Apply for permission to ship pharmacy-only medicines

If you want to send pharmacy-only medicines as a pharmacy, you need a permit to do so. You can find out more here.

The mail order of pharmacy-only medicines is subject to authorization. For each public pharmacy through which you, as the pharmacy owner, wish to send pharmacy-only medicines, you need your own mail-order permit.

In order to obtain the permit, your mail-order pharmacy must meet certain quality requirements.

For example:

• Your mail-order business is carried out from a public pharmacy in addition to the usual pharmacy operations
• a quality assurance system is in place, which means, among other things
  • the medicine is packaged, transported and delivered in such a way that quality and efficacy are maintained
  • delivery is made to the person named in the order; this may be a named person or a named group of persons
  • the advice provided by the pharmaceutical staff is given in German
• You generally send the available medicine within 2 working days of receiving the order
• You use a shipment tracking system
• the second delivery is free of charge
• You have taken out transport insurance for the shipment

The Hessian State Office for Health and Care (HLfGP) is responsible.

Please contact the Hessian State Office for Health and Care (HLfGP).

• Proof of the operating license for the pharmacy
• Assurance from the applicant that they meet the requirements for quality management and the mail-order process and that they will provide mail-order services in addition to the usual pharmacy operations

If you wish to use premises outside the approved pharmacy premises for the mail-order business, you must provide the following information and proof of the additional premises:

• Size
• Nature
• Furnishings
• Function
• Floor plans to scale
• rental agreement

• Dispatches may only be made from a public pharmacy in addition to the usual pharmacy operations.
• Your public pharmacy has an operating license.
• A quality assurance system for the dispatch process is in place.
• If the medicinal products are distributed via e-commerce, i.e. via the Internet, appropriate facilities and equipment must be available.

Note: All pharmaceutical distributors who operate a webshop must be entered in a central register at the Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices - BfArM.

Mail-order sales of pharmacy-only medicines may only commence after a license has been granted.

Administrative fine 175,00 EUR

If the competent authority grants the mail-order authorization, it forwards this information to the Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices (BfArM). The BfArM publishes information on authorized mail-order pharmacies in a national register. As a mail-order pharmacy, you are obliged to display the specified EU safety logo on your website. A click on the logo leads to the details of the webshop operator in the register. This serves to inform consumers about authorized mail-order pharmacies in the European Union (EU).

EU safety logo

The EU safety logo can be found on the websites of online pharmaceutical retailers that are listed in the mail order register.

On its own, it does not have any significance. But with three simple steps you can reduce the risk of ordering from websites of dubious providers: