My employer-provided insurance is UHC, which has a preferred partner situation with OptumRX, a mailorder pharmacy. They give you better rates on your prescription copay if you use them. The mail turn-around time is not great though. It's good for long-term prescriptions, shitty for short term like antibiotics.

My doctor sends short term stuff to a local pharmacy for me to pick up, and my daily long term pills to Optum, who charges my CC and mails them to me. They take about a week to arrive, but you can set it up so they automatically recur, so you always get your next 90 days before your current pills run out.

> there’s a big opportunity for insurers to pick a default mail pharmacy

Looks like it’s already happening, albeit in an opposite direction, with Aetna acquisition by CVS.

Insurers already do that and also limit how many prescriptions they will cover outside of mail order delivery.