Software Remedies for Alliance Pharmacy

Alliance Pharmacy is part of the retail division of Alliance Boots (the largest healthcare retailer in the UK). It currently dispenses around 70 million prescriptions a year and employs approximately 10,000 employees. With such a prominent presence on the high street, labour is the most significant cost within its operational budget. However, the tools available to plan labour were limited to the annual budgeting process based on average sales figures. Alliance Pharmacy needed a system to ensure it is effectively utilising labour across its many stores.

Retail Answers and Alliance Pharmacy designed and developed the very sophisticated algorithms needed to calculate labour requirements. For the first time this allows Central Operations Staff and Area Development Managers to track productivity, service level and cost effectiveness KPIs at a company, regional, area and branch level at the click of a button. Significant attention was also given to the user interface throughout the system’s design as presenting the labour demand in a way that was quick and easy to interpret was crucial.

The Labour Scheduling System predicts the demands of the business and its customers, ensuring that team members within branches are contracted to work at times that best meet the peaks and troughs of business activity. This is now empowering Area Development Managers to make evidence based decisions concerning labour allocation.

Mandy Whittall, Central Operations General Manager at Alliance Pharmacy commented: “Retail Answers gained a good understanding of our business processes and specified our requirements quickly and efficiently. Their professional and flexible approach has provided us with a high-quality bespoke application, delivered for half the cost of the packages we initially reviewed”

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