Third Party Coordination Goes Awry - Meds Edition

A few weeks ago I had to figure out where to order my and my surrogate's meds from. ACRM recommended 3 pharmacies and called the Rx in to all 3, allowing me to compare prices and such. One of these pharmacies, Village Fertility Pharmacy, actually had the forethought to test my insurance coverage even though I told them it wouldn't be covered. Thankfully I was wrong, so we went with them (a huge bulk of mine were covered!) I ordered both mine and my surrogates meds, shipping to our respective homes. Mine took 1-2 days. 

Since we paying ACRM extra money (~$3100) to do "third party coordination", I naturally thought that if I ordered the meds, that they would do more of the "coordination" and stuff. Honestly, they have not done a good job with this. Repeatedly I feel like I'm running around like a crazy person doing the bulk of the coordinating. With my ADD and new job, this is terrifically difficult for me. 

When my GC came in for her appointment on Monday, they gave her a written Rx for her meds and told her to fill it. No one thought "hey, we've already placed an order with the IP a few weeks ago, maybe we should check on that." The reason I found out? The nurse copied me on an email to the GC that said "You don't need to pick up the Lupron in your original order." All of a sudden I was like "Is this a double order???" The nurse emailed me at first and said that maybe the fertility pharmacy sent the Rx to Kroger. I asked my GC, and she said no - no one told her  about the previous med order and ACRM just gave her the Rx when she went for her baseline ultrasound. She was suppose to start meds that day and not one red flag was thrown up. A few back and forth emails, and it was apparent that no one on their end was really keeping tabs on this. 

Truthfully I should have checked that her med order went through smoothly weeks ago when I got mine. I had informed my nurse that I had received mine, but then got violently ill and forgot to double check if our GC got hers. I had no reason to believe she didn't and I guess with all the balls I am juggling, that was another one I dropped. I'm terrible at organizing these types of things, which is why I didn't mind paying the extra money to the clinic to do so. And I really don't consider $3100 a small fee to do this. As I am sure you have already guessed, our GC did not receive her meds from Village Fertility and it upsets me that I feel like I'm having to do the bulk of "third party coordinating" while paying them a chunk of extra cash. (Yes, I know some of this goes towards the medical aspect, but we were also told it goes towards things like this.)

All of this resulted in frantic phone calls, in the middle of a workday, with my very public cube, to multiple people. This is sucktastic for me to have to do at a new job. Village Fertility Pharmacy said they did not ship the GC order because they had left 2 messages to set-up a profile for the GC and she did not call back. My GC said she never received the messages and I 100% believe her. I asked Village why they didn't call me when they couldn't reach her, and they admitted they should have. (As a side note: I am very forgiving when people admit mistakes and then do whatever they need to do to correct it - Village did this.) Village apologize and after I altered the order (minus the no longer needed Lupron and minus the already procured Estrace), they were able to ship out overnight. 

In the long run, I think the mess-ups of everyone (me, the clinic, and the pharmacy) saved me money, but that still doesn't give me a warm and fuzzy. Especially mid-cycle. I'll write more later on my HUGE upset about a screw-up in charges. It's a freaking shame because we adore our doctor over there.