Walgreens — Local services in Bedford

I have been coming to this location literally since I was a child. But tonight, June 5, 2022 roughly 1:15am, was the first time I’ve ever felt alienated at a store that over the years has gotten thousands of dollars from me. I hate large consumer maze’s such as Walmart or Costco or who ever! That is why I do the majority of my shopping needs, such as hygiene, hair care products, medical prescriptions , etc, at Walgreens. I love it but tonight was the first time I thought of leaving and going across the street to the neighborhood Walmart. I came to the store to purchase Benadryl. My allergies have been insane lately and I ran out of mine. The cashier, and please I won’t mention names, seemed to not know what HE was doing. The customer in front of me was trying to pay not realize that it was a chip reader. So swiping away and away and again away before th GENTLEMAN at the register suggested the chip reader. Ok so being in the service and retail business, I have a very good understanding on how the POS(point of sale) works. So swiping your debit, credit card or whatever so many times, if the security protocol is any good, would register all those attempts as suspicious. Low and behold the POS freezes , with me standing next in line with my Twix ice cream melting. The employees training was inadequate in my opinion. Both this technical skill and customer service skill. Finally the manager tells the employee to go to another register. Now I’ve been here longer than efficiency stands for. The purchase is finally made!! Close to fifteen minutes later. My turn. Ok I said before my allergies have been terrible so I’m there really to just purchase the medication but I always seem to walk out with more than I intended. The cashier rings my medication and asks, may I see your ID? What??? For what? Then he explains to me that is for the Benadryl. 😳 Listen, I’m 37 years old and I’ve never ever been asked that before for an over the counter medication. Let alone Benadryl. The employee starts to get rude with me for questioning that. I’m not opposed to showing my ID but in the 21st century, I hardly carry a wallet around and my ID is usually in the car and I pay with apple pay . The inconvenience was something so shocking that I felt the need to review this store( my store). I nearly walked out. The service from this particular employee needs some work. Whatever though. I’ll most likely still come in because I’m very big on brand loyalty. The ruler’s of Walgreens...

I have been on hold for 14 minutes at this point and after waiting for more than 10 minutes someone picked up the phone, hung up and when I called back it said there were more than 3 people ahead of me after I already waited through the other callers and was next in line. Who picks up the phone and puts it back on hold without saying something? And when they did, it hung up putting me to the back of the line after 10 minutes of waiting. It's now going to be 25 minutes and it just updated saying 2 others remain ahead of me. This is not the first time, and I've heard others complain about this every single time I've been here. My wife and I are treated poorly every time we visit in person and often if you call them, you can make it all the way to their store, and stand in line and speak to someone long before they will ever answer the phone. I've literally driven there and stood in line while they ignored me on the phone watching them let it ring and ring and ring. There's one guy who answers and is kind. The rest all expect someone else to do it and treat people like they should know what's going on. They don't know how to tell you why they are charging more than they should for medicine and when they finally figure it out they say it's the insurance's fault but it's too late now cause they already rang it up and insurance won't deal with it after they ring it up. They literally told me they didn't know why it was an extra $100 then rung it up and then told me after ringing it up there's nothing that can be done so I should have done it before they charged me. But they didn't tell me until AFTER they charged me! Even though I specifically asked them why it was so much more before they charged me! This place is awful and the people are rude. The manager runs a poor shop and I'm switching pharmacies. My gosh, we've got tons of options people, you earn our business or you don't get to keep it. You take money without giving any though...

Called to get a prescription delivered, proceeded to wait on the line for 25min, had the line switch hold music before just hanging up on me, called a second time, had a completely different robot system that while different was still frustrating and befuddling in many of the same ways, and shared many conventions and malignancies with the 1st robot, but after sitting on hold for another 30 odd minutes, finally someone picked up, it had taken so long that it gobsmacked me, and before i could even evoke the level of waiting i had just been through; that i had a hold-line bossfight to get to this point; that walgreens took a portion of my soul at 6am on a friday so i could ask this man to deliver my meds to me. He had already gone through all the steps with me, and i confirmed that i wanted it delivered, and he hung up before i could say anything about spending like an hour and some change of my life waiting to do something that the company could very easily set up their dumb robot to do.

And then to add insult to injury, the guy didnt even actually do it; my meds were just left on ready for pickup; and i had to pay the same price as same day shipping to get it delivered tomorrow; after very specifically waiting over an hour in the waking hours of the morning to talk to the pharmacist so i could get it today..

Does walgreens even actually provide a service? Or have they been making it this far on the whim of whispering sweet nothings into our collective ear?

If it only affected the company's bottom line; maybe there would be some solace in this world; instead we're left none but this insipid...