CVS — Local services in Vernon

yet another horrible experience I faced in the talcottville Vernon CT location. I visited to make a return, Assisted by Edi. I was asked for the original DEBIT card used. I kindly explained that I no longer had the card, now curious of my options. He was unsure & called Heather over to HELP. Heather informed me that I would have to return the items in exchange for a store credit or “attempt” to make the return in “hopes of the money going back to my account”. (I paid debit so I assumed debit = CASH). Not the case here but I said ok with receiving a store credit. As Edi continued my return, 2 women stood in line. Heather stepped away from Edi(who’s behavior showed he was still in need of her assistance)in order to take the next customer. Edi made an error, now having to restart the return over. he asked Heather for assistance again & I quote: “it will not allow me to scan in the other card for return”. Heather responded “well I guess she can only return 1 card”, continued with her customer & attempted to take the next person when I asked if she minds helping Edi & I first. She came over, analyzed the transaction & said “it seems as if you can only return 1 card not both” with attitude. I am now confused & embarrassed because the transaction worked the 1st time & should have been voided to be reprocessed. there are now people behind me, witnessing my inconvenient experience & I am being shown to hold up the line. I have returned before, without an error being my fault but Heather presented that there was nothing more she could do to get me my full refund back. The negative energy & frustration was supported by distasteful comments she made while “helping” but again this was not my fault & that is how she was making me feel. I expressed that I would appreciate being treated like a respected, valued customer who’s transaction was a priority, like everyone else & to resolve my issue at hand before further assisting anyone else. Heather’s response to me was “yea ok”.. in a very sarcastic tone. I was shocked by her response— up until this point, I was extremely patient & cooperative through the inconvenience & mistreatment by Heather. She reacted as if it was an issue to assist me, continuing to comment under her breath & show that she had very little empathy of my situation. It wasn’t until I asked for assistance, for Edi on behalf of helping me, that I got it from this “experienced” employee. After I informed Heather of me staying until the return was processed correctly, she rudely told me to “stop talking to her” & that she “WILL refuse my transaction & I can come back tomorrow to fix this”. That her “30 year of retail experience does not need any retraining”. I am now truly disgusted by her level of unprofessionalism. I did not appreciate how she spoke or handled my situation, talking down to me as if I was any less than her. My horrifying experiences seems to always be in this location, reason I no longer visit if I can help it. The smart comments towards me while fixing an error, rudely telling me to stop talking & threatening to refuse to assist me, was all Insinuations that Heather did not feel she had to help or value/respect me as a human being. I called to inform Denise Cato of my terrible experience in her store & her response was that Heather was not wrong. Denise asked what did I want her to do about the situation as her not being present she could not “take sides”. when quoting Heather’s comments towards me & how they made me feel, Denise justified that it was handled correctly & started to get very defensive, raising her voice & talking over me. I asked for corporate contact as I am truly beside myself for the audacious behavior during my visit & phone call so I will be filing a grievance with cvs corporation as when speaking to the supervisor, Denise, she expressed it was none of her importance nor concern how her employee handled the situation. Also, that Heather felt comfortable enough to present such unprofessional behavior towards me with out care of her actions or how it would...

BEWARE: READ BELOW I’ve had more problems with this CVS pharmacy than 𝙖𝙣𝙮 other I’ve dealt with.

First off, this pharmacy NEVER answers the phone — you're forced to leave a voicemail & either wait for a callback or physically go in to the store to get an answer. It’s incredibly frustrating, especially when you only have a 2 second question that needs to be answered. (Or you can try to find the answer to your question at CVS.com — however, I've been told firsthand by two different pharmacy techs that what is reflected in the system is often wrong).

I believe that this is a major contributer as to why to why the drive-thru pick-up line is always backed up out into the street. I've waited up to an hour just to pick up a prescription!

I think another contributing factor is the lack of staff in the pharmacy. The customer demand for this area is so much greater than what this skeleton crew staffing level can handle. Many times you have only one pharmacist and one pharmacy tech at peak times & then everyone is rushed, unable to ask questions or have an actual discourse with the pharmacist. Not only does this contribute to poor customer service but it's also dangerous, & that's how mistakes are made. Speaking of which...

