Kathy says:

I was picking up prescriptions for my 11 year-old son (who had pneumonia) at the Target pharmacy and was given the bag, asked if I had any questions for the pharmacist, I said “no” then paid and turned to leave (it was approximately 9 p.m.).

I looked in the bag before leaving—I was about 5 steps from the pharmacy counter, and I realized I had better ask a question about the odd looking box inside I had never seen before. Since the last time I had given my son nebulizer treatments at home, the medication had changed.

So, I turn and tell the female Target pharmacy employee that I DO in fact have a question about my prescriptions and I noticed the “iron curtain” had been pulled down behind her indicating the closure of the pharmacy. They must have pulled that down fast as I turned to ask the question in mere seconds after leaving the counter. The female then told me to “come back tomorrow at 9 a.m. We are closed.”

I didn’t pay her any mind and proceeded to take the medication out of the sack and proceed with my questions hoping she could answer them. She told me that she didn’t know the answer and repeated to me, “come back or call tomorrow at 9 a.m. I told her that I couldn’t do that as I was heading home to give my son the medication immediately and I couldn’t do that if I wasn’t sure what or how to give it. Well, she didn’t budge or even offer to get the pharmacist from behind the iron curtain. I was pretty much denied access to the pharmacist because it was something like 9:01 p.m.—after official closing time.

Kathy says she complained to the Minnesota Pharmacy Board (they were apparently horrified) and to Target itself. Target's response was to remind her of the closing time of the pharmacy.

It seems like Kathy has the situation well in hand, complaint wise, but she might consider letting Target's CEO know about the incident.

(Photo: imasuperhero )

(Photo: Ben Popken )

Rebecca got one of those calls from her mother that everybody dreads. "Is there anything you think you should tell me?" her mother wanted to know. Rebecca's mom got a piece of junk mail with Rebecca's first name and her boyfriend's last name and was under the impression Rebecca had snuck off for a Vegas wedding. She hadn't. After Rebecca calmed her mother down, she tried to figure out how Rite-Aid, where both had worked for a time, had merged her name and her boyfriend's. When Rite-Aid gave her the run around, we advised Rebecca to try an EECB to get some answers. Read her email, inside.

To The Board of Directors:

Good Morning. I am sure you can help me with a little problem that I am having with your company.

Last Friday, my mother received a piece of mail from your company's current promotion regarding the "gas giveaway" if I switched my prescriptions to you. Annoying as any other piece of junk mail is, this one was particularly disturbing. It was addressed as:

Rebecca J*****
[redacted]
[redacted] CT

My mother called me where I live, in Vermont, and told me of the mail that I had gotten. It turns out, my last name isn't J*******, it's F*******. My boyfriend's last name is J*****, though. When she called me, she was extremely agitated and excited (and not in a good way), over the fact that I had gotten married behind their backs. My mother had just gotten out of the hospital with congestive heart failure and a massive infection, and the last thing that she needed was to be excited.

I spoke with one of your customer service representatives on Monday, and she assured me that I would get a call with someone from "corporate" yesterday. I waited all day without a call. She told me that the marketing comes from the pharmacy division. My boyfriend hasn't had a prescription filled at a Rite-Aid in two and a half years, the time we've been together.

We both worked together at Rite-Aid, but never once marked myself as being "connected" to him, except by address.

I cannot figure out how my first name got linked with my boyfriend's last name. Simply what I am asking for help with is to find out where this came from.

If you could help me, it would be greatly appreciated. I simply want to know where this name came from, so I can get it removed, and make sure it doesn't happen again.

And about the piece of mail? If your pharmacy can't even get my name right, and is linking me to other people I'm not even related to (yet), how can I trust them to get my prescriptions right? More than likely, I will never do anything personally identifiable with Rite-Aid again. I was once a loyal shopper, but if this problem cannot be solved, I may never shop there again.

Thank you for your time, and for reading my email.

Looking forward to your response,

Rebecca

It's one thing if a customer loyalty program gets confused about your name. Irritating, but unlikely to actually hurt you. It's another thing completely if the pharmacy decides you'd be better off married and starts sending junk mail to your mother's house in another state. If the pharmacy makes such an appalling, counter-intuitive mistake about what name to use on annoying junk mail, how badly are they going to screw up your prescription? If you're having trouble with Rite-Aid, the link with tips for sleuthing corporate contact information is here.

(photo: Clean Wal-Mart)

At a local trip to the CVS by Rancho Bernardo High School I was appalled to discover the low regard for customer service. When you walk in there is a line where they segregate teens from adults. They allow the adults to just walk in while teenagers have to wait in a long line where only two can go in at a time. The whole time this lady and a security guard stand there while they sneer at teens. When asked about the policy and they commented that it was to prevent shoplifting and that it was legal because it wasn't excluding customers it was just dividing them by age. To me it seems to be blatant ageism, which I'm appalled at. To think that you can be discriminated against by a factor you can not control angers me deeply. Bad customer service doesn't prevent shoplifting. If anything it encourages it. It's a horrible policy on their part seeing how about 50% of their customers are students. Not just that it's an unfair bias to place on high school students, as if they are the only ones who shoplift. In addition it isn't even an effective means to prevent shoplifting, monitors at door would be a more effective option that doesn't infringe upon customer service. It's unfair for teenagers to be treated as second class citizens. When a student asked an adult, who was more than willing, if she would mind purchasing an item for him the lady at the door said to "please not disturb the customers". As if discriminating against your customers isn't disturbing the customers. The local CVS has lost my business.

