Walgreens — Attraction in West Lake Hills

I have now switched pharmacies, having created an account at this Walgreens pharmacy only a couple of months ago. A phantom claim was submitted two weeks ago to my insurer and paid even though no refill was dispensed and I was unaware of their actions for about ten days — until they refused to refill my prescription, and failed to fix a problem of their own making.

It took a conference call with a customer service representative at my insurer’s, who eventually proceeded to browbeat a Walgreen employee and her testy, uncooperative supervisor, before the issue was resolved. Before calling him I had tried multiple times to secure the refill I was owed and Walgreens was refusing to dispense.

I was put through several days of misleading information via both their iOS app and electronic messages, followed by the failures to dispense. Walgreens eventually left me with no medication from the prescription despite known risks associated with sudden treatment interruption. It was not until I made a store visit that I was told about the imaginary refill less than two weeks before. When I made it clear nothing was ever dispensed on that date and suggested the app was involved, the employee promised to take care of fixing the problem the next day. Around noon the next day I returned and spoke to the pharmacist in charge. Nothing had been done, and she knew nothing about the matter.

Throughout this experience with Walgreens, no one, at any point, offered to dispense without involving my insurance plan. No one offered to dispense a limited amount to tide me over until some date on which my plan could be used. When I asked the pharmacist point blank about the consequences of sudden treatment interruption, she recited the minor ones but failed to say a word about the major ones. I had just handed her the empty pill bottle. At that point I told her to cancel everything in the Walgreens system as I had decided to have the prescription transferred to another pharmacy.

Every step of the way, the attitude at Walgreens had been to pass the buck to my insurer and make no effort to remedy the problem affecting me as a patient. I did not yet know that had previously charged my insurer for medication that was never dispensed — in another state.

My insurer’s customer representative was very persistent, even more so when he uncovered the phantom refill tied to some store in Arizona where I had never set foot. That is when our call became a conference call. (I later got two calls from an Arizona number: it was the unpleasant supervisor from the conference call. I ignored both.)

Eventually, my insurer’s customer representative, after devoting over an hour to sleuthing and advocating for his client, told me my new pharmacy would be able to proceed normally using my insurance plan; told me what the charge would be; and specified when the system would be purged of the spurious claim from Walgreens. When I showed up everything was back to normal — and the co-pay was actually lower than at Walgreens. Maybe they have to charge extra for the remarkably consistent lack of professional ethics and customer service, while pocketing insurance money in exchange...

AVOID THIS PHARMACY AT ALL COSTS! I have been filling my prescriptions both here, which is near my work and at HEB which is near my home, and the contrast could not be more striking. Because of convenience I have put up with long lines, alerts that my rx was ready when it in fact was not and sub par customer service at Walgreens but yesterday was the per verbiage last straw. I picked up 2 prescriptions and neither were completely filled. They claim they informed me the day I dropped the prescription off, however I don’t remember, but they definitely did not inform me the day I picked it up and paid for it. There WAS a hand written note in the bag informing me that only 44 of the 60 tabs of one prescription and 19 of the 30 of the other prescription were filled. I’m a dentist and this would be like me running out of composite and only filling half the tooth and then telling the patient about it with a hand written note placed in their take home goodie bag!!! Unacceptable in my opinion.

It’s not the fact that they were unable to fulfill my order, or the fact that I now have no idea if my insurance will pay for the remainder of my months supply of medication, or the completely unapologetic response to my frustration, not to mention the hoops I now have to jump thru to contact my physician to get a partial prescription sent, that was enraging, it was the lack of communication that is unacceptable to me. Had I known the full amount of my monthly supply of medication was not available I would have filled it elsewhere.

As heath care providers we have a duty and obligation to our customers to go above and beyond when it comes to effective communication. We must always assume that telling someone something once a week prior is never enough. It is this lack of care or concern that leads me to leave this review. Save yourself the headache and get your stuff...

Just for anyone expecting to get a covid test here. I arrived to Walgreens at 4 and promptly got in line for my 4:30 appointment. Confirmation email states to come at least 5 minutes before, I came 30 minutes before just to be safe. Upon arrival there was over 9 cars in line. I attempted to call the pharmacy to let them know that I was in line and didn't want to miss my testing appointment. You are informed to not go inside for covid testing so I wanted to respect that. After 1 1/2 hours of waiting we finally get to the window, just to be told that they stop covid testing at 5. Which is nowhere mentioned in their website or in any confirmation emails sent to me. I explained that we've been waiting over an hour and the girls response was, "well just reschedule online." This is 2 days before thanksgiving, there are NO other appointments anywhere for a rapid. The girl in the window as well as the pharmacist didn't seem to care and reiterated that I'd be required to reschedule and they can't do anything because they stop at 5. So, if you schedule an afternoon covid test, make sure you get there before 3:30PM to ensure that you can actually get your...