Pharmacy Home Delivery

Executive Summary

Pharmacy Home Delivery extends your dispensary so medicines can reach patients at home — not only at the counter. A patient order is prepared and verified in Pharmacy, then handed off to Logistics for routing, driver assignment, live tracking, and proof of delivery.

The system is designed for pharmacies that run online orders, repeat-medication refills, chronic-care programmes, or any model where patients expect medicines brought to their door. It keeps the same patient record, stock, and payment trail as walk-in dispensing, while adding the operational layer needed to run a delivery fleet reliably.

Organisations such as Trinity Pharmacy use this model at scale — online orders grouped into trips, drivers completing stops with verified handover, and operations monitored from a central dashboard.

Pharmacy Home Delivery is not a separate product. It is the combined use of Pharmacy (dispensing and verification) and Logistics (trips, drivers, tracking, proof of delivery), supported by the Rider mobile app for field execution.

Who This Is For

Key Capabilities

• End-to-end fulfilment from dispense to verified home handover
• Multi-stop trip planning with patient addresses and delivery instructions
• Special-handling tags (Fridge, Urgent, Fragile, Chemotherapy, and more)
• Smart driver allocation based on proximity, workload, and performance
• Route optimisation for efficient daily delivery rounds
• Live Command Center map for active trip monitoring
• Proof of delivery via OTP, signature, photo, or initials
• GPS-validated delivery confirmation and full audit trail
• Driver performance scorecards (on-time rate, success rate, completion time)
• Offline-capable rider app with sync when connectivity returns
• Recurring trips for scheduled delivery rounds
• Confidential delivery visibility for sensitive orders

Important Concepts

Before running pharmacy deliveries day to day, it helps to understand these terms:

Table of Contents

1. How It Fits Together
2. The End-to-End Delivery Journey
3. Special Handling for Medicines
4. Proof of Delivery
5. Monitoring and Management
6. Collection vs Delivery
7. How Pharmacy Delivery Connects to Other Modules
8. Daily Routines and Best Practices
9. Troubleshooting Common Situations

How It Fits Together

Pharmacy and Logistics are two halves of one fulfilment process:

Patient order → Dispense & verify → Schedule for delivery → Plan trip → Driver delivers → Proof captured → Order closed

Walk-in collection and home delivery share the same dispense record. The difference is what happens after Verified: the patient either collects at the pharmacy, or the order becomes a delivery stop on a trip.

The End-to-End Delivery Journey

1. Order received

An order may come from:

• A walk-in patient who asks for home delivery
• An online or phone order
• A scheduled refill that the patient prefers delivered

The patient must exist in the shared patient register (from Pharmacy or Clinic), with a valid phone number and delivery address.

2. Dispense and verify (Pharmacy)

1. Staff dispense medicines in Quick Dispense as usual.
2. Labels and dosing instructions are printed.
3. A pharmacist verifies the dispense in the queue.
4. Payment is collected or deferred, per your policy.

At this point the medicines are ready to leave the pharmacy. For delivery orders, they are set aside for the dispatch desk rather than the collection counter.

![Screenshot: Verified dispense ready for dispatch — placeholder]

3. Handoff to dispatch

Dispatch receives:

• Patient name and contact number
• Delivery address (with map pin where possible)
• Medicines and quantities
• Special instructions (gate code, leave with security, call on arrival)
• Handling flags (refrigerated, fragile, urgent, chemotherapy, etc.)

4. Trip planning (Logistics)

1. Open Logistics → Trips or the Command Center.
2. Create a new trip with:
   • Origin — usually the pharmacy branch
   • Driver and vehicle
   • Departure time
3. Add one stop per patient delivery:
   • Patient / customer
   • Address (confirmed on map where possible)
   • Planned arrival time
   • Delivery instructions
   • Tags for special handling

Stops can be reordered for an efficient route. Recurring trips can be set up for regular delivery rounds (e.g. daily chronic-care runs).

![Screenshot: Trip planning with multiple patient stops — placeholder]

5. Driver assignment

Drivers can be assigned manually or with smart allocation, which weighs:

• How far the driver is from the pickup point
• How many deliveries they already have
• Past performance and availability

Nearest available drivers can also be searched when creating a trip.

