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Special offer from Boots on medical products

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shirl24

Member
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5
I have spent the last 2 weeks battling with Boots the chemist via email and telephone calls as they were charging VAT on diabetic products, finally they have acknowledged that the products should be VAT exempt and have today updated their website accordingly.

Also at the moment until 19 October they are doing a 3 for the price of 2 offer, so I have saved over £120 today by ordering testing strips and lancets online. :D

You can also buy them in stores but will need to take the VAT exemption form with you if you do not want to pay VAT.

Shirl
 
Interesting. Wonder if they'll accept that VAT reduction should apply to their diabetic chocolate range? :lol:
 
Grazer said:
Interesting. Wonder if they'll accept that VAT reduction should apply to their diabetic chocolate range? :lol:
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I doubt it applies to that as anyone can eat diabetic chocolate, whereas testing strips would only be used by people with diabetes, see this example of exemptions http://www.diabetes.co.uk/vat-exemption.html
 
why do you have to pay for them at all, i have a medical exemption card so i get all medical needs through prescription for free or are you from overseas.
 
I am from the UK my surgery does not provide them on prescription, apparently it is a bit of a postcode lottery if your surgery will supply them on prescription. There is a link to a petiton on this website for people to get free testing strips http://www.diabetes.co.uk/diabetes-petitions/share-petition.html
 
astle9 said:
why do you have to pay for them at all, i have a medical exemption card so i get all medical needs through prescription for free or are you from overseas.
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As you inject non-insulin meds for your diabetes, you are potentially vulnerable to hypos so are likely to be prescribed strips. If you're on diet only or metformin, which means you're not likely to heve dangerous hypos, you are unlikely to be prescribed strips although some do.
 
How do you qualify for a prescription exemption certificate, where do you apply for one and what does it cover? Thanks.
 
my med exemption was sorted by my GP and i pay for no medication diabetes related or not, has to be updated every 5 years.
 
I have a medical exemption certificate, all handled by the Drs surgery and all my meds are now free. However my GP refuses to prescribe testing strips due to a change in policy about 18 months ago which I am sure is because of cost cutting. So I am not able to get testing strips for free.

thanks for the tip Shirl, I bought some strips, saved £22 ! Nice one!!
 
Hey shirl24!

Well done you! I battled Boots over the same issue 3 years ago just before I went on insulin. The level of knowledge among their staff was dire and Boots head office simply weren't interested. Customer Services just told me if I bought anything from their web site I should pay the VAT and write to the VAT man to try to reclaim VAT! I was too ill to keep fighting them at the time so gave up and used a different on-line pharmacy. Really pleased you've got them to change their ways!

Smidge
 
I was only diagnosed with type 2 in August of this year, and bought myself a meter and test strips as my surgery do not supply testing strips for type 2. I was prescribed metformin which I have not taken as the instructions say you should not drink alcohol and I went to a group nutrition meeting last week and several people were talking about the problems they were having with metformin. I am not even sure what metformin is supposed to do?

When I bought my meter I was not aware of the VAT exemption and it was only by chance I found out about it on this website. I contacted the Boots online customer service and pointed out to them that they should not be charging VAT, I received a reply saying I was wrong. After several emails and phone calls to their customer services (who all agreed that VAT should not be charged, but nothing happened), I eventually phoned their head office in Nottingham and was put through to a manager who finally got it sorted.

During this time I went to a Boots chemist and took the exemption form with me, they were very helpful but confused as they were unaware of the exemption, I was in the shop for an hour while they tried to sort it out and after an hour I left with 2 for the price of 3 and got the VAT off.

It was rather strange that if you searched the Boots site for VAT in their FAQ it clearly states that diabetic products are VAT exempt but they were not implementing it.
 
shirl24 said:
I was prescribed metformin which I have not taken as the instructions say you should not drink alcohol and I went to a group nutrition meeting last week and several people were talking about the problems they were having with metformin. I am not even sure what metformin is supposed to do?
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Few things here. First of all, take the metformin. It's a great drug with good protective measures against cardiovascular disease as well as lowering BGs a little. It works by helping the insulin you produce have more effect on your blood sugar, and by restricting the amount of sugar produced in the blood in the first place. It doesn't stimulate your pancreas to produce MORE insulin the way Gliclazide does, so doesn't "wear out" the pancreas more quickly. It doesn't cause hypos and the tummy side effects are avoided if you have the slow release version - insist on this. Doctors normally prescribe the normal toilet-trip metformin first because it's a few pence cheaper. Insist on the slow release. You CAN drink alcohol - I drink regularly on it - sometimes a lot!! I checked this with an endocrinologist who specialiises in diabetes and lectures doctors on the subject. He said it's safety first nonsense to say don't drink with it! His words! Apparently there's a very rare condition that can arise if you mix metformin with alcohol, called lactic acidosis. BUT it only normally applies to people with existing liver disease and alcoholics. He's never known a single person to suffer from it in 30 years at his private hospital. Metformin won't have a big effect on BGs, but will drop your peaks by 1 or 2 mmols and help your fasting BGs a tiny bit. It's the cardio prototection it gives which is why I asked for it; I had my HbA1c below 6 on diet alone so they didn't want to let me have it until I insisted!
 
Hi shirl :)
You should be able to read the message now as you have posted five times.
 
I always get my strips and lancets from the Diabetes.co.uk on line pharmacy, they are the cheapest and most efficient that I have found.
 
I am very surprised that anybody who follows this forum and has to pay for strips would buy test strips from Boots or any other high street pharmacy.
My most recent order of 10 x50 test strips for my SD CodeFree From HomeHealth-UK worked out at £51.98 --- only 10.5p per test.
The prices charged for strips for most meters is crazy, the SD CodeFree is as accurate as most meters in fact checking it against test solution it appears to give more consistant and accurate than all of my more expensive meters except my two Contout Next Meters.
 
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