Caremark keeps medication costs low by not sending you any

It's a good thing that Holden has three national pharmacy chains. I still have a choice after I stop doing business with CVS.
In mid-December, my doctor and I agreed that I could make a change to one of my medications, reducing the daily dosage by 25%. Because of the way that the med is packaged, I needed a new prescription.
Believing that I could save some money by receiving the medication by mail, I asked my doctor for a prescription for a three-month supply. He wrote the prescription. I went home and mailed the new prescription with the mail-order form to Caremark, the mail-order and online service of CVS.
I mailed the prescription on December 16. Caremark received the order on December 17 and duly created an online order.
On December 25, I received an email from Caremark.


There was no indication that I needed to do anything other than wait. I still had some of the medication at the old dosage and, what with the end of the year hooptedoodle, I didn't around to checking on the order status until last week.

After wiping the coffee off my keyboard and screen, I clicked the View link to learn about the details.

Fully confused, I called their customer service number.

Amid my sputtering, I managed to articulate my extreme concern that my order for an important med had been in a queue for than two weeks and that it was now canceled. The customer service representative, probably a good person just trying to doing an impossible job, explained that a change in dosage was the same as a new medication and that, therefore, I would need Prior Authorization to obtain the medicine. 

Prior Authorization, for those of you who are healthy or who take can take generic medications for generic conditions, is an exquisite little inconvenience wherein:

1. The doctor determines that a patient needs a medication.
2. The doctor writes the prescription and gives the slip to the patient.
3. The patient tries to have the prescription filled.
4. The pharmacy learns from the insurance company that the prescription isn't good enough. The doctor must tell the insurance company that the patients really needs this medication.
5. After the doctor tells the insurance company what it wants to hear, the insurance company authorizes the pharmacy to fill the prescription.

This extra step can take anywhere from 15 minutes to 15 days.

Caremark had not been able to reach my doctor and therefore canceled my prescription.

I realized that part of my quarrel is with my insurance company and I was able to take care of that with a quick call. 

My complaint with Caremark, and the one that will keep me from using their service or CVS, is that, aside from their note on Christmas Day, they failed to let me know that there was an issue, let alone a serious one. They had my email address. They had my phone number. 

When I've run into similar situations with other pharmacies, Rite-Aid, notably, they've given me a supply of the medication while the insurance business gets worked out. Instead, Caremark wrote me a letter. It was dated December 28 and arrived on January 6, about six hours after I called them about the cancellation. 

In the letter, they noted that the business of prior authorization. They also suggested, ominously, that, even if we got through the prior authorization brier patch, we might not be done.

Once we get the information that we need from your doctor, the prescription will be reviewed. If it is approved, we will send you the prescription.

Thanks, but I think I'll get my medications from someone who wants to care.