Walmart, taking my money so my family can live better?
Two weeks ago my wife was released from surgery with five medications to take. Of course our presecriptions are at our local walmart. However, our self employed insurance only covers 2 prescriptions each thirty days which we had used for her pre op meds. So, i went by my local walmart, the only one in our small town, and had them give me a price quote on the five meds. Over two hundred dollars. One of the meds cost 125 by itself. Distraught and looking at my finances and the costs of the meds, i opted to get a quote from a private family run pharmacy in our city of 7000 people.
They quoted all the meds at 134 with the one med that cost 125 at walmart only costing 24 dollars at the family pharmacy. I was awestruck, So i called the CLarksville Arkansas walmart pharmacy and asked the pharmacist why the med cost so much there. His only excuse was that prices were set by corporate offive in Bentonville. Well, living in Arkansas I called about 20 numbers until i got a guy in pricing at Walmart Corporate. He listened to me and said he would call me back before the end of the day.
In the mean time called the other three pharmacies in our city and got price quotes form them, there prices ranged from 55 dollars to 23 dollars for the same med. Finally, the next day, I called the pricing guy back at Walmart Corporate and he refered me to the district manager. I called the district manage for Clarksville Walmart and he told me that prices were set by corporate and are competitive with other national pharmacies only, not with local pharmacies, I asked him how a 100 dollar difference in prices is being competitive? He only said that Walmart would price match.
What is amazing to me is that the price difference was 100 dollars. Obviously, walmart off sets their four dollar prescriptions by grossly overcharging for other prescriptions. I encourage all to check local private pharmacies after getting a price quote from walmart. Most have insurance to cover all medications. But for those of us who have limited insurance or no insurance, make phone calls and check prices, Walmart is not always the lowest in this case they were not even in the ball park. With that being said, for me and my family, Walmart will never fill another prescription for us again.
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