Do not study optometry it is a terrible/bad career (long)

If you read before you'll see I'm not a pharmacist, but a dispenser who works 8 hours a week. I'm an economics PhD student (don't ask why i'm in a pharmacy, it's some side income).

In the future we won't have this retail problem, as robots will replace the humans on tills. Or just self checkouts.

Oh right. Well that is completely different. You might as well be stacking shelves for all the relevant professional qualifications you have, frankly.

Please don't take offence but it isn't comparable to the OPs position.

Having no relevant qualifications doesn't mean the staff should be overworked and abused?

I'm more qualified than the pharmacist, and I have much more useful knowledge. All the money I make I invest in the stock markets, I know how to make money from the financial markets, which they are too scared to do.

I can walk out tomorrow from that job, which the OP can't.

Having no relevant qualifications doesn't mean the staff should be overworked and abused?

I'm more qualified than the pharmacist, and I have much more useful knowledge. All the money I make I invest in the stock markets, I know how to make money from the financial markets, which they are too scared to do.

I can walk out tomorrow from that job, which the OP can't.

Not sure if trolling or just a bit dense now tbh.
Of course its for profit.
No one has ever said to themselves, 'Oh i suddenly have gone blind in one eye, better get to Specsavers so they can have a look'.
Your job is to correct vision, that is what an optometrist does. Contact lens and glasses cost money, hence businesses like Specsavers exist.
If you want to work for a genuine health reason, you should have become an ophthalmologist who save peoples sight and treat infections/diseases.

Did you not research where optom grads go after uni? You are trained to correct sight in healthy eyes, nothing more nothing less. People go to the high street for that, which is RETAIL.

My Background: I graduated in 2008 and qualified as anOptometrist in 2009, I have been qualified 7 years. Since then I have worked asa resident for all large chain providers (Specsavers, vision express, opticalexpress, boots, Tesco). I have also locummed in over 20 practises. I did myresearch before choosing Optometry including work experience and reading up but after 7 years I have concluded: Optometry in the UK Is terrible career choice.Period. There are many reasons for this which I set out below:

#1 You will not be seen as a “eye specialist” Optometryis presented very misleadingly by UK universities: They present it as though willbe some kind of “eye specialist who treats eye conditions and checks vision”.Believe me, you will not. 90+% of Optometrists work in a RETAIL setting whereyou will be expected purely to sell glasses or contact lenses. The generalpublic do not even think about going to YOU as an optometrist for eyeproblems/disease. They go to their GP or Hospital A and E and to be fair whyshould they go to you as an Optometrist?? All YOU can do as an Optometrist iseither refer them To their GP or hospital so why shouldn’t they just go straightthere? You have no power to given them a prescription of any type of eyemedication apart from Chloramphenicol which they could easily just buy from aPharmacist without you****unless you study independent prescribing for 2 years postgraduate – which less the 5% of Optometrist do as it is a lot of hard work andresponsibility and will get NO extra pay for doing it compared to a normalOptometrist, so why would most people bother? – They don’t. These days evenpatients have caught on to the fact that you are just a “glasses salesmen/women”as they often call us.


#2 You will have extreme sales pressure As I said,90% of Optometry graduates will work in retail, and you will have incrediblystrong sales pressure thrust upon you by often unqualified managers who have no optical training themselves. Also it is worth adding that even qualifiedmanagers or Optometrist practice owners themselves encourage this terriblepractise. I have been qualified 7 years and it was basically the same everywhere I went, you will have targets like forexample you need to get 70-80% of patients to buy glasses per day. AnyOptometrist out there will tell you this is incredibly hard to do most of thetime. For example if you see an old pensioner who tells you they can’t affordglasses (which they often do) are you really going to FORCE them to buy glasses when they don’t need them/ or maybe already have glasses in good condition. This is what you WILL be expected to do. And if you do not you will be berated by sales managers. In some places it’s so bad the sales managers come and talk to the Optometrist after every patient they see to ask/berate why they didn’t “convert” the patient (get them to buy glasses). If you say to the sales manager things like “they didn’t need them” or “they couldn’t afford them” they berate you and tell you “YOU SHOULD OF DONE BETTER” In almost all practices having high sales figures is the ONLY way to get a pay rise, In every Interview I have had the first question you are asked is “what is your conversion rate for glasses sales” or “what your current sales targets are”


#3 You will not be not respected by other Optometrists orthe public: I can’t tell you the amount of times someone in thepublic/patient has asked me “Do you need a degree to do this job?” These days patients have caught on to the fact that you are mostly just a “glasses salesmen” as they often call us. The general public just do not recognise this isprofessional job which requires you to complete a tough and challenging degree. Furthermore the lack of unity if the profession is a joke, Optometrists do not respect each other in the slightest, I can’t tell you how many times I have heard one Optometrist bad mouth another in front of patients!!! You don’t really see Doctors bad mouthing each other in front of patients since they have that mutual respect but it does not exist in Optometry – no one cares.


