[Sidney Lanier]

Constantly hearing all the hype about Wal-Mart Pharmacy having the lowest prices on generic drugs, I went out of my way to get a generic prescription filled at a local Wal-Mart Pharmacy in NY (my first prescription in 2008, filled in June). When I picked up the prescription, I was a little stunned to be charged more than $141! I knew I had not yet met my deductible on my (nightmare of a) Part D Prescription Drug Plan, but somehow I did not expect a generic to cost this much.

Barely a week later we were traveling in Arizona and we stopped in at a Fry's Supermarket (a grocery chain owned by Kroger's, a large company but tiny in contrast to Wal-Mart). While my wife shopped for a few items, I chatted with the pharmacy assistant at the in-store pharmacy, and out of curiosity I asked how much this prescription would cost there. Ready for this? $64.49! Less than half the price I had paid at Wal-Mart Pharmacy! I asked for an 'official' printout of this information on a pharmacy form, which they happily gave me. A friend we were traveling with advised me to call the pharmacy manager at the actual store where I had purchased the prescription.

As soon as we returned to NY I did so. I spoke with a very pleasant man--the pharmacy manager--who listened thoughtfully and asked me to fax the printout from Fry's, which I did. He later called me back and told me that he had phoned Fry's and was told that I was covered under some kind of Fry's plan. I told him this could not possibly have been the case, that I was a tourist in Phoenix, that we were merely in the store to shop for a few items, and that we had never been in a Fry's store before. At that point he suggested that I speak with the pharmacy district manager, that he would refer the matter to him, and that I should expect to receive a phone call from him, which came within a day or two.

The district manager, equally pleasant, told me that Fry's Pharmacy has a heavily discounted price for this one medication and not for any other! I don't believe that he called Fry's to come up with this strange suggestion, but I could be wrong. I told him that I could not dispute this, as this was the only generic whose price I had checked on, but it seemed so unlikely that they sell hundreds (thousands?) of different generic prescription meds and I just happened to inquire about the one with the special price? I told him that I believed that Wal-Mart Pharmacy should price-match the Fry's price since it was the lowest I found. After checking with his regional manager, he told me that they would not honor this request, since I did not find the lower price at a pharmacy within the region, even though he assured me that the price I had paid at Wal-Mart Pharmacy would be exactly the same at every single Wal-Mart Pharmacy in the country.

I explained to him about TOTV and how it worked and that I intended to share this experience with my fellow TV residents. I am troubled by this from the point of view that Wal-Mart Pharmacy has generated a picture of itself as selling generic drugs at the absolute lowest prices. This has been proven not to be so, and if this is true for this one, it could be true for countless others. The bottom line, IMHO, as suggested to me by the pharmacy manager and my Part D plan clerk, is to be a proactive consumer and find out exactly how much a prescription is going to cost before buying it. I might add, BTW, that though this makes sense, this is not easy to do, as when I sought out the price of this med at other pharmacies, they told me that they cannot tell me a price (other than a cash price as if I walked in the door without any coverage) without actually filling the prescription and filing it online with my insurance company to know how much to charge me.

I know for sure that I will not return to Wal-Mart Pharmacy based on this experience....