I want to say bad things about the Safeway Pharmacy here.
I should probably take a breath before slamming them, but I'm too dizzy with frustration at the moment to wait. Must rant now. And it's gonna be TL;DR so to sum, lemme just say that they are so rude and incompetent that they ruined my day. Twice.
I first dealt with them about a year ago to get a prescription for baby vitamin drops. When I picked it up I noticed that what I was given didn't have iron, and I remember my doctor saying that the prescription he gave me has iron. I asked the pharmacist (technician -- I have to assume that she wasn't a real pharmacist) about it and she said "No, babies shouldn't have iron - who told you that babies need iron?" I was kind of caught off guard and mumbled, "Um, most of the baby books I've read..." She continued, "Babies can overdose from iron. We don't have anything that has iron for them." In actuality, yes, iron overdose is the biggest cause of early childhood poisoning, but, yes, they actually do need iron, and when I dropped of the prescription at Walgreens, I actually ended up getting the vitamins with iron.
Fast forward to a few days ago. I was lured in by a coupon for a $20 Safeway gift card if I transfer a prescription, and what do you know, I just happen to have a baby that just happens to have a prescription elsewhere baby vitamins, and I needed to get some groceries, so in we go.
So I wrote down on a slip of paper the babies name, where the pharmacy is, and that it's for baby vitamins and I give it to the pharmacist technician figuring that they'll call and get the details.
She asks me a couple other general questions and then tells me that baby vitamins are over the counter.
And I explain that well, I've always gotten them as a prescription and that the other pharmacy should have the information. Then another pharmacist tech joins in saying that my insurance probably won't pay for them because they're available over the counter and besides, they don't have them in stock anyway.
So I'm starting to feel like I'm on the defensive and explain that my insurance always paid for them because they were always a prescription. I fish the bottle out of my purse and tell one of the techs to have a look at it, but she doesn't take it from me - just glances at it and says that they don't have that kind and they'll have to give me the over-the-counter ones and try to bill my insurance for them, but that it'll take a day anyway so I'll have to come back. Okay then.
So I get an automated call that my prescription is ready, but I decide to call just to make sure I have the right ones. I explain that there was some confusion before and I wanted to clarify that they do in fact have the right kind, with the iron and the fluoride and everything, and she says that yes, they do have the right kind and yes, it is only available by prescription and she remembers talking to me before. And this is where I expect some kind of apology, but instead she says that I didn't write the complete description down on a slip of paper, that I just wrote baby vitamins, and I said that I showed them a bottle, but she says, "No, you didn't. You just gave me a slip of paper. You said nothing about the iron and fluoride." And we go back and forth a little with me trying to explain, and her trying to make sure I know I'm wrong.
And that's the problem here. It's not my onus to explain the finer details of the baby vitamin prescription to them -- it's for them to get when they call the pharmacy to transfer. But before bothering, they first decided to assume that I didn't have a real prescription, and to convince me that I was wrong. Instead of, I don't know, clarifying with questions or calling the pharmacy. And then when I talked to them a second time, they had to convince me that the confusion was again my fault.
I've never really gotten into power games with a pharmacist tech before. I'm have a feeling one of the technicians I dealt with was the one from a year back. WTF? What is she trying to prove exactly?
I was so upset I just called Walgreens to get the prescription transfered there. At least their disposition is indifferent. read more