6. Execution in the field (Rider app)

The driver:

1. Goes online and receives assigned stops.
2. Sees the optimised route with patient name, address, phone, and instructions.
3. Navigates stop by stop.
4. Marks Arrived when at the location.
5. Hands over medicines to the patient or authorised person.
6. Captures proof of delivery:
   • Patient enters an OTP, or
   • Signature or initials, or
   • Photo of handover (where policy allows)
7. Marks the stop Delivered or Failed with a reason.

The app works offline where needed: confirmations are stored locally and sync when connectivity returns.

![Screenshot: Rider app stop detail with proof of delivery — placeholder]

7. Confirmation and closure

When proof is captured:

• The stop status updates in Logistics.
• Dispatch sees completion on the Command Center.
• Pharmacy can treat the order as Collected — the patient has received their medicines.
• Performance metrics (on-time rate, success rate) are recorded for reporting.

8. Failed delivery

If the patient is unavailable, the address is wrong, or access is blocked:

1. Driver marks the stop as failed and selects a reason.
2. Notes and optional photo are recorded.
3. Dispatch is notified.
4. Pharmacy is informed — medicines typically return to the pharmacy.
5. Customer service reschedules or arranges collection.

Special Handling for Medicines

Pharmacy deliveries often need more care than general parcels. Use tags on stops to communicate this to drivers and dispatch:

Confidential deliveries can be restricted so only authorised roles see trip details — useful for sensitive patient orders.

Proof of Delivery

Every home delivery should leave an audit trail:

• Who received the medicines
• When and where (GPS at confirmation)
• How receipt was verified (OTP, signature, photo)

This reduces disputes ("I never received it"), supports regulatory expectations, and gives managers confidence that drivers follow procedure rather than marking deliveries complete without handover.

Verification methods

Your organisation's policy determines which methods are required, optional, or used as fallback.

Monitoring and Management

Logistics Command Center

Managers and dispatch use the Command Center to:

• See all active trips on a map
• Spot late or stuck deliveries
• Intervene before patients call to complain
• Track daily volume against targets

![Screenshot: Logistics Command Center with active trips — placeholder]

Key metrics to watch

Collection vs Delivery

How Pharmacy Delivery Connects to Other Modules

Pharmacy

• Same patient, stock, and dispense records as walk-in.
• Dispense moves through Dispensed → Verified before delivery.
• After successful delivery, status can move to Collected and Paid.

Clinic / Healthcare

• Shared patient register — allergies and conditions visible during dispensing.
• Clinic does not auto-create delivery trips today — your local process links clinical orders to pharmacy fulfilment.

Inventory & Stock

• Stock is deducted when the dispense is saved (FEFO — earliest expiry first).
• Returned failed deliveries may need a stock return process per your policy.

Accounting

• Payment can be taken at dispense or on delivery, depending on setup.
• Delivery operations are tracked in Logistics; revenue sits in Pharmacy/Accounting.

HR & Performance

• Driver delivery metrics feed into performance scorecards.
• Useful for incentives, reviews, and identifying training needs.

Daily Routines and Best Practices

Pharmacy (start of day)

1. Review orders marked for delivery today.
2. Process and verify refills due for delivery.
3. Hand verified, packaged orders to dispatch with clear instructions.

Dispatch (start of day)

1. Open the Logistics Command Center.
2. Group today's delivery orders into trips by area and urgency.
3. Assign drivers; prioritise Urgent and Fridge stops.
4. Confirm patient phone numbers for drivers.

During the day

• Monitor active trips; call patients ahead of refrigerated deliveries if needed.
• Handle failed stops quickly — reschedule same day where possible.
• Keep pharmacy informed of returns.

End of day

1. Confirm all trips are completed or cancelled.
2. Reconcile failed deliveries with pharmacy (stock returned, patient contacted).
3. Review on-time rate and failed-stop reasons for tomorrow's planning.

What good looks like

A well-run pharmacy delivery operation:

• Verifies every order in Pharmacy before it leaves the building
• Groups stops into sensible geographic trips
• Tags special-handling orders clearly
• Requires proof on every successful handover
• Monitors live trips instead of waiting for complaints
• Closes the loop with Pharmacy when delivery succeeds or fails

Troubleshooting Common Situations

Related Documentation

• Pharmacy — dispensing, refills, patient register, queue workflow
• Logistics — trips, drivers, vehicles, Command Center
• Healthcare (Clinic) — shared patient records and clinical context
• Inventory & Stock — product catalogue, locations, batches
• Accounting & Sales — payment methods, sales register, reconciliation