The pharmacy that moved its bank, one account at a time

Before Affiniti

Reimbursements at one bank, the wholesaler at another

Semmes Pharmacy is rooted in a commitment to treating every patient like family. Led by Dr. Jessica Hung, PharmD, and her business partners, Alan and Lancer, the team has worked tirelessly to navigate the difficult economic realities facing independent pharmacies, including rising costs and shrinking reimbursements.

“Turning patients away has never been an option,” Dr. Hung says. “We’re here to serve our community, even when it means absorbing losses on certain prescriptions.”

That kind of commitment is expensive to run. Insurer and Medicaid reimbursements landed at one bank. The wholesaler pulled its payments from another. More than twenty employees bought supplies and vaccines on cards. Payroll, rent, and a second business Dr. Hung owns each had their own paper trail. For a pharmacy running on thin margins, knowing where the money actually was on any given day meant logging into several places and doing the math by hand.

The switch

June 2026: the wholesaler’s next pull came out of Affiniti

Semmes came to Affiniti through NCPA in 2024, for the business card. The team trusted NCPA’s track record of supporting independent pharmacies and saw the platform as a natural extension of that mission. Within a year, 22 staff cards were covering secondary drug suppliers, vaccine orders, and the day-to-day purchases that keep a pharmacy open.

The bigger move came in February 2026, when Dr. Hung opened an Affiniti business checking account. For the first few months it ran alongside the pharmacy’s existing banks. Then in June the team pointed the wholesaler’s automatic payments and the main reimbursement streams at the new account.

That was the month Affiniti became the pharmacy’s bank. Money moving through the account went up about fivefold, and over the following months Semmes brought roughly $2 million over from the two banks it had used before.

Running the pharmacy on Affiniti

Reimbursements in, wholesaler out, interest on what sits in between

A pharmacy’s cash flow has a shape. Reimbursements from insurers and Medicaid arrive in large, irregular deposits. The wholesaler pulls its payment on a schedule whether or not the reimbursements have landed. Payroll runs every two weeks. Semmes now runs all of it through one Affiniti checking account: reimbursements and counter sales in, wholesaler and payroll out, rent by a check Affiniti prints and mails, and same-day ACH for everything in between, with no monthly fees.

The cash sitting between a reimbursement deposit and the next wholesaler pull is not idle. Affiniti checking earns up to 3% APY on balances, and deposits are FDIC-insured up to $3 million through the program’s sweep network. For a pharmacy that routinely holds six figures waiting on the next payment cycle, that is interest a traditional business account was never going to pay, on money that stays fully liquid.

Every transaction syncs to QuickBooks, so the books reflect the account as it stands, not as it stood at the last statement.

One account for prescriptions, one for vaccines, one for the other business

The pharmacy didn’t open one account. It opened four. The main operating account carries the prescription business. A separate account holds the money from clinical services, so the revenue from immunizations and programs stays visible on its own, and when a balance built up there it earned interest until the team moved it back. A second business Dr. Hung owns has its own account, with its own statements, under the same login.

That structure is the kind of thing an owner used to get by opening accounts at three branches and keeping a spreadsheet to tie them together. On Affiniti it is a few clicks, and an owner can see every entity, every balance, and every employee from one dashboard.

Twenty-two cards for everything the wholesaler doesn’t carry

Twenty-two employee cards cover the purchases that don’t go through the wholesaler: secondary suppliers, vaccine orders, software, and supply runs. Each card has its own limit and policy, and every purchase alerts the owner as it happens, so a pharmacy with a large staff doesn’t need a shared card or a month-end hunt for receipts. The card line has tripled since 2024 as the pharmacy’s spend has grown.

The results

$2 million moved off two banks and onto one dashboard

Semmes started with a card in 2024. Two years later, Affiniti is where the pharmacy banks.

What that looks like in practice:

• The pharmacy’s main operating account moved to Affiniti in June 2026, with roughly $2 million brought over from two previous banks.
• More than $1 million a month now moves through the account: reimbursements and sales in, wholesaler, payroll, and rent out.
• Four accounts under one login, including a dedicated account for clinical-services revenue and one for a second business, each with its own statements.
• Operating cash earns interest at up to 3% APY while it waits for the next wholesaler pull, with FDIC coverage up to $3 million.
• 22 employee cards with their own spend policies, and a card line that has tripled since 2024.
• No month-end reconciliation across banks. Every account syncs to QuickBooks as transactions happen.

Today, when a reimbursement lands, Dr. Hung sees it in the same place she sees the wholesaler pull scheduled against it, the payroll run behind that, and what each of her 22 staff bought this week. “It’s not a fix for the reimbursement crisis,” she says, “but it’s one more tool that helps us keep doing what’s right for our patients.”

Dr. Hung’s advice to other pharmacy owners

Dr. Hung spent eight years as a pharmacy technician before pharmacy school, joined Semmes as a clinical pharmacist, and became an owner in 2024. Her advice to other independents is the same thing she did with the pharmacy’s clinical programs and then with its finances: stop accepting the way it has always been done.

Reimbursements are what they are. The bank you run them through, how fast you can see them, and what the cash earns while it sits are choices. “We’re here to serve our community,” she says, and the operating side of the pharmacy should make that easier, not harder.