Drug Tariff Part VIII

Detailed information on Part VIII of the Drug Tariff.

Category A

Update on Category A Price Setting

From July 2025, all Category A reimbursement prices will be calculated using data obtained under the Health Service Products (Provision and Disclosure of Information) Regulations 2018. Therefore, the Category A price setting approach sheet will no longer be published following the end of the transition arrangements.

Category M prices

Changes to Category M reimbursement prices in Part VIIIA of the Drug Tariff

Changes to Category M reimbursement prices in July 2025 reflect:

Adjustments for underlying market price movements during the quarter January– March 2025;
The latest results of the Medicine Margin Survey up to the quarter October-December 2024.

The latest results from the quarterly Medicines Margin Survey indicate a total cumulative over delivery of £85.7m at the end of the October-December 2024 quarter. As per the Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework settlement 2024/25 and 2025/26, any over-delivery of medicine margin will be recouped over the following 12 months.

In light of the latest medicine margin survey results, the medicine margin adjustment applied to Category M reimbursement prices in July 2025 is a reduction of £13 million per quarter.

Note: the adjustment resulting from a quarterly Medicine Margin Survey result is not applied all in one go in the following quarter but smoothed over the following 4 quarters. Further, the adjustment includes an element to adjust the baseline with the aim of delivering the required amount of medicine margin going forward and an element to recoup any over delivery (or make up when there has been an under delivery). An implication of this smoothing process is that the actual margin adjustment made in a given quarter is complex; it is the net sum of 4 different quarterly adjustments (each comprising the 2 elements noted above), with new quarterly adjustments being added in and old quarterly adjustments that have run for 4 quarters dropping out.

The medicine margin adjustment for any one quarter cannot be derived by taking the cumulative over-delivery and dividing it by 4

Category M Prices - Quarter 2 July 2025 (Excel:46KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 2 July 2025 (CSV:37KB)

Previous copies of Category M prices

Category M for April 2025 contains:

Adjustments for underlying market prices (between October – December 2024).
Takes account that £193 million of the cumulative medicine margin over delivery (up until end of September 2024) has been written off as per the community pharmacy contractual framework funding for 25/26.

In light of the latter above, the medicine margin will be adjusted upwards by £12.3 million per quarter through Category M reimbursement prices.

Category M Prices - Quarter 1 April 2025 (Excel:46KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 1 April 2025 (CSV:38KB)

Category M for January 2025 contains adjustments for underlying market prices (between July – Sep 2024) and the latest results of the Medicine Margin Survey (up until end of June 2024). Medicine margin will be adjusted downwards by £17.9 million per quarter through Category M reimbursement prices based on the results of the survey.

Category M Prices - Quarter 4 January 2025 (Excel:47KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 4 January 2025 (CSV:38KB)

Category M for October 2024 contains:

Adjustments for underlying market prices (between April – June 2024).
Adjustment as indicated by the latest results of the Medicine Margin Survey (up until end of March 2024).
Adjustment to correct the error made in July’s Category M reimbursement prices.

The combination of the last two is a downward adjustment of £9 million per quarter through Category M reimbursement prices.

Category M Prices - Quarter 3 October 2024 (Excel:47KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 3 October 2024 (CSV:38KB)

Updated due to the addition of the following products into Category M for September.

Rivaroxaban 15mg tablets
Rivaroxaban 20mg tablets

Category M Prices - September 2024 (Excel:45KB)Category M Prices - September 2024 (CSV:39KB)

Due to an analytical processing error, July’s category M Drug Tariff prices were higher than they should have been. Category M tariff prices for August and September have been adjusted back to what they should have been for August and September.

Category M Prices - August 2024 (Excel:47KB)Category M Prices - August 2024 (CSV:38KB)The Department of Health and Social Care has announced the Category M prices which will apply to prescriptions from 1 July 2024.

Category M Prices - Quarter 2 July 2024 (Excel:47KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 2 July 2024 (CSV:38KB)From 1 April 2024, Category M reimbursement prices contains adjustments for underlying market prices (between July -September 2023). No adjustment has been made from the results of the medicine margin survey (April to June 2023), however, concessionary prices during April, May and June will be constrained to take account that the medicine margin survey results indicated that a downward adjustment of £16.2 million should have been made. It is important to emphasise that requests should continue to come in and will be dealt with as usual, except for the downward adjustment applied meaning lower price will be granted and/or may result in an increase in the number of no concessionary prices.

Category M Prices - Quarter 1 April 2024 (Excel:53KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 1 April 2024 (CSV:39KB)The Department of Health and Social Care has announced the Category M prices which will apply to prescriptions from 1 January 2024.

Category M Prices - Quarter 4 January 2024 (Excel:48KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 4 January 2024 (CSV:40KB)

Category M for October 2023 contains adjustments for underlying market prices (between April – June 2023) and the result of the margin survey (latest result up until end of March 2023). As well as the adjustments for market prices, medicine margin will be adjusted downwards by £21 million per quarter through Category M reimbursement prices.

Category M Prices - Quarter 3 October 2023 (Excel:52KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 3 October 2023 (CSV:41KB)

Category M adjustments for July 2023 reflect:

an adjustment of -£23.8m, in light of the results of the margin survey (latest result up until end of December 2022), and the phasing down of the additional £100m agreed across years 4 and 5 as part of the Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework.
uplifts for underlying market prices (between January – March 2023).

Category M Prices - Quarter 2 July 2023 (Excel:48KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 2 July 2023 (CSV:40KB)

Category M for April 2023 contains adjustments for underlying market prices (between October-December 2022) and the result of the margin survey (latest result up until end of September 2022). It also contains an element, with the aim of delivering the additional £100 million agreed across years 4 and 5 as part of the Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework.

Category M Prices - Quarter 1 April 2023 (Excel:53KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 1 April 2023 (CSV:39KB)Category M for January contains adjustments for underlying market prices and the result of the margin survey, with the aim of delivering the remainder of the £50 million of the additional £100 million agreed across years 4 and 5 as part of the Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework.

Category M Prices - Quarter 4 January 2023 (Excel: 46KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 4 January 2023 (CSV: 38KB)

As part of the delivery of non-recurrent additional investment into funding of the Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework of £100 million over the 2 financial years 2022 to 2023 and 2023 to 2024 to be delivered by medicine margin, Category M December reimbursement prices have received an upward adjustment.

Category M Prices - December 2022 (Excel: 53KB)Category M Prices - December 2022 (CSV: 41KB)

The Department of Health and Social Care is announcing that from 1 October 2022, medicine margin will be adjusted upwards by £6.7 million per quarter (circa 2.23 million per month) through Category M reimbursement prices.

Category M Prices - Quarter 3 October 2022 (Excel: 54KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 3 October 2022 (CSV: 41KB)

The Department of Health and Social Care has announced the Cat M prices which will apply to prescriptions from 1 July 2022.

Category M Prices - Quarter 2 July 2022 (Excel: 54KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 2 July 2022 (CSV: 41KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 1 April 2022 (Excel: 45KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 1 April 2022 (CSV: 41KB)

The Department of Health and Social Care is announcing that from 1 January 2022, medicine margin will be adjusted downwards by £49.3 million per quarter (circa £16.4 million per month) through Category M reimbursement prices.

Category M Prices - Quarter 4 January 2022 (Excel: 47KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 4 January 2022 (CSV: 41KB)

The Department of Health and Social Care is announcing that from 1 October 2021, medicine margin will be adjusted downwards by £26.8 million per quarter (circa £8.9 million per month) through Category M reimbursement prices.

Category M Prices - Quarter 3 October 2021 (Excel:55KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 3 October 2021 (CSV:40KB)

The Department of Health and Social Care is announcing that from 1 July 2021, medicine margin will be adjusted downwards by £48.9 million per quarter (circa £16.3 million per month) through Category M reimbursement prices.

Category M Prices - Quarter 2 July 2021 (Excel:46KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 2 July 2021 (CSV:40KB)

The Department of Health and Social Care is announcing that from 1 April 2021, medicine margin will be adjusted upwards by £10.4 million per quarter (circa £3.47 million per month) through Category M reimbursement prices.

Category M Prices - Quarter 1 April 2021 (updated) (Excel:48KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 1 April 2021 (updated) (CSV:40KB)

The Department of Health and Social Care is announcing that from 1 January 2021, medicine margin will be adjusted upwards by £27.2 million per quarter (£9.07 million per month) through Category M reimbursement prices.

Category M Prices - Quarter 4 January 2021 (Excel:40KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 4 January 2021 (CSV:40KB)

The Department of Health and Social Care is announcing that from 1 October 2020, medicine margin will be adjusted downwards by £23.3 million per quarter (£7.77 million per month) through Category M reimbursement prices.

Category M Prices - Quarter 3 October 2020 (Excel:41KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 2 July 2020 (Excel:41KB)

Category M reimbursement prices are being increased by £15 million per month from 1 June 2020. This is outside of the usual 3 monthly cycle for Category M reimbursement price updates.Category M Prices - June 2020 (Excel:40KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 1 April 2020 (updated) (Excel: 40KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 4 January 2020 (Excel: 40KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 3 October 2019 (Excel: 40KB)

Category M reimbursement prices are being amended from 1 August 2019.

This is outside of the usual 3 monthly cycle, where Category M reimbursement prices are updated because the Department of Health and Social Care, with the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee’s agreement, is increasing Category M reimbursement prices by £15 million per month.

This is informed by medicine margin survey and will be kept under review.

Category M Prices - August 2019 (Excel: 39KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 2 July 2019 (Excel: 40KB)Category M Prices - Quarter 1 April 2019 (Excel: 39KB)