This CVS pharmacy has gotten two of my prescriptions wrong—and 𝗯𝗼𝘁𝗵 𝘄𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗿𝗼𝗹𝗹𝗲𝗱 𝘀𝘂𝗯𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗻𝗰𝗲𝘀. When I brought this to the pharmacy's attention—without any investigation into my complaint—I was immediately met with sarcastic, incredulous disbelief from the pharmacist and was told that my medication "𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘧𝘪𝘦𝘥 𝘣𝘺 𝘵𝘸𝘰 𝘱𝘩𝘢𝘳𝘮𝘢𝘤𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘴 𝘴𝘰 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘯𝘰 𝘸𝘢𝘺 𝘱𝘰𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘣𝘭𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘮𝘺 𝘮𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘤𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥 𝘣𝘦 𝘸𝘳𝘰𝘯𝘨." I was then dismissed with half of my medication missing & the same arrogant disbelief that I was met with. I couldn't believe it! After someone finally reviewed the pharmacy footage they realized that they 𝙝𝙖𝙙 distributed the wrong amount of medication. Apparently they then checked the count of their stock, they confirmed it. All the condescending, dismissive cynicism that I received was completely unwarranted & to remedy this, I was left a 10 sec. voicemail telling me to to pick up the rest of my medication, without so much as an apology let alone a mention that they handled the situation Inappropriately — and this happened to me 𝙩𝙬𝙞𝙘𝙚!!!

Inside the actual CVS store itself is no better. The CVS store is 𝘀𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗲𝗹𝘆 understaffed. Most of the time, there's only one person working in the entire store, and as patrons you're left to figure things out on your own. If you need something unlocked, you’ll have to wait for this one employee to eventually make their way to you. The situation is even worse at self-checkout—if your order needs assistance, you could be stuck waiting for an indefinite amount of time. It’s beyond frustrating.

The poor employees working at this CVS are now so shorthanded that it's impossible to give each customer the attention that he/she deserves. I remember a time when CVS had dedicated staff for specific areas of the store, like beauty for example, & their customer service was absolutely 𝗣𝗛𝗘𝗡𝗢𝗠𝗘𝗡𝗔𝗟! The beauty expert knew exactly what each and every skin care product did, how it worked, & which conditions it was best used for. I once saw the beauty expert myself. She helped me with a persistent skin issue that I had been struggling with for a few years. In just one meeting, she recommended the perfect skin care routine based on my individual needs. It worked perfectly to address my needs within the first month. She then followed up with me after a few months just to see how everything was working. I 𝙨𝙩𝙞𝙡𝙡 use that same regimen to this day. Unfortunately, that kind of personalized customer service is long gone from this store.

I’ve made the decision to transfer my family’s prescriptions, along with my own,...

This pharmacy is so frustrating and I won’t be going here again. This is now the 3rd time I’ve had inefficiency and rude staff.

Today’s experience was negative enough for me to come here and write a review.

I just got a hysterectomy done and need my pain meds. I went to a post op appointment and asked them to call it in to this pharmacy (despite my better judgement) because it was closest. After the appointment we went for lunch and did some grocery shopping to give the pharmacy time. 2 hours later we went to the counter. It was 1:28pm. The counter was chaos - so many people trying to be helped. We got called up by a blonde woman with glasses who immediately told me my prescription was still not ready and it wouldn’t be ready until after their lunch break - at least 2:30. She then said they were all going on to lunch and the pharmacy was closing. She didn’t offer to ring up the items we were buying, didn’t offer empathy or any human touch at all. What really drove me over the edge is she then scream back behind us to this one elderly woman waiting by herself (the only other person online) “we’re closing for lunch you’ll have to come back later”. This poor woman was the only other person in line, she was elderly and was being yelled at to come back in an hour. It was just so rude. We left and then 15 minutes later I got a text telling me my prescription was ready. How the heck does that make sense? So we either could have waited just 15 minutes to get it or it was already ready and the woman just needed her lunch break so badly that she couldn’t bother to help us.

So the big problems with this location: More of a CVS problem - I do not understand the rhyme or reason for sending all employees to lunch at the same time - completely screwing over those in line and stopping operations for an hour. Why not stagger lunch breaks so the business can keep running like every other company. Having my prescription for over an hour and still not having it ready for me. The one that’s the least forgivable - rude employees. Just have empathy, be nice, be helpful. It’s not that hard.

It can happen once, maybe even twice but now three times - it’s clearly the place and not...