Service to Their Customers
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What changes do you recommend to CVSs existing pharmacy fulfillment process? What information technology (IT) changes, if any, are required to implement those changes?
As a company primarily focused on providing a valued service to their customers, CVS needs to reevaluate the current fulfillment process in order to maximize their damaged customer satisfaction rate. Given that the main problems reside within the Data Entry and Pick-Up stages of the fulfillment process, the obvious choice could be to revise these two processes and implement changes accordingly (Schroeder, Meyer Goldstein, & Rungtusanatham, 2011, pg. 457). But one critical thing we must consider while providing recommendations is that within any business process, the repercussions of earlier stages are only felt on the latter stages. As such, the Drop-off stage is where CVS must concentrate their attention. When a customer drops off a prescription, he or she is asked for pick-up time of their choice (Schroeder, Meyer Goldstein, & Rungtusanatham, 2011, pg. 455). Since most customers prefer to pick-up their prescriptions after work, the company is overflowing their pick-up window service capacity during peak hours which translates into longer wait times (Schroeder, Meyer Goldstein, & Rungtusanatham, 2011, pg. 458). Additionally, the current process does not require the drop-off stage to gather and check important information that can prevent potential problems during the Data Entry stage. It is only after the customer is gone that the refill, drug utilization and insurance information is verified (Schroeder, Meyer Goldstein, & Rungtusanatham, 2011, pg. 456). At this point, any discrepancy affecting any of these three areas will cause major delays in the fulfillment process. Considering all these factors, CVS will need to implement a first come first serve (FCFS) model of operation to decrease the peak hours wait times (Schroeder, Meyer Goldstein, & Rungtusanatham, 2011, pg. 322). The company must define how many orders they can successfully process each hour and use this data to schedule their pick-ups based on the drop-off times. Additionally, CVS needs to revamped the drop-off process and integrate new information management systems that allows them to identify and solve prescription discrepancies in real time while the customer still present. This will completely prevent unpleasant customer surprises during the pick-up process.
How can you be sure that the new process you propose will be an improvement over the existing one? How can you be sure that it wont make things worse?
While no process is 100% guaranteed I feel confident that the proposed changes can provide an adequate setting for a smoother and faster fulfillment process. Given the PSI team findings during their site visits, it is clear that what is causing discontent among the customers is the extended wait time during the pick-up peak hours and when their orders are