This is a review for the Pharmacy and one specific pharmacist (skinny, white dude--yes, I said it because he is rude and I have to wonder, given some of the other reviews from POCs), Spencer Brown.
I went to Urgent Care today at 10:30am. When I was discharged at 11:00am, the doctor told me that I had 3 prescriptions that he would call into the pharmacy right away. Cool. Albertsons is NOT my preferred pharmacy but it is in the same city as my neighborhood whereas my preferred pharmacy is not. Seeing as how I was at Urgent Care, I just wanted the medicine quickly.
Since it usually takes some time to make all of that happen, I went home and took a nap after my appointment. I had another appointment that afternoon and decided to stop by Albertsons pharmacy on my way to grab my meds. I thought my plan was pretty good. How wrong I was. Never again.
At 3:50pm, I stand in line and wait my turn. When I'm up, I ask for the medicine. The cashier looks. She can't find it. Asks the pharmacist for an "urgent fill". He tells her it's going to be 30 minutes she repeats the message to me. Out loud, I say, "Oh, I'm surprised by that." The pharmacist hears and retorts, "Well, you shouldn't be." Yes, yes, it was a retort.
Feel my blood pressure rising right now after his comment. The cashier wasn't rude and neither was I. I wasn't yelling. I wasn't angry. I was bewildered. My Urgent Care visit discharge was at 11:00am. This was almost 5 HOURS LATER. It still wasn't ready and, when asked about it, it moves to the "urgent" category, delayed for another 30 minutes--which I didn't have.
This dude, who is an absolute BLOWHARD with zero, ZERO customer service skills, proceeds to medically mansplain how the process works. Our conversation goes a little something like this.
Him: You shouldn't be surprised because unless you call it in and tell us its urgent, it goes into a queue of a couple hundred people and we get to it when we get to it. Thirty minutes to fill 3 prescriptions is like really fast.
Me: Umm, so you're saying that I, as the customer, had to call in? I didn't know I had to call it in as urgent."
In a moment of sheer, unmitigated condescension, walking backwards as he walks away shrugging his shoulders, he offers this final retort, "well, now you know."
I have never wanted to go SCORCHED EARTH on someone so much but I did not have the time. I did ask for the Manager--who was off-duty--and got the number for Corporate CS. Spoke to a lovely woman on the phone but, since I was in the car, of course we were disconnected before I could finish the complaint call.
A few things to mention here--
1). If I had walked into the pharmacy at 11:05, I could see him being annoyed that I would expect my meds to be ready. Again, 5 hours later, this was not the case.
2) I.went.to.URGENT CARE. I didn't forget to call in my acne medication. There's no internal expedition process? Wild.
3) If the Urgent Care team had forgotten to call it in, again, it happens and I can almost promise is THAT were the case, I would have told upfront. UC did not forget. They called it in when they said they would. Albertsons apparently did not make the connection that it was an "urgent" request when an Urgent Care facility called it in.
4) Speaking of calling it in, according to dude, while he was doing his best to shame me, I had to call it in. The implication is that it was MY fault my medication wasn't ready.
Ummm, no. I didn't treat myself. I certainly don't have the ability to call in any medication nor any RX forms from the doctor.
5) His language that I "shouldn't be surprised" is ridiculous at best as it does not match the explanation. Instead, it assumes that what he is explaining is commonly-held knowledge. The average person knows and I am the anomaly. Pretty sure most people do not. Plus ...
6) The information he shared wasn't even relevant. He basically gave me a BS answer from start to stop, adjusting the timeframe to suit his needs. I think the UC facility did call it in. It got buried (which happens) and when I showed up, it was easier to speak to me like I'm an idiot and pretend that doing his job was doing me a favor.
Do I believe that filling 3 medications in 30 minutes is fast? Sure. Again, if I had showed at 11:05 and been huffy, I could see him sharing that information. 5 hours later, um, no.
So, to recap, if I were to end up at Urgent Care again, according to this fool, it is MY responsibility call in the medication as urgent because there apparently is no way to make that natural connection from the UC staff themselves. That, like, people in Urgent Care need their meds a little more urgently than, "we get to it when we get to it."
If you Google Albertsons Pharmacy, the average rating comes up as 2.5 stars. I absolutely see why. I am going to get my medication. I will never, never, ever patronize (ironic choice of words) this pharmacy again. read more