1. Meeting Doctors in their clinic, hospitals.
Medical Representative has to visit the doctors at their clinic on a specified day and time and discuss their brand, molecule, and salient features with the doctor. Considering the number of Medical Representatives meeting a single doctor every day and the possible disturbance it may cause to their patients, doctors have specified certain days of the week and timings when the patient flow is minimum, so that, they can devote time to meet the Medical Representatives.
2. Discussing the latest updated information about medicines, its dosage, etc with Doctors.
Medical Representatives, need to study the latest information they receive from Head Office either from the Product Management Team (PMT) or Medical Affairs Department. Generally, PMT from Reputed Pharma Corporate provides a detailing talk with each & every Scientific or Promotional input that needs to be discussed or given away to the doctor. Medical Representative needs to remember it by heart and discuss it while in call with the doctor. Giving a brief outline about the Scientific Update arouses interest in the doctor’s mind for reading the information thereby it helps the doctor to get convinced about the molecule or brand and thereby make up his / her mind to prescribe the brand in the next suitable patient for the disease/indication.
3. Ensure availability of the Medicines stocks at Stockists / Chemists for honoring prescription of Doctors.
Doctor’s each & every prescription needs to be honored in the Chemist store which means, the brand must be sold on the doctor’s prescription. In absence of the brand stock at any particular chemist store, where the doctor’s prescription is presented by the patient, the chemist may have to either substitute the brand with some other company’s brand with a similar molecule. This results in the loss of sales for the brand. In case, if the doctor, is known to be averse to the direct brand substitution by the chemist, the chemist may call up the doctor and ask him to change the brand as the stock is not available. The latter one is more harmful, as now, the doctor, may change the prescription considering the brand is out of stock. To avoid such situations, Medical Representative, need to ensure the availability of the Medicine Stocks at the Stockists & Chemists all the time for honoring doctor’s prescriptions.
4. Ensure payment collection from Stockists for the stocks sold by them to chemists as per payment norms set by the Pharma Corporate.
Most organizations are now, changing to the norm, internally, the sales are done when the payment from stockists is collected. Many times, chemist sells the brand, stocks are nil, but they tend to delay in giving the payment to the stockist. The stockist, too, in such cases, tends to delay the Payment to the Corporate Pharma or to the C&F agent, who collects the payment from the stockist on behalf of the Corporate Pharma. Medical representative should ensure the payment collection cycle.