is used to calculate reimbursement and remuneration. It includes items prescribed in England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, Guernsey / Alderney, Jersey, and Isle of Man which have been dispensed in the community in England. English prescribing that has been dispensed in Wales, Scotland, Guernsey / Alderney, Jersey, and Isle of Man is also included.

The Data excludes:
• Items not dispensed, disallowed and those returned to the contractor for further clarification.
• Prescriptions prescribed and dispensed in prisons, hospitals, and private prescriptions. • Items prescribed but not presented for dispensing or not submitted to NHS Prescription Services by the dispenser.

Dataset – Data has been provided for all dispensing of paper prescriptions reimbursed to the NHSBSA for payment by English community pharmacies for the time period stated.

Time Period – April 2015-March 2024 (aggregated by Financial Year)

Number of Prescription Forms- The number of paper prescription forms dispensed.

Items- Items shows the number of times a product appears on a prescription form, not the quantity prescribed.

Question Two: Section 21 – Information already reasonably accessible

We have considered this request under the FOIA 2000 and are issuing a refusal notice. This is because the NHSBSA does hold the requested information; however, we consider that this information is exempt from disclosure under section 21 of FOIA. This provides an exemption from the duty to disclose information where this is reasonably accessible to an applicant by other means. Please see the following link to view the section 21 in full - https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2000/36/section/21

The information you have requested is already available in the public domain and can be accessed at: https://opendata.nhsbsa.net/dataset/contractor-details

Question Three:

The total staffing cost for processing all prescriptions was £10.8 million for the financial year 2023/24.

We process electronic and paper prescriptions together due to the system configuration and therefore the NHSBSA does not hold the requested information, and responding to the request would require the NHSBSA to create new information. The FOIA only applies to information already recorded and does not oblige a public authority to create new information when responding to requests.