Problem with Walgreen's online pharmacy

Parent Cafe
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<p>Last fall, I filled a prescription through Walgreen’s online. My insurance doesn’t cover this, so I called around and checked prices at various online and local pharmacies. Walgreen’s online had the lowest price, $58.66. I called in again to double-check the price, was given the same number, to the penny. I took the name of the agent, and filled in the mailorder prescription form with my credit card information, noted that they were authorized to charge $58.66, included the prescription, and mailed it in. A few days later, I received an email saying that they’d received my order and were processing it. A week or so later, I still hadn’t received it, and I got an email from them that was garbled. I tried calling them, but was unable to get through on three different numbers listed on their website. I used the chat button and was connected to someone. She checked and said that the mailorder department needed my insurance information. I replied that I didn’t have insurance and wanted it filled at the full price, $58.66. She checked and said that the price was $94.99. (This was substantially higher than the highest price I’d been quoted at other pharmacies.) I said that I’d been quoted $58.66 twice, and I had the name of the second person who quoted it. She said that the price was $94.99. </p>

<p>I was quite irritated, as I’d sent the order in over a week before, and starting all over with someone else would require getting another prescription from the doctor, etc. I asked for the email address of the person in charge of the mailorder pharmacy. This started an exchange where she kept telling me I could call the corporate offices on Monday, and I kept demanding an email address. At one point, she wrote, Do you want to fill the prescription at $94.99? I ignored this and repeated (for the 4th time) my request for an email address. Finally she came up with an email address for customer service, and we ended the chat. I have screenshots of the chat.</p>

<p>A few days later, I received the medicine in the mail and my credit card was charged $94.99. I called the credit card company and started a dispute. I sent them a copy of the mail order form on which I’d written the price I’d agreed to ($58.66) and a copy of the online chat. They investigated and refunded the difference, $36.33.</p>

<p>A few weeks later, I received a letter from Walgreen’s, saying that the credit card company had taken back the $94.99, with a bill for $94.99. I called the credit card company, and they said that they had taken back only $36.33. They asked me to send them the bill. I did, with a memo summarizing the situation. They said that they would take care of it.</p>

<p>A couple of weeks ago, I received another bill from Walgreen’s, for $94.99. I didn’t have time to call the credit card company until today. I spoke to someone there and during the conversation, she found another charge to my credit card from Walgreen’s (that I hadn’t noticed) for $94.99. In a long conversation with her, I learned that Walgreen’s had started a dispute about the $36.33 refund. No one informed me of this. When I asked what they’d submitted to support their dispute, she said that they’d submitted a copy of their invoice. (Not the order form where I authorized a charge of $58.66). </p>

<p>By this time, I was frustrated with the woman I was speaking to. Other people I’d spoken to in the credit card dispute department had been smart and on top of things, she was having a hard time understanding what was going on. She said that she would call the number associated with the charge. She did, with me on the line, and she got someone at Walgreen’s who said that she didn’t have access to any records. The credit card rep suggested that I open another dispute about the second $94.99 charge. I told her that this was part of the initial dispute. By this time, I’d been on the phone for 35 minutes. I asked her to connect me to a supervisor. She said that she could have someone call me back in 24-48 hours. Not very satisfactory. I’m going to be travelling later in the week.</p>

<p>So, at this point, Walgreen’s has charged me $94.99*2 - 36.33 = $153.65 for a prescription with a quoted price of $58.66. I am at a loss about how to proceed from here. I see an endless cycle of refunds and charges.</p>

<p>Any suggestions?</p>

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<p>You were on the phone ONLY 35 min? That’s great!</p>

<p>At the end of this long transaction–you were charged? What?
The credit card company gave you your approved price and credited you the difference…Was that paid? If so–we’re down to a 40 dollar difference.</p>

<p>Walgreens charged you again somewhere along the line if I follow–those charges should be cancelled. That is a second dispute.</p>

<p>Here’s what I would do–call the store where you got the prescription filled and delivered it to you.
Speak to the pharmacist first–don’t rant and rave-- just be calm and say you have a billing issue that needs to be resolved. If that doesn’t work–and it may not–but at least the pharmacy department has heard of it…
Then speak to the manager of the store (if it’s not resolved). State your case clearly, you want it cleared up. You’ve laid out the facts very clearly here. If they need it in writing, give it to them.</p>

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<p>I agree that you need to start a second dispute for the $94.99 charge. That should be a simple one to resolve, since it’s a duplicate. Then do as gouf suggested. You’ll probably have to be persistent. I hate these kinds of situations!</p>

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<p>Dittto to Gouf and Mainelonghorn. </p>

<p>However, I would just deal direct with the credit card company, as it will be one less layer of frustration to go through.</p>

