contact lens discussion thread (merged)

A question about : contact lens discussion thread (merged)

Posted a question but it seemed to get lost during the forum upgrade.

Anyway, have been with D&A on monthly lenses for half an year, I am thinking of going to internet vendors. However, D&A bluntly refused to provide me with a signed contact lense prescription, which is apparently required to order from internet, saying that by law they are only obliged to provide a normal glass prescription. This seems to contradict with the advice in Martin's article. Anybody knows of any reference to the relevant law, or regulatory body that I could find out the truth?

Thank you.

Best answers:

• Don't know what the law is, but I have my eyes checked at D&A and they tried to put me on their monthly scheme.
  I buy my lenses and solutions from postoptics.com and all they require name & address of optician and the date of your last check. As long as your last check was less than 12 months ago then they can dispense lenses to you.
  I can't remember if I asked D&A for my contact lens prescription. I didn't need to as all the information is on the lens packets that they supply to you.
  D&A weren't too happy with me cancelling my direct debit in first month, but as I told them if they only charge Ј10 a month (rather than Ј25) I wouldn't have cancelled.
  So if you know your lens details and date of last check is in last 12 months then there shouldn't be anything to stop you ordering on line.
• I am afraid that I don't know if there is any law or regulator body that you can contact but speaking from my own experience. When I tried to order some lenses online without contact lense description I just gave them the lense details and requested the seller to contact my optician direct to verify the detail which they did and I had my lenses delivered within a week. I suppose you can do the same if D&A won't release your description detail to you.
• If you check your direct debit agreement with D and A it should have your prescription on there.
  They would not give me my prescription, so I joined the scheme and will be cancelling before they take the first payment.
  They claimed to me that they could not give the prescription to me until they had checked me and knew that I was getting on ok, so after 6 months of your being in the scheme they should be sure that you are ok with the lenses. It is your right to have your prescription and, as I said, it should be in the direct debit form you signed. If not, as the poster above said, it will be on the end of the contact lense box.
  On a related note, all these people who purchase on the 'net, what do you do about your aftercare? Which opticians will perform lense checks without your purchasing their lenses?
• Surely your right to see your prescription comes under the Data Protection law or patient information access in that you are entitled by law to see information held about you eg doctors notes etc unless there is a good reason under the law to withold the info and I don't think here there is.
• they do have to give you your prescription in writing and usually do this on the day of your eye exam
  after that under data protection they have to give you the "details" of your prescription but this could be verbally.
  as mentioned above - most internet companies will just contact the optician to confirm that the prescription you have ordered is correct.
  i have never had any problems with this method and have never found any that expect you to send a signed prescription.
  i have been wearing contact lenses for 15 year and its amazing how much they cost!
  we need them to be able to see!!!
  postoptics used to be cheap, but am not so impressed anymore.
  the cheapest one i have found is in USA, but even after shipping its much cheaper than the UK ones.
  i was paying Ј20 a month to D&A, i paid Ј37 for 6 pair from the USA including shipping!
  try www.discountcontactlenses.com
  they do everything for you with regards to contacting the optician etc, you just have to tell them where you had your eye test etc
• Many thanks for all the helpful hints.
  i) D&A initially said that they could gave me the prescription after a check in 6 months time. But now (after the check) they changed and said they would not give me a signed contact lense prescription. They said that they could write me a note with my contact lenses details but that apparently would not enable me to order from online suppilers.
  ii) The online supplier (Postoptics) contacted D&A for my prescription details but was refused citing data protection.
  iii) I offered Postoptics with the DirectDebit form or the pack sheet which has my contact lense details but they said it is not sufficient as a prescription.
  So much hassle made me wonder whether it's worthwhile to change. But I don't like D&A's attitute so try to find some concrete base to argue with them.
• i think they must be losing a lot of money to internet suppliers, especially as it costs them to do the initial contact lens "fitting" etc
  they do this for free on their monthly lenses scheme - so its not really fair for us to just get our prescription and cancel our order
  however, they should think about ways around this
  e.g. making us sign a contract to stay with them for a minimum period if we take the free fitting service
  its not fair for them to be awkward!
  did the original prescription you got when you had your test have a signature on it?
  i cant remember any of mine being signed... but then again i have never checked
  dont give up - why should you pay 4 times more for the same lenses...
  even if u have to pay for another test - it will still be worth it
• I would suggest that people look round their local opticians and see if any of them have cheap lens schemes - I've found one locally (in Newcastle upon Tyne) that does monthly lenses for Ј11.95, which by the time you factor in the cost of the solutions on top of the lenses and paying for your eye tests makes it pretty much as cheap as the internet suppliers and much less hassle. They also offer you a free pair of glasses to the value of Ј75 - I've not taken them up on it yet as I want to contribute to the cost of high index lenses but still, it's a marvellous scheme. If anyone's in Ncl, it's !!!! opticians, near the library behind Northumberland Street
• Can anyone please help wih contact lenses?
  At present I have perfect distant vision but use off the shelf reading glasses. Last week I had my first eye test (I'm 58). Tomorrow I am having a fitting for contact lenses, I am told I have a choice of varifocal or standard soft lenses with one lens for distance and one for close up. With varifocal at nearly treble the price are they worth paying the difference? And, is it possible to wear just one standard close up lens in one eye and nothing in the other as my distant sight is okay? I think that if I ask the optician he may suggest the dearest (more Profit).
