How much is an NHS prescription?
Short answer
£9.90 per item in England, charged for each medicine on the prescription rather than once per form. A three-month prepayment certificate costs £32.05 and a twelve-month one £114.50, capping the cost however many items you need. Prescriptions are free in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
The charge is per item, which is what surprises people: a prescription listing three medicines costs £29.70, not £9.90. The charge applies at the point of dispensing, so a hospital outpatient prescription on an FP10 is chargeable while medicines given during an inpatient stay or an outpatient appointment are free.
Capping the cost with a PPC
A Prescription Prepayment Certificate covers unlimited items for a fixed period:
- 3-month PPC — £32.05. Worth it from four items per quarter.
- 12-month PPC — £114.50. Worth it from twelve items a year, and payable by direct debit instalments.
Buy one online through the NHSBSA, by phone on 0300 330 1341, or at some pharmacies. A certificate can be backdated to the date of your most recent paid prescription, so it is worth checking rather than writing off recent payments. A PPC covers prescriptions only — dental and optical charges are separate.
Exemptions, refunds and penalties
You pay nothing if you are under 16, aged 16 to 18 in full-time education, 60 or over, pregnant or within 12 months of giving birth (with an FW8 maternity exemption certificate), diagnosed with a qualifying condition such as diabetes, epilepsy or cancer (with a medical exemption certificate), an NHS inpatient, receiving Universal Credit, Income Support, income-based JSA, income-related ESA or Pension Credit, or holding an HC2 certificate from the NHS Low Income Scheme.
If you do not qualify automatically but are on a low income, apply on form HC1. An HC2 gives full help with prescriptions, dental treatment, sight tests and glasses; an HC3 gives partial help. People on Universal Credit whose earnings are too high for the automatic exemption often still qualify this way.
Paid when you were actually exempt? Ask the pharmacy for an FP57 receipt at the time of payment and claim within three months — after that no refund is possible. Conversely, ticking the exemption box wrongly triggers a Penalty Charge Notice of £100 plus the prescription charge. You have 28 days to pay or appeal in writing to the NHSBSA, and genuine first-time errors — an exemption certificate applied for but not yet received, for example — are usually resolved on appeal.
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