The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 272 No 7290 p334
13 March 2004

Society summary

Retention fee payments: some questions answered

Philip Green, the Royal Pharmaceutical Society's Deputy Secretary and Registrar and Director of Education and Registration, answers some questions about the Society's new system for collecting the annual retention fees from members and pharmacy owners

Why did we have to change the payment process for retention fees? What was wrong with the old system? In August 2003, the Society’s Council took the decision to outsource the process of collecting the annual retention and fee collection. The old system involved an increasingly unmanageable workload on the in-house staff, which had resulted in an inefficient service that was inconvenient to members. It seemed sensible, therefore, to employ an organisation for which the collection of large volumes of payments and form processing were core business.

Which outside agencies are involved and why? The Society approached its bankers, The Royal Bank of Scotland, for advice and support in relation to the annual return and fee collection cycle. The bank introduced the Society to Atos Origin, a key partner organisation for the bank. Atos Origin is one of Europe’s largest information technology services companies, with 47,000 staff and revenues of €5bn. The Society contracted with the bank, agreeing to place the work with Atos Origin.

How many fees have been collected so far? Ninety-four per cent of members had paid their fees as at 5 March, a significant improvement on fee collection over previous years. The vast majority of members had paid their fees and made annual returns by the close of January and the Society will benefit from the consequential improvement to cash flow during the first quarter of the year. On 5 March, statutory demands for payment were issued to those members who had not attempted to make payment. The number of demands issues was about half the number issued in 2003 figures.

More than 4,300 members have used the new online payment method, and 8,300 members have used the credit and debit card facility on the retention fee form to pay their fees. In total, a third of members embraced the opportunity to use one of these new payment methods.

It was recently reported that there were a few teething problems with the new system. Can you explain what these were and why they happened? As with any new system, there have been difficulties. Initially, despite the Society’s best efforts and extensive planning, the performance of Atos has proved disappointing across the range of complex processes required to distribute forms, collect fees, process payments and update the Society’s records. Specifically, some members did not receive the original paperwork in good time and some have received reminders to pay when in fact they may have already done so. The Society can only apologise to those members.

The Royal Bank of Scotland has contributed staff and significant resources, working intensively with Society staff, to ensure that the problems are resolved as quickly as possible. This work is ongoing until the completion of an entire audit of the process.

Some people received demands when they had already paid their fees and this may have caused considerable distress. The Society acknowledges that members are entirely justified in their frustrations and annoyance when faced with duplicate and unnecessary demands for payment. Confusion of this sort, affecting the working lives of pharmacists, is understandably upsetting. Where problems have occurred, the Society has identified them quickly and worked closely with Atos Origin and the bank to resolve them.

So what is being done to help avoid in the future the problems that have occurred in the first year of the new system? The Society worked hard in preparing for the new system and, through the course of the past three months, has revised and honed its processes hand-in-hand with its partners. No system is infallible and the Society can only work towards minimising the problems in the future, but it is confident the lessons learned during the 2004 retention fee cycle have put it in a stronger position to offer an even better service in 2005.

Overall, what can members expect next year? The success of online card payments has added weight to the Society’s intention to investigate a range of other online services. For those members who have not found the new system easy or customer friendly this year, the Society would expect things to run more smoothly in 2005