Saturday, January 17, 2015

On Queuing at the Chemist

   The other day I submitted a prescription for refill. The next day I got an automated message from Walgreens letting me know it was ready for pick up. I drove past the store and the parking lot was full. From the road I could also see that the drive-thru lanes were quite busy as well, so I just kept on driving. I ignored Walgreens for a while, but it finally reached a point where I was going to have to retrieve the prescription.  This time the parking lot was a little less crowed so I went inside. There were three people standing in line at the pharmacy counter so I got in line too. And I waited. And waited. And waited. It was taking them an average of 7 minutes per customer to process the people in front of me. I know because I timed them. 
   So as I stood there (waiting) I couldn't help but wonder: what if life had some kind of "fast pass"?  I thought if works at the airport and it works at Disney why couldn't it work in daily life. Think about it. You could take some kind of aptitude test, a physical exam and post some kind of bond and they give you a bracelet to wear that lets you bypass, well, everything. I could have walked behind the pharmacy counter, found the bin that starts with "B", flipped thru the packages until I found the one with my name on it, waived it under the scanner, swiped my credit card and have been done.
   Since that probably won't happen anytime soon, I came up with this flow chart that Walgreens can post in the pharmacy department that should help expedite the check out process.