Questions to ask a hospice PBM matter because a sales pitch is designed to highlight strengths, and it is the CEO's job during procurement to surface everything the pitch does not mention. The gap between what a vendor presents and what a hospice actually experiences after go-live usually traces back to a question that was never asked clearly enough during due diligence.
This checklist is organized around the areas where that gap shows up most often: pricing, technology, support, and formulary control. Ask every vendor on your shortlist the same ten questions, and request the answers in writing wherever possible.
These ten questions land differently depending on who is asking and who is answering. A finance leader should be present for questions one and two, since pricing and formulary change fees are ultimately budget questions. A director of nursing or clinical lead should be present for questions three, four, and five, since those determine what daily workflow will actually feel like for the team using the platform every shift. Bringing the right stakeholders into the same due diligence conversation, rather than splitting these questions across separate calls, makes it much harder for a vendor to give an incomplete answer to any one of them.
Send these ten questions to every vendor on your shortlist in the same written format, with a request for written responses rather than a verbal walkthrough on a call. This does two things at once: it creates a paper trail you can compare side by side later, and it naturally filters out vague or evasive answers, since it is harder to be vague in writing than it is out loud on a demo call where a confident tone can substitute for a specific answer.
A due diligence checklist only works if it's used consistently. A few habits tend to weaken it even when the ten questions are asked in good faith.
BetterRX uses transparent, pass-through pharmacy pricing and does not profit from medication or delivery markups. Formulary updates happen directly in the platform in real time, at no charge, with ownership staying with the hospice. Intelligent Medication Management puts ordering, approvals, prescribing, and reporting on one connected platform, and per BetterRX’s 2026 Voice of the Customer survey, 98% of hospice clients say BetterRX has improved their nurses’ job satisfaction.
On support responsiveness, BetterRX's 24/7 pharmacist and tech support answers in about seven seconds on average, sourced from BetterRX’s 2026 Voice of the Customer survey, not an unmeasured marketing claim.
(Source: www.betterrx.com/testimonials)
That kind of specific, attributed response is exactly what question seven on this list is asking every vendor to produce: not a number alone, but the source behind it and a real client willing to stand by it.
Once every vendor on your shortlist has answered all ten questions in writing, compare the answers side by side rather than relying on memory from separate sales calls. This protects financial stewardship by locking in pricing expectations before signing, and it protects nurse satisfaction and patient care by confirming the support and workflow claims hold up before your team depends on them.
These ten questions are useful beyond the initial evaluation. Written answers to questions one, two, and five, covering pricing structure, formulary change fees, and support response times, belong directly in the contract or a signed addendum, not just in a sales conversation that is easy to forget six months later. If a vendor is willing to say something confidently in a meeting but hesitant to put it in writing, treat that hesitation as information.
It also helps to revisit these same ten questions at renewal time, even with an existing partner. Pricing structures, support staffing, and platform capabilities can all shift over a multi-year relationship, and a CEO who asks the same due diligence questions at renewal protects the organization from quietly drifting terms that were never renegotiated on purpose.