<p>You will need to articulate this to the credit card representative:</p>

<ul>
<li><p>On my bill there are two charges of 94.99. The first 94.99 should have been 58.66 , however I called and you guys credited my account 36.33, so that charge is legitimate and correct.</p></li>
<li><p>The second charge of 94.99 is what I’d like to dispute, as I was duplicately billed. Do ensure you tell the represenative you have only received ONE order of the prescription.</p></li>
</ul>

<p>Hopefully, that should help to make it clearer to the represenative you speak with. </p>

<p>Good Luck!</p>

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<p>Perhaps your credit card company can issue you a new card with a new number and shut down any further charges on the current one? Or is there a way to block any future charges from Walmart? Otherwise I fear you will be doing this forever.</p>

<p>The lesson to be learned is that Walmart is light years away from perfecting its online experience. I also had an online mess to untangle recently. I used their online order/store-pick option, paying in advance with my credit card, to make sure they would put aside an item I feared would be out of stock before I had a chance to get to the store. It was bad enough that there were no signs indicating where to pick up my item and that I had to ask multiple employees, before anyone could direct me, but then the clerk spent 30 minutes fruitlessly trying find my item in their storage area. She kept coming back to ask me what it looked like. After she was gone 10 minutes on her third attempt, I found the same item on the regular shelf, left her a note to cancel the online order/store pick-up transaction, and paid cash at the regular checkout line. Only to get home to an email from Walmart confirming my successful pick-up of my online order! The clerk had entered the transaction as completed before she wen to look for my item. I can’t begin to tell you the number of calls I had to make and the number of people I talked to before I got that mess straightened out. I couldn’t get them to credit my credit card without going to the store (half hour away–that wasn’t happening), so ended up with Walmart mailing me a gift card for the charge plus an extra $20 gift card as an apology. Now I have two gift cards to use in a store that can’t get out of its own way. Target has made a loyal customer without having to do a thing!</p>

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<p>Thanks, everyone, for the responses. learninginprog, thank you for condensing my situation by such a huge factor! The only two missing pieces: (1) Walgreens sent me bills twice for the $94.99, claiming that the credit card company took back the entire $94.99 and (2) Walgreens disputed the $36.33 adjustment, using meaningless documentation. Besides the inconsistency, I am worried that Walgreens will put negative information on my credit report.</p>

<p>MommaJ, I agree that they are completely incompetent. Here is the text of the email I received from them, that prompted the chat session:</p>

<hr>

<p>Dear $firstName,
Order Number: $orderID
Order Date: $dayOfDelivery </p>

<p>Pickup Details </p>

<p>Store Information
$address1
$city, $state, $zipCode </p>

<hr>

<p>This is especially strange because picking the order up at a store was never part of the arrangement.</p>

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<p>Thanks for the heads up–will never use WalMart–having enough trouble with CVS. I wouldn’t stress about the credit report–you are allowed to dispute anything they write about you anyway and I would just never use them again.</p>

<p>I specifically went in person to our local CVS and told them to CANCEL an order for an Rx and told them the name of the drug. They said it was too early to refill anyway and I told them DO NOT FILL THIS Rx. They have been calling me daily trying to get me to pick up the Rx I told them not to fill! They also told me to come and pick up a med and when I arrived, seemed to surprised and said I’d have to return in another 30 minutes to come and get it! Really don’t like them but they are the participating and preferred pharmacy by our insurer. At least they haven’t done weird things about our billing and pricing like your WalMart horror.</p>

<p>Would DEFINITELY continue working with CC and forget about WalMart already. Soeak with a supervisor at the CC company and dispute the duplicate charge and show that the other one was already adjusted and that you only got ONE order of the Rx, which was the only ONE order you placed and had filled or want.</p>

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<p>I know about the CVS headaches, HImom. They are pretty much the only drugstore option around here (except that the first Walgreens in our area just opened a few weeks ago - I don’t plan to ever darken their door!) Their default is to put prescriptions on autorefill, and it is very hard to get them to stop.</p>

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<p>Yea, CVS keeps trying to refill our Rx and we have to keep saying NO, we will call YOU when WE want a refill. I really dislike them but am stuck with them because our insurer prefers them. ARGH!</p>

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<p>I would like to point out that WalMART stores and WalGREENs pharmacies are unrelated.
However, the frustrations of dealing with the huge faceless corporate retailers are similar.</p>

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<p>CVS has an auto refill option. You need to tell them to turn that off in their system on your Rx.</p>

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<p>DH has a prescription at Walgreens. They did not put him on auto refill. However he does get an automated call each time it’s due for refill saying that it’s time to refill his prescription and does he want it refilled… I’m wondering if it depends on the person at Walgreens that originally enters the order.</p>

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<p>Believe it or not, this is still not resolved. I have been dealing with the CC company on multiple occasions since last fall, multiple letters and documentation, and they have just resolved the dispute in Walgreen’s favor! Their incompetence is stunning. </p>