It's not completely unheard of for stores to restrict the after school crowd, but it's unreasonable to think that only minors shoplift. Clearly none of these teens are Consumerist readers, or they'd already be outside the store with signs proclaiming "CVS Hates Teens!" Would you shop at this store, or are you grateful for CVS keeping the teen scourge at bay? Let us know, in the comments.

(photo:foundphotoslj)

I went to the doctor today and she suggested that I try Zyrtec for my allergies instead of a prescription. On my way back to work, I stopped by a Giant Food Store to buy some. As I was checking out, the cashier asked me if I was 30. I said no, that I am only 29 and gave him my ID. He said that he would go ahead and sell me my medicine, but not to tell anyone that he did so. When I asked why, he said that they are not allowed to sell anyone Zyrtec (and possibly other medications, but I didn’t ask) to people under 30. Luckily I had my doctor’s recommendations in my purse with me if there had been any problems, but I found the age limit of 30 to be a bit high….

Amie

We suspected this guy was just hitting on you, so we called Giant Foods and confirmed that they had no age restrictions on over-the-counter allergy medicines. Feel free to complain to the manager of the store where this apron-wearing lothario works.

She took the drugs because she thought she'd been given a generic for her normal prescription, but when she started feeling ill, she called CVS and asked them about the strange new drug. They told her it wasn't a generic for her usual prescription, but they did offer to refill it for her. Finally, Dorothy looked up the drug on the internet. That's when she found out it was a powerful chemotherapy drug.

Ms. Enriquez ended up in the hospital, and CVS ended up in Fox 5, New York's "Hall of Shame." Fox 5 went to the CVS with their camera crew and tried to interview the pharmacist who made the mistake. He wasn't willing to talk, but they did notice that he was supervising more assistants than is allowed by law. When they asked him about the violation he smiled and answered, "You're good!"

Shame, Shame, Shame: Medication Mistake [Fox 5]

It's like the pharmacy your dad would build you if you wanted to play pharmacy.

Inside, the complaint letter Nick wrote Rite Aid, in all its golden, speaking-for-itself glory.

Wherein We learn It Is Not CVS Constantly Rapping Upon Rob's Cellphone, Who Still Remains Not Stacy, But Rather A Scurrilous Online Apothecary Rooking The Hapless And Helpless, And So An Inquest On Rob's Part Ensues, Revealing Their Fell Identity And The Mewling Cries Of Victims In Their Wake...

"Hi guys

I thought I would give you an update on my calls from what I thought was CVS requesting Stacy.

They hadn't called me for over a week when I just received another call on my cell, again from the same people, (The number on my cell showed 703)asking for Stacy.

I responded "no im not Stacy, but can I ask who's calling please?" and this is where it gets interesting:
The caller was judging by the accent Indian, she told me that she was calling from RX Pharmacy and that I "use prescription drugs and they could sell them to me for cheap and make me very happy", she then wanted to know the name of the drugs that I use and she could quote me a price and have them shipped to me.

So obviously not CVS.

I requested some more information about the company but all she was willing to tell me is that the company is called RX Pharmacy, that they are based in Salt Lake City and are the largest pharmacy in the united states. After a bit more pushing she said that she would get me a supervisor who would get more information for me, but first I had to tell her what drugs I was needing and needed filled by them. So I pulled some random sounding drug name from the air, and she corrected me with Xanax, and asked how many I wanted, 50, 90 etc. I went with 90.

After a brief wait her supervisor came on the line, and a bit more prodding from me yielded their customer support number: 866-272-6256, but he would not give me an address nor their internet address, apparently I would get that after I made my order and received a "Shiny, Glossy magazine" with my order. It was at this point I told him this was a cell phone and not to bother calling me again.

So I then did a bit of research, and yielded the following:
http://www.rxlist.com/rxboard/vicodin.pl?noframes;read=83858 - complaining about the scam

http://whocalled.us/lookup/8662726256 - A lot of comments talking about the abusive number of calls these guys get, not only from this number but multiple others.

So it appears to be a scam, it also appears that I will get another call whether I like it or not, and im guessing these guys aren't based in the US so ive got no real recourse to stop the calls other than attempt to block each new number they call with.
Well thats my update!"

Previously: CVS Won't Accept You're Not Stacy

Manically, they think his name is Stacy. A slobbering mental patient at the other end will not accept his name is not Stacy. They keep on calling him, over and over and over again. Not only that, but they delight in calling his mobile, racking up his precious free minutes.

The CVS employee will not identify himself, or the specific store he works for. In infinite, creepy recursion, Robert awaits the next call, unsure of how he can possibly convince CVS that his gruff, masculine voice is that of a man, not a valley girl trick.

Robert's email, after the jump.

I have recently started receiving phone calls from CVS pharmacy, asking for someone called Stacy. Annoyingly these calls are coming to my cell phone. Each time the person calling is a bumbling idiot, barely able to put together a coherent sentence and completely able to grasp that:

1) Im not Stacy
2) Im male and therefore not Stacy
3) That they have the wrong number and therefore not Stacy
4) That they are calling a cell phone and racking up my cell phone minutes rather than Stacys
5) That despite me not being Stacy, calling back each and every day for the last week or so in the vane hope that Stacy will answer my cell phone is not going to happen

Ive tried asking them where they are calling from, telling them that they have the wrong number etc, but as soon as they figure out they hang up, only to call back the NEXT DAMN DAY.

I am currently awaiting the next call ala Groundhog Day.

I havent called corporate yet, but surely the staff should be intsructed on how to deal with wrong numbers, or does it fall to me to spend my time on fixing their mistakes?