The Veterinary Medicines Regulations 2013 (VMR 2013) set out mandatory record-keeping requirements for every medicine dispensed from a UK veterinary practice. RCVS inspectors treat medicines records as a primary focus. Practices with incomplete batch number records, missing prescriber details, or gaps in their controlled drug register face formal findings. A practice can hold these records in a separate dispensing system, inside its PIMS, or in a spreadsheet. That choice decides how well it can show compliance on inspection day.
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The Veterinary Medicines Regulations 2013 classifies all veterinary medicines into categories that determine who can supply them and under what conditions. The main categories relevant to practice dispensing are:
| Classification | Full name | Who can supply | Prescription required |
|---|---|---|---|
| POM-V | Prescription Only Medicine: Veterinarian | Vet only (or pharmacist on written prescription) | Yes: written Veterinary Prescription |
| POM-VPS | Prescription Only Medicine: Veterinarian, Pharmacist, Suitably Qualified Person | Vet, pharmacist, or SQP | Yes: from prescriber |
| NFA-VPS | Non-Food Animal: Veterinarian, Pharmacist, SQP | Vet, pharmacist, or SQP | No written prescription required |
| AVM-GSL | Authorised Veterinary Medicine: General Sales List | Any retail outlet | No |
POM-V covers antibiotics, controlled drugs and most prescription items in practice. Every supply of a POM-V medicine needs a written or computer-made prescription. The prescription must be retained.
VMR 2013 sets the least you must record at the moment of supply. This applies to POM-V and POM-VPS medicines from a veterinary practice.
All dispensing records must be retained for a minimum of five years from the date of supply. This applies to both paper and electronic records. For practices using a PIMS, this means understanding how the system handles data retention if you switch supplier, migrate platforms, or close a site.
A practice may change PIMS and move only its active patient records. The old dispensing data then stays in a system nobody uses. If those records become unreachable inside the five years, the practice breaks the rule. Before any PIMS migration, confirm what happens to historical dispensing records and how they will remain accessible and retrievable.
Schedule 3 and Schedule 4 controlled drugs need more records than the standard VMR 2013 rules. The Misuse of Drugs Regulations 2001 requires:
Most PIMS platforms include a controlled drug register module. One question decides this. Does the system calculate the running balance itself? Or does a person type it, and possibly get it wrong or miss it under pressure?
VMR 2013 permits verbal prescriptions in genuine emergencies only. Where a verbal prescription is used, the practice must:
In practice, verbal prescriptions should be exceptional. Some practices use them as a matter of routine, for example to speed up repeat dispensing. That use breaks the Regulations, and an inspection would record a finding.
VMR 2013 requires that veterinary practices carry out an annual audit of their medicine stock. The audit should reconcile physical stock counts against purchase records and dispensing records. A system can produce a full audit report by itself. Purchases in, medicines dispensed out, stock on hand, and any differences. That takes far less work than a spreadsheet.
Practices that count stock by hand usually find differences they cannot explain on audit day. Product is missing from the shelf and absent from the dispensing records, or the reverse. The reasons are usually ordinary. The clinical team skipped the dispensing steps in an emergency, or stock moved between sites with no record. An unexplained difference on a controlled drug count is still a serious finding.
One difference separates good dispensing software from bad. Does the system enforce correct entry, or does it only offer a field? A form with a batch number field that can stay empty is not a compliance tool. It is a record of your liability. See how the main UK PIMS platforms compare in our Provet Cloud alternatives guide.
When evaluating any PIMS or standalone dispensing module, the questions to ask are:
The leading platforms (ezyVet, Provet Cloud, and RxWorks) all include dispensing modules. What varies is how strictly they enforce these fields and how easily they generate audit-ready reports. Practices with findings on medicines records say the same thing. The gaps were known shortcuts, and the system allowed them instead of stopping them.
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This article names the real difference twice. A system either enforces correct entry, or it offers a field and hopes.
Almost every system offers the field. Very few refuse the record.
The reason is where the rule lives. In most software the rule sits in a screen. A screen can be skipped in an emergency, and a second screen elsewhere may write the same record without the check.
We build veterinary systems on engage.re. Your practice declares every record type and field before any data exists, and the server refuses a write outside that declaration. A dispensing record with no batch number is therefore not an incomplete record. It is not a record at all, because the server will not accept it.
The five-year rule follows the same design. Each record carries its own retention period, so the system holds it for the full term. All data also sits in five database tables that never change. A change of PIMS therefore never leaves old dispensing data in a system nobody uses.
We explain that retention question in can you prove you deleted someone's data. We explain why an audit record must resist change in who answers when an AI agent gets it wrong.
Some practices have harder needs. Referral hospitals, multi-site groups, and practices with an in-house pharmacy, several species or research programmes. A standard PIMS dispensing module may not enforce entry strictly enough, or report well enough, for them. A system built to the exact VMR 2013 rules closes those gaps. It enforces every required field. It balances the CD register for you. It reconciles stock, and it keeps records for five years. These are properties of the design, and not options a person can switch off. That includes an audit trail accurate to the second and rollback capability for any record, backed by a fault guarantee with no time limit.
Our live veterinary demo opens without a login, and it covers the dispensing work in this article. Sign in as vet and log the dispensing with VMD withdrawal, or as nurse and check the stock. It is a working system, not a screenshot.