NCPA Joins Class Action Suit Against GoodRx, Industry-Leading PBMs
Along with discount drug card company GoodRx, the suit is aimed at CVS Caremark, Express Scripts, MedImpact Healthcare Systems, and Navitus Health Solutions.
In their attempt to condemn price-fixing schemes directed at independent pharmacies, the National Community Pharmacists Association (NCPA) joined Community Care Rx in a class action lawsuit against GoodRx and major pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs), according to an NCPA news release.1
“Adding insult to injury, GoodRx charges pharmacies an additional fee for each transaction that it processes for the PBMs,” saidNCPA CEO B. Douglas Hoey. “Then it splits the fee between the PBM with the lowest pharmacy reimbursement and the PBM handling the drug benefit for the patient. Often, after the lowball price and fees have been forced on the pharmacy, there’s no margin left or, outrageously, the pharmacy may actually be paying GoodRx for the ‘privilege’ of being paid below its cost to acquire the drug.”
The suit serves as yet another action from the NCPA and independent pharmacy advocates in attempting to hold PBMs accountable. | image credit: Leszek Kobusinski / stock.adobe.com
According to the Community Care Rx—an independent pharmacy in Michigan—and NCPA suit, discount drug card company GoodRx has been working with major PBMs to claw back from independent pharmacies and profit for themselves. The suit serves as yet another action from the NCPA and independent pharmacy advocates in attempting to hold PBMs, or pharmaceutical middlemen, accountable for their predatory practices.
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The GoodRx business model, as stated on its website,2 is to find patients the lowest price for prescriptions at a nearby pharmacy, ultimately designed to save patients money and keep medications accessible. However, according to the recent lawsuit, GoodRx knowingly steered patients toward major PBM-affiliated pharmacies mentioned in the suit, including CVS Caremark, Express Scripts, MedImpact Healthcare Systems, and Navitus Health Solutions. The lawsuit states that the scheme was designed for GoodRx to send patients to big-chain pharmacies, keeping them away from independent community locations and further forcing profits away from smaller pharmacies.
“GoodRx’s business model already potentially misleads consumers by preferentially listing some large chain pharmacies in their search results despite the higher-ranked pharmacies having higher prices, excluding nearly all independent pharmacies from appearing in the results,” continued Hoey.1
Between organizations banding together to file lawsuits and the slew of legislative vehicles for encouraging PBM industry reform, the push to hold PBMs accountable for their actions and give power back to independent pharmacies has heated up significantly in the past year. It’s not just independent pharmacies and advocacy groups getting involved as the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is also investigating PBM practices and the largest entities’ overall market control, issuing 2 interim staff reports since the summer of 2024.
Furthermore, this isn’t even the first time these 5 exact corporations have been sued for the same reason. On November 4, 2024, Old Baltimore Pike Apothecary and Smith’s Pharmacy II sued Good Rx, CVS Caremark, Express Scripts, MedImpact Healthcare Systems, and Navitus Health Solutions for manipulating prescription drug prices.3
“Independent pharmacies are the backbone of our communities, providing essential health care services to millions of Americans,” said Partner and Chair of DiCello Levitt’s Antitrust and Competition Litigation Practice Group Greg Asciolla, according to a news release.4 “GoodRx and these PBMs—4 of the largest in the United States—have not only hurt small businesses but also the patients who rely on them for their medications. We aim to hold them accountable for the considerable harm caused by their sophisticated price-fixing scheme.”
Whether they’re referred to as price-fixing, patient-steering, or some other notable PBM tactic, the practices of these once misunderstood middlemen are coming to light day after day. It’s now the hopes of independent pharmacists and advocacy groups that change is enacted on the federal level.
“The actions alleged in this class action suit further disadvantage small businesses and cater to PBMs,” concluded Hoey.1 “We are suing to stop this!”
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