PRP application (UiTM Pharmacy student version)

Assalamualaikum and hi! This time I decided to make an entry regarding what to do pre-PRP training which is applying for PRP at PRiSMA (no promises on whether I can post consistently during my PRP later, doa la banyak-banyak that I can muster up an effort to do at least one entry post-PRP to tell you about my experience). A quick disclaimer before I delve into this: I would be speaking mostly in the perspective of UiTM student, yeah. But no worries, you can actually just read GARIS PANDUAN BAGI PERMOHONAN PENDAFTARAN PROVISIONAL AHLI FARMASI and you'll be good to go. As you can see below, that is the process that you will all have to follow after you finished your BPharm.

I finished my classes at the end of July, did my finals early August and got my results on 10th September. Took me about 2 weeks to know that I can quickly apply for PRP early even without official transcript and all. However I'm lucky (sort of) that my batch wouldn't make it into the last intake for this year because guess what? The qualified applicants are only those that managed to do a full application to SPA and have registered with Pharmacy Board by 26th August 2021. Which means that even if I passed the 4th stage as in the picture, I couldn't apply for penempatan at ePharmacist anyway because hey, the results weren't even out yet. So for now, I'm still at the 2nd stage and oh my goodness, I have so many things to tell you about this part - things I didn't knew before and wow nasib baik next intake would be around Feb-April 2022 so I got enough time. Alright, so let's start with the day you got your results.

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First thing you have to do is apply for official transcript and surat tamat belajar, of course. This thing is a must and the sooner you do it, the faster you'll get your real documents. You can refer to this blog on how to do it, I followed pretty much all the steps given by her. Next, which is equally important would be to ask for Surat Pengesahan Tamat Belajar AND Mini Transcript (full semesters 1-8) from the faculty (our batch RX16 requested from Miss Atikah) because hey, guess what happens when you combine these two under one PDF? You'll get your temporary copy of degree and that's actually enough for PRP application, who knew huh?

Okay, now let's look at what documents are required for this application:

1. Certified copy of degree (Surat Pengesahan Tamat Belajar + Academic Mini Transcript)

2. Certificate for Qualifying Examination to Practice Pharmacy

That's it, only these 3 documents are needed. Please make sure they're CERTIFIED before you upload it though. Now, this part is the one that's been giving some of us problems. Your application would be pending if you didn't get your documents certified by selected people only.

"MOHON RUJUK KRITERIA PENGESAHAN DI BAHAGIAN ATAS BORANG PERMOHONAN. PENGESAHAN HENDAKLAH OLEH PEGAWAI KUMPULAN PENGURUSAN DAN PROFESIONAL (GRED 41 KE ATAS DALAM SEKTOR AWAM), AHLI FARMASI ATAU PENGAMAL PERUBATAN BERDAFTAR DI MALAYSIA DENGAN MENCATATKAN NOMBOR PENDAFTARAN DAN PENGEKALAN AMALAN TAHUNANNYA."

This was one of the inquiries I got after I submitted my PRP application - complete with caps lock. Okay, here's the deal. You want to make sure your certified documents would be accepted? Your best bet would be either medical doctors or pharmacists working at the government hospital or klinik kesihatan. Hospital too far away or like in my case, the nearest one at my home is Hospital Sg Buloh and yeah, I don't really feel like walking to that very busy hospital with so many COVID cases just to get my documents certified either so next best thing you can do is walk to a community pharmacy instead and ask the pharmacist working there to certify it for you. Please make sure you got their registration or RPh number AND their annual registration number/year too! Examples: RPh 019110 and 016110/2021 - if not on the stamp, then just write it down next to their signature. Remember these two key things, yeah. (My friend got her documents certified by a Magistrate, who is a government worker but somehow her documents are not accepted! That's why I said you have better chance with MO or FRP).

Another one of my inquiries was my graduation date. Oh my god, the confusion over this is giving me grief. But I got it figured out so that's okay, things are cool and fine, thank you. Remember when I told that it took me 2 weeks to know about the usefulness of Surat Pengesahan Tamat Belajar (and Mini Transcript) by the faculty? There would be one difference in that aforementioned surat when requested at different times. For example, my friend quickly requested and got her completion letter on the day we got our results 10/9/2021. The date of the letter (upper right) would be one day earlier which means it's stated there as 9/9/2021. On the other hand, I requested and got my completion letter on 24/9/2021 which means the date on that letter would be 23/9/2021. What's so important about the date in the letter? Well, that is actually your GRADUATION DATE. Yes, we all actually graduated at the same time but the day we got the letter is different and this is something that officers-in-charge of the PRP applications are very particular with. So my friend's graduation date would be 9/9/2021 and mine would be 23/9/2021. At first I set it at 9/9, because that's what most people say our graduation date is but now I know that was the case only for those yang minta awal 😅 So remember everyone, dapat je your results, quickly apply for (1) official transcript and so on at website Konvokesyen UiTM (jangan lupa the last step as shown by the blog, which is to email the clerk in charge of PH faculty - the one working in Konvo dept, so it's not Miss Atikah. Just click the link to the list name of clerks that can be found in the blog) and (2) mini transcript and the completion letter from the faculty. Then quickly print out and certify the documents!