• Hi
  I'm going to move this over to the Health board for you
  regards , Sheel
• I have a friend who only wears one lens - she doesnt have any problems.
  I wear one lens for distance and one for reading and it only took me a few days for my brain to realise what was going on. However I am very short sighted and now need reading glasses as well so this was the best option for me.
  It is harder getting used to using varifocal lenses so I think you are probably better off with a standard lens in one eye and one for close up in the other. I think lenses are only sold in pairs, dont know if opticial will just let you order the close up lens but it is worth asking.
• I am short-sighted in one eye with O.K- longish sight in the other, and the optician wanted me to wear a different lens in each eye. Unfortunately this had the effect of making the short-sighted eye long-sighted and the other one short-sighted (i.e. just swapped the problem around!!) I find that the solution for me is to wear the lens correcting the short-sighted eye when I'm driving, at the cinema etc, and not at all if I have lots of reading to do.
• Hi there
  If your optician tells you to wear your contact(s) for a maximum number of hours per day and max no of days per week...follow that advice!!! I got contacts a few years ago and loved them so much I wore them for lots longer than the recommendation. Stupid me! What happens is that with some types of contacts your eyes have to work a lot harder to get their oxygen supply - taking your lenses out when you're awake gives them a chance to rest and replenish. Leaving your lenses in too long day in and day out can cause damage to your eye - it doesn't hurt but it could mean bye bye to your lenses forever!
  I know contacts have advanced a lot and some modern ones can even be worn while you sleep, but do follow your optician's advice. Things can go wrong if you don't and there possibly won't be any pain to tell you. My intention is not to put you off contacts, but just to share with you my mistake and the consequences in the hope that you don't do the same.
  I am now a permanent speccy four eyes as I am too scared to put contacts into my eyes now.
• Thank you for your most helpful replies, it sounds as if one standard lens for close up may suit me. I now feel more confident for tomorrows visit to the optician and a little wiser.
• I've been reading this thread with interest. My partner Debs wears contacts. She has been using the same village optician for years. I didn't realise till recently that you can order on the net. I looked into it and realised that we can save quite a bit of money. She currently orders three months of dailies at a time. This costs Ј90 each time. I've found exactly the same lenses online for Ј64.50. This is nearly Ј10 a month cheaper.
  She phoned the opticians to make sure that they don't order the next three months worth, and told them she was going to order on the net. The opticians phoned up a while later and told her that the price of her six monthly checkup was going up from Ј27 to Ј47. She has always been told that for contacts she needs a checkup every six months and has been doing this for years. It's only now that we've found out that she only needs a check every 12 months. Her prescription doesn't change that often, so it doesn't seem like she has a special need for six monthly checkups.
  I can understand the shop not wanting to lose a regular customer, but, not only does it seem that they have been scamming her for years by doing two checkups a year. The price rise seems completely ridiculous and plain bad blood on their part. They have now lost all of our custom.
  Can they refuse her a copy of her prescription? I'm just starting the process of ordering on the net and although we know the type and strength of the lens, we don't have anything in writing. Her last checkup was two months ago and there was no change from the checkup before. I'm worried they may try to cause problems if a new supplier contacted them for her details.
• If an optician refuses to supply a written contact lens prescription report them to the General Optical Council. Taken from the GOC website: https://www.optical.org
  The contact lens (specification) rules 1989
  The General Optical Council, in exercise of their powers under section 31(1)(e) of the Opticians Act 1958, hereby make the following rules:-
  Citation and commencement
  1. These rules may be cited as the Contact Lens (Specification) Rules 1989 and shall come into force on the 1st day of June 1989.
  Duty to provide specification
  2. An optician who fits a person with a contact lens shall on completing the fitting give to him a written statement of the particulars necessary to enable the lens to be replicated.
  Jurisdiction
  The Council deals with concerns about registrants who have:
  · been convicted of a criminal offence;
  · been guilty of serious professional misconduct;
  · breached a rule regarding professional activities by, for example
  ◦ producing inappropriate publicity,
  ◦ not supplying a contact lens specification,
  ◦ failing to refer to a general medical practitioner when appropriate to do so.
• I used to buy my lenses online from Holland which was cheaper but when I got an eye infection and needed to see an optician ,because I wasn't registered with anyone,every optician I went to wanted to charge me a horrendous amount-over Ј100.I therefore thought I wouldn't take the risk again so I am now with specsavers.
• Thanks for the info panther. Very informative. In fact, it looks like the opticians may be in breach of their own code. The GOC deal with cases of inappropriate publicity.
  Last week Debs received a letter from the opticians reminding her about her six monthly checkup. In the letter they state, and I quote "Current research has shown that soft lens wearers require an examination every six months, and this is recommended by the British College of Optometrists"
  Just to double check on this I contacted Dr Susan Blakeney who is the Optometric Advisor at the College of Optometrists. She wrote back to confirm that their advice is that contact lens checkups should be conducted at least every twelve months.
  This looks like the optician is trying to drum up extra business by giving out false information. If they are doing it here, I'm presuming they are doing this to all their customers. I've downloaded the complaint form from the GOC and we are going to complain about this. At Ј47 a test, they must be scamming a fortune off people.
  On the other hand.....................
  On Thursday we ordered three months worth of lenses from www.postoptics.co.uk This was our first order, and we weren't sure how long it would take for the lenses to arrive. Saturday morning and the lenses were at our door. Fantastic service!!! And a lot cheaper than we've been paying for years.