4# You will have to work weekends and bank holidays Youwill be expected to work either Saturday or Sunday or sometimes both!. Thiswill likely cause havoc in your personal life as most people (whichprofessional jobs) work Monday to Friday, so forget about ever going out onFriday nights. You could say “so what doctors work weekends?” That’s right they do but their pay reflects that and is higher on weekends, whereas you as aresident Optometrist will not receive any higher pay for weekends, you willjust be expected to as that is the norm. Also Doctors/Police etc who work weekends are emergency services which we need - selling someone glasses is not an emergency service (see point #1)


5# You will not be wealthy or have a comfortable lifestyle:Pay in Optometry is terrible, it is now common for newly qualifiedOptometrist in/around London to start on 27k or lower, and there is no yearlyincrease like you get in other jobs. I know Optometrists who haven’t had a payincrease in 5 years or even longer and the only way to get pay increases inmost places is by having high sales figures, which apart from beingimmoral/unethical is extremely difficult to do. On average after 5 years qualifiedyou will be on about 40-43k which is of course higher than the UK average butyou will need to work very hard for it. This includes severe sales pressure(point #2) never having weekends off (point #3). On the other hand had I havefriends who didn’t even go University and work in fields like recruitment whoalready earn more than that. The reason = pay is so low is two things: 1. too many Optometry graduates for what was always a niche field. 2. Large multiples like Specsavers pushing down salaries



6# You will have repetitive job What you do will be EXACTLY the same from the day you qualify to the day you retire. I have put this point last as to be fair, having a repetitive job isn’t the worst thing loads of jobs are repetitive but it is INCREDIBLY BORING if you’re the kind of person to get bored quickly.


My experiences relates to retail Optometry where I have 7 years experiance (this is where 90% of optometrists will go), my friends who are loccuming also tell me the situation is getting worse locum rates going lower and lower (there is actually a recent petition about this – I have no experience of working hospital Optometry where tiny minority will go but from what I understand pay is often lower then retail optometry. Also most hospital posts are part time so you would need to string together a hospital job and maybe a part time retail one to make a decent living.


CONCLUSION: THINK VERY VERY CAREFULLY BEFORE CHOOSIING TOSTUDY/BECOME AN OPTOMETRIST THERE ARE A LOT OF CONS/DISADVANTAGES. MOST QUALIFIED OPTOMETRISTS I HAVE MET BADLY REGRET THEIR CHOICE BUT ARE TRAPPED (LIKE I AM)

Our university training in some ways is similar to a opthalmologist (obviously not the surgery part) yet we do not use any of this in practise

I think you need to get real here.

You aren't a qualified pharmacist, therefore you aren't more qualified than one.

You are doing a job that requires no formal healthcare qualifications, you aren't registered with a regulatory body that checks up on you, and you have no professional society/union to support you. Therefore, you will have to use physical labour to earn your money.

If you don't like what you're doing the only option is to vote with your feet.

So what is your highest qualification?

A BSc. If you're going to tell me your PhD in Economics makes you a qualified pharmacist then save your fingers.

A BSc. If you're going to tell me your PhD in Economics makes you a qualified pharmacist then save your fingers.

I also find it odd why someone with a PhD in Economics needs the extra pay by being a pharmacy run-a-round. Guess the PhD didn't bring in as much money as hoped for.

No, I will be reasonable here....

All I'm saying is I've seen both sides of the coin. I've seen people slave away for £7 an hour and I've seen professors piss about chatting about what they did on the weekend for £60 an hour.

What I don't agree with you here is that because someone is working for £7 an hour, they have no right to complain about their working conditions or if they are being overworked. In our place, people go sick from exhaustion, the management don't care, they run the place on skin and bones.

Someone working on £7 an hour is no less of a human being than the professor earning £60 an hour. I'm lucky in the sense I am more educated than 99% of the population and have the opportunity to get out of the gutter.

I wouldn't use my privileged education to screw people below me.

The problem is lower paid jobs are generally the ones you need limited training for. You are easy to replace and its common sense to think that someone easy to replace can be paid less. If you are as overworked as you say you are, then you need to leave. Nothing will change if everyone sticks with it.

A professor will have spent their whole lives learning the subject and that knowledge comes at a price that's set by the demand for those skills.

This is the whole reason why people get into proper careers - so they aren't stuck doing **** jobs at the bottom of the ladder. I quite liked working in Sainsburys while I was studying because it was a great incentive to do well.

No, I will be reasonable here....

All I'm saying is I've seen both sides of the coin. I've seen people slave away for £7 an hour and I've seen professors piss about chatting about what they did on the weekend for £60 an hour.

What I don't agree with you here is that because someone is working for £7 an hour, they have no right to complain about their working conditions or if they are being overworked. In our place, people go sick from exhaustion, the management don't care, they run the place on skin and bones.

Someone working on £7 an hour is no less of a human being than the professor earning £60 an hour. I'm lucky in the sense I am more educated than 99% of the population and have the opportunity to get out of the gutter.

I wouldn't use my privileged education to screw people below me.

Just out of curiosity, why aren't you working in your related field? I'd have thought someone so highly qualified would have a decent job with a decent income and wouldn't need to work at £7 an hour as a side job....

Yeah your right. No one should be over worked regardless of qualifications or job. However I've been to different pharmacies and I have yet to see sweaty over exhausted employees, I've not had to wait in long queues too. So what you keep repeating is only YOUR workplace, it's not representative of every pharmacy or even a pharmacists job. So go speak to your employer, make another thread or quit the job and stop moaning.


Posted from TSR Mobile

Just out of curiosity, why aren't you working in your related field? I'd have thought someone so highly qualified would have a decent job with a decent income and wouldn't need to work at £7 an hour as a side job....

Yeah your right. No one should be over worked regardless of qualifications or job. However I've been to different pharmacies and I have yet to see sweaty over exhausted employees, I've not had to wait in long queues too. So what you keep repeating is only YOUR workplace, it's not representative of every pharmacy or even a pharmacists job. So go speak to your employer, make another thread or quit the job and stop moaning.


Posted from TSR Mobile

Then do so and stop moaning.
For the record i go to Lloyds pharmacy every couple of weeks and have done for years, i'm friendly with the early 20's staff there and they're very happy and rarely stressed.