Valerie got some free parenting advice from a CVS cashier. She says that when she took her 1-year-old daughter in to get some Benadryl to sooth her rash, the cashier refused to sell it to her because it says on the bottle that the product is for kids 4 and older. Valerie says she’d already gotten the approval from the pediatrician.
She writes:
I went to CVS to buy Benadryl my 1yr old was scratching her face, turning red, getting little bumps on her face and I picked up the children’s Benadryl and the cashier would not sell it to me and she saw how my baby face looked, she said do you see this under 4 do not take and refused to sell it to me even though her pediatrician said it was OK.I had to drive 10 min to another CVS to get it and watch my daughter closely to make sure her throat did not swell but her lip became swollen on one side and one eye was a little swollen . I got the Benadryl at the other CVS no problem. The next day I called the CVS and spoke to the supervisor and she apologized and took my name and number and said she was going to talk to the manager over her about the cashier, here it is two weeks later no phone call.
I am so mad I wish I could sue them for her refusing to sell me medication for my child because of her own personal thoughts.That was a very serious situation. Did she really think I would just give my daughter medication without consulting her pedi? What should I do?
If I were Valerie I would have told the clerk that my daughter looked young for her age and thanked her for the compliment. What would you have said?
easy solution: drop the $4 on the counter, and walk out. you’re not stealing, and she has no right (legally or otherwise) to refuse accepting your payment for the product, so legally you’re not stealing it.
I just had a horrible experience at my local CVS.
I selected a handful of items I needed and proceeded to the checkout. Nobody was up there but myself and one other customer, however, soon after that a line formed behind me.
3 cashiers on 3 registers to take care of under 6 people. That’s fine, after years of working retail I can appreciate wanting to expedite a line.
I get rung up and swipe my debit card at the same time that I realize I hadn’t used my CVS card. I’m not necessarily blaming the cashier for this, just stating that I realized I hadn’t used it. So, I ask her simply and politely BEFORE I verify any charge on the card or have even provided my PIN if any of the items on my bill were subject to a discount based on the CVS card. I had also wanted cash back.
I guess she was pushing buttons to force the transaction through faster, because I did not have the opportunity to sign for anything, provide a PIN for anything or opt to get cash back.
now all of a sudden, without discussing it with me, she starts slamming my items back out on the counter and initiates an item-by-item return. For this purchase that I have not even verified. I shop there often, I know how many screens you have to go through before the transaction is approved.
so here we are:
1) cashier rails my card through inappropriately (illegally?)
2) initiates a return based on a simple question without giving me any choice in the matter
3) acts all ridiculous slamming my items down
so we ring everything up again, and lo and behold, even with my CVS card being swiped, the total is exactly the same as where we started. My original question was never answered, but the total I am given here in the end was my answer. None of this was necessary, there were no items effected by swiping the CVS card or not.
Of course once I’m rung up this final time there’s not enough money in my account to actually make the purchase.
I got a (shrug) and a superficial barrage of “I’m sorry.”
my point in the end being, I feel kind of violated by how my card was handled by this cashier.
Top related post: Feds make CVS pay $77.6 million for not monitoring sale of meth ingredients.
I’m not exactly sure why the lowest head on the totem pole would care about CVS’ profits, but…