<p>At this point, I have paid Walgreen’s through my credit card 94.99+58.66 = 153.65, for an item that should have cost 58.66. </p>

<p>The initial charge in October was for 94.99. I think I have put the story in the OP; basically I was calling around for prices on a prescription, Walgreen’s quoted the lowest price (58.66), I called back to confirm and was given the same price again. I filled out the mail order form, with my cc information, and wrote on the form that I was authorizing them to charge the 58.66 that I’d been quoted. I am pretty sure I don’t have a copy of that form.</p>

<p>I was charged 94.99 after I had a long online chat with them, arguing about the price. I have the transcript of the chat and I did not authorize them to fill the prescription for 94.99. A few days later the prescription came and my cc was charged 94.99. I disputed the charge with the cc company, and they refunded the 36.33 difference. Walgreen’s is claiming that they charged back the entire 94.99.</p>

<p>A couple of months later, Walgreen’s again charged 94.99 to my cc. I disputed that charge, as well, and the cc company changed my number. They refunded the 94.99 and said they would ask Walgreen’s for documentation. Today I got a letter saying that the 94.99 had been charged to my card again. They included Walgreen’s “documentation” - an invoice showing the initial charge of 94.99, a refund of 94.99, another charge of 94.99, another refund of 94.99, and now the cc company has reversed the last refund. </p>

<p>I called the cc company and they said to write everything in a letter. I told them that I’d written multiple letters, provided documentation including the chat transcript, had multiple phone calls with them, they had all the information. I kept insisting that the guy look at my cc activity and check the first refund, which was 36.33 but Walgreen’s “documentation” shows as 94.99. He wouldn’t even do that, said that I had to write a letter.</p>

<p>I’m not sure how to resolve this now. Calling Walgreen’s is not an option - the reason I did the chat is that I tried every number they had and couldn’t get through. On one of my calls to the cc company, they tried calling Walgreen’s, using the number attached to the cc charge, with me on the line. Someone answered but she said that she didn’t know anything about the mail order pharmacy.</p>

<p>Any suggestions?</p>

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<p>Here’s another scenario–the first time you got the price it was SUPPOSED to be 95 bucks and the lower price was wrong information. Unfortunately the prices of medications can vary widely dependent on the insurance–sad, but true. Most pharmacies can not give an accurate price until your actual insurance info is entered into their system.
My suggestion is to transfer your script to another pharmacy (no need to go to the doctor to get a new order) which has a lower price. Call the new pharmacy, tell them where you have the prescription from, the number etc (all on the bottle). They should take care of the rest.</p>

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<p>"I’m not sure how to resolve this now. Calling Walgreen’s is not an option - the reason I did the chat is that I tried every number they had and couldn’t get through. On one of my calls to the cc company, they tried calling Walgreen’s, using the number attached to the cc charge, with me on the line. Someone answered but she said that she didn’t know anything about the mail order pharmacy.</p>

<p>Any suggestions?"</p>

<p>Have you called Walgreens Corporate Office? If not, I would do that. I would ask for the VP of Mail Order Divison. If I got the run around I would then ask to speak to the person they report to. I would continue up the food chain until the CEO office if the issue remains unresolved. A lot of times you can skip this whole process and ask to be connected to the Executive Office. I’ve found once you get to that office your problem will be rectified pretty quickly. It does take perseverance, though. </p>

<p>Walgreen Company Corporate Office</p>

<p>Write or call us at:
200 Wilmot Road
Deerfield, IL 60015
(847) 914-2500</p>

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<p>Thanks, emilybee. That’s a good idea. I’d given up on Walmart because I could never get through on any of their numbers. But I expect that this one works.</p>

<p>gouf7, insurance is not in the picture. I asked for the full price and was given the lower number, twice. I placed the order on the basis of that information. In the online chat, I made it very clear that I was not willing to pay the higher price. Yet they sent it out anyway. Prescriptions cannot be returned.</p>

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<p>Supplementing @emilybee’s advice, read this from The Consumerist website, explaining how to launch an “executive email carpet bomb”:</p>

<p><a href=“How To Launch An Executive Email Carpet Bomb – Consumerist”>http://consumerist.com/2007/05/11/how-to-launch-an-executive-email-carpet-bomb/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>along with these two follow-up posts:</p>

<p><a href=“A Guide To Figuring Out Executives’ E-Mail Addresses – Consumerist”>http://consumerist.com/2012/10/24/a-guide-to-figuring-out-executive-e-mail-addresses/&lt;/a&gt;
<a href=“Can’t Find Executives’ Names For An EECB? Use LinkedIn – Consumerist”>http://consumerist.com/2013/04/05/now-that-grown-ups-use-social-networking-sites-use-that-to-your-eecb-advantage/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;