NHS Prescription Prepayment Certificate Break-even
Compare paying per prescription item against a 3-month or 12-month NHS prepayment certificate, and see how many items make each one worth buying.
Fill in your details and press Calculate.
How this is calculated
In England each dispensed prescription item costs a flat £9.90, however cheap the medicine is. A prepayment certificate replaces those charges with a fixed price: £32.05 for 3 months, £114.50 for 12 months, or £19.80 for the HRT-only certificate. Prescriptions are free in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, so this comparison applies to England only.
The calculator converts whatever you enter into a monthly item rate, projects it over a full year, and compares three ways of paying for that year: item by item, four consecutive 3-month certificates, or one 12-month certificate. The cheapest of the three is reported along with the saving against paying per item.
The break-even point is the smallest whole number of items at which a certificate is strictly cheaper than paying per item. Dividing the certificate price by the item charge and taking the next whole item up gives 4 items in 3 months for the quarterly certificate and 12 items a year for the annual one — at the item count immediately below each figure the two cost the same, which is no saving at all. The HRT certificate breaks even at just 3 items a year.
What this does not model: it assumes a steady rate of prescribing, so a burst of items in one quarter may make a 3-month certificate better than an even spread suggests. It ignores the 12-month certificate's ten-instalment direct debit option, which spreads the cost but must run to completion. Most importantly, it does not check whether you are exempt — if you have a medical exemption certificate, a maternity exemption, an HC2 certificate, or receive certain benefits, your prescriptions are already free and a PPC would be wasted money.