Update 6/10: Attention to those with long names, please tengok whether your whole name is displayed in full on the mini transcript before you upload the document. If it's cut off, then sorry to say but you'll have to wait for the official transcript instead. One of my friend's name is too long and it doesn't appear in full - in the inquiries, the officer asked for another copy with proper display of her name. But she can't do anything because it's a waiting game, like I said, and that's why you need to quickly mohon for official transkrip right after you got your results! (or maybe 1-2 days earlier also can). Don't worry, the application would only be discarded by PRiSMA if no action was taken after three months. My friend'll got hers somewhen this week soon, I think.

Okie so next, I'll walk you through the application process at PRiSMA. You can make an account even before you graduate actually but for RX16, somehow pihak office dah tolong buatkan early on 😂 Tahu-tahu we already had an account registered at PRISMA so in the end all we had to do is press forget password and make a new one - the recovery email would be the personal one you used for Google Classroom. Then you can update your profile: name, mobile phone, home address, practice address (you can put the same as home address if you're not practicing anywhere yet) etc.

The pictures above were from the guideline I mentioned earlier. Pretty straightforward stuff, though I'll explain a bit further. There are two sections in the application form: personal details (name, IC, DOB, home and mailing addresses - can be the same) and qualification. The most important thing for personal details are the addresses, do NOT put any commas whatsoever at the end of each line because the system will input it for you automatically so if you put any, there'll be two commas - which is not pretty. 

As for qualification part:

1. The type of qualification - set it as Recognized Pharmacy Degree.

2. There'll be a drop-down form of country, university and programme, just pick the right one for you: Malaysia > UiTM > Sarjana Muda Farmasi (Kepujian).

3. Your graduation date - like I said before, refer to the date on your study completion letter. 

4. Type of programme - Full-time in Malaysia (or part-time, up to yours).

5. The session/year of your qualifying exam, for example mine is in March 2021.

6. Certified copy of degree - Surat Pengesahan Tamat Belajar + Mini Transkrip (combined both CERTIFIED documents in one pdf, not more than 2MB).

7. Certificate of qualifying exam - also must be CERTIFIED and not more than 2MB.

Then re-check all the details you filled in are correct before you press submit! (Don't be too hasty though, if you're not sure yet then you can save it as a draft first - once you submit it but somehow found something you wanted to change, you cannot edit your application details anymore until any inquiries by PRiSMA is emailed to you). If everything's a-ok then ta-da! Your application has been sent and will be processed accordingly. You can download the PDF form of your application and it'll look like the one you see in your law book (ROPR 2004). Figure below is the application process to apply for a certificate (PRP, FRP, annual cert) that I got from the PRiSMA website and the second one is the general timeline.

As you can see, the processing time would take about 5 days, which in my case was true. I first submitted my application on 26/9 (Sunday) and I got the enquiries emailed to me on 30/9 (Thursday). I decided to re-certify my documents on the day I need to do clearance at Kolej Rafflesia that Saturday and finally resubmitted my application with corrected graduation date and certified documents on 3/10. Guess what? I passed the verification process yesterday and confirmation process today. So I'm now waiting for the approval, which I think would be sooner than the ETA stated there (probably this evening or tomorrow?).

That's it, I guess. Since mine was not approved yet, I figured I'd get a PDF form for my PRP certificate later. Here's hoping my PRP number would be an easy one for me to remember 😂 Next step after getting registered as PRP is SPA application, but I'll, maybe, talk about that in the next entry - who knows hehe. So yeah, good luck and hope this post will be helpful to you.

P/s: My PRP application just got approved about an hour ago! I'm sooo happy because I've wanted for the certificate to be dated on 05 October 2021. Why? Well, I think it looks good. Oh, and my PRP number was pretty easy to remember as well, it's got number 8 like my student ID 😁 I saw that the view count for this post is going up after I shared about it on my Whatsapp status. If you have any questions regarding this, feel free to comment and I'll do my best to reply!