MEDS: Costco vs Walmart

[RCSAR]

I'm here to shill for costco.
Went to get a script filled (walmart) for a drug that just went generic.
Looked it up on the costco site. 35.07
http://www.costco.com/Pharmacy/DrugInformation.aspx?p=1

Walmart was going to give me a discount because I have no insurance for $500. and change

This for the same drug, dose and generic maker, with both being cost for a 100ct bottle.

If you have a Cosco near you find your drug on the link above. Then call around and see if anyone is even close to the price. Also no membership is needed to buy from the pharmacy at Costco per fed law.

I'm posting this because walmart called me a liar when I told them the costco price and ask them to match it. After many words exchanged with the pharmacist calling me a liar I left.

I went to Costco and bought the drug and ask the pharmacist to give it to to me in the factory bottle and put the label on the back side so the makers name (Teva same as walmart) was visible. Went back to walmart showed him the bottle and reciept. He said Costco must have made and error. I just said, whos the liar now.
I was ask not to return.

Costco also does fill by mail too if is too far to make the drive.
Seldom do I get on here and rant but this went up my backside sideways.

I suggest you price check and don't take my word for it.
I will still go to walmart if I ever get a script on the walmart $4 list. It will take me a while to cool down some as I don't like being called a liar. It was not worth the attorney cost to drag him over the counter and motivate him to change his attitude.

[Double_A]

Good job. Perhaps your thread will be enough for Wallmart to make some changes or at least cal a Pharm' on the carpet.

[kemosabe]

The hell with walmart...

The clinic I go to has their own in-house pharmacy, where everything is very cheap and/or reasonably priced... To get my pain meds (lortab 7.5/500 90 count) filled there it is only $19.99 , as I do not have any insurance ...

But it so happened today, being the end of the month, they were completely out..This is the 2nd month in a row that they were depleted.. (I guess from what the clinic's pharmacist told me, down in Florida, dr.'s are prescribing painmeds like candy for pretty much any reason, and Florida is where all the pain meds are going, causing shortages elsewhere..)

Last month , I ended up going to a local mom and pops pharmacy, and for the exact same thing, they charged me $36... I was crappy , freakin $16 more ...

So anyways , today after being told the clinic was out AGAIN, I called around trying to hopefully find the cheapest place to get my pain medicine filled, as I didn't want to have to spend $36 that I didn't have .. So , not wanting to pay $36, I called around...

EVERYWHERE I called, walgreens, costco,payless,CVS were anywhere from $48 , all the way to $55 ..

So I decided to give walmart a call ..

Namebrand , was $200 !!!!! and generic... (which the generic they have are the sucky
Mollenkropt(sp?) with imprint M358 .. I don't care for those generics, as they upset my stomach) Anyways they wanted freakin $65 for them!!...

I said you gotta be kidding me... I thought walmart was supposed to be cheap and reasonably priced.. and hung up..


So yea screw walmart ..

[Mercury3]

I'd heard Costco was cheaper but when I checked my Cytomel for Thyroid it was substantially more at Costco than the only Medco pharmacy where I order it from.

[kemosabe]

Also , u should check out Meijer .. On alot of drugs, mostly antibiotics, you can get them filled for free .. They have a huge list of RX's you can get filled for free... That's where I get all my antibiotics..

[Ravekid]

I'm posting this because walmart called me a liar when I told them the costco price and ask them to match it. After many words exchanged with the pharmacist calling me a liar I left.

I went to Costco and bought the drug and ask the pharmacist to give it to to me in the factory bottle and put the label on the back side so the makers name (Teva same as walmart) was visible. Went back to walmart showed him the bottle and reciept. He said Costco must have made and error. I just said, whos the liar now.
I was ask not to return.

Seldom do I get on here and rant but this went up my backside sideways.

I will still go to walmart if I ever get a script on the walmart $4 list. It will take me a while to cool down some as I don't like being called a liar. It was not worth the attorney cost to drag him over the counter and motivate him to change his attitude.

Why are you so angry about this? I don't understand why folks want to complain and drag on and on and on about prices/service. As soon as Walmart gave you the higher price, why continually debate the issue? Ask for a price match, and if the answer is no/they don't believe you/whatever, then go to Costo and give them your money. Why reward Walmart, even with a price match, with your business? You seriously wanted to cause physical harm to someone engaged in a simple business transaction....take a step back and breath a bit. There are a lot more things to worry about in life than something like this.

[Moggy]

This on-line site lists the best discount drugstores...it's worth a look:

http://deepdrugdiscounts.com/

[RCSAR]

I was not mad over the the price so much as when the man called me a liar.
It would be silly to get in a fight over a price of an item.

I guess things are just different here in this small part of Texas.

[amarilla]

Costco is the only place I know of that offers a generic for Ponstel (NSAID type drug.) Only $5 there. The name brand is over $1000 cash.

A

[rafter]

I'm here to shill for costco.
Went to get a script filled (walmart) for a drug that just went generic.
Looked it up on the costco site. 35.07
http://www.costco.com/Pharmacy/DrugInformation.aspx?p=1

Walmart was going to give me a discount because I have no insurance for $500. and change

This for the same drug, dose and generic maker, with both being cost for a 100ct bottle.

If you have a Cosco near you find your drug on the link above. Then call around and see if anyone is even close to the price. Also no membership is needed to buy from the pharmacy at Costco per fed law.

I'm posting this because walmart called me a liar when I told them the costco price and ask them to match it. After many words exchanged with the pharmacist calling me a liar I left.

I went to Costco and bought the drug and ask the pharmacist to give it to to me in the factory bottle and put the label on the back side so the makers name (Teva same as walmart) was visible. Went back to walmart showed him the bottle and reciept. He said Costco must have made and error. I just said, whos the liar now.
I was ask not to return.

Costco also does fill by mail too if is too far to make the drive.
Seldom do I get on here and rant but this went up my backside sideways.

I suggest you price check and don't take my word for it.
I will still go to walmart if I ever get a script on the walmart $4 list. It will take me a while to cool down some as I don't like being called a liar. It was not worth the attorney cost to drag him over the counter and motivate him to change his attitude.

Take your story to Bentonville. There was no call for you to have to be treated that way. www.walmart.com/contactus

[Jeff B.]

I'm a pretty dedicated Costco shopper but have never moved my prescriptions there. It's probably about time to check to see if they accept our insurance. It's also interesting to see the variety of options that the folks have put up. With the price of medicine, it's well worth the time to check 4 - 5 sources.

If you've seen the recent CNBC "Costco Craze" special, they make a big deal out of Costco selling everything in bulk, which to a degree is true. Many items, however, are packaged in individually usable sizes put together into a large pack. It's not all giant one sized bags/boxes of stuff.

Jeff B.

[51plymouth]

My BP meds are $56 a month at walmart and $27 for 3 months at costco. It pays to shop around.

[DustMusher]

I was not mad over the the price so much as when the man called me a liar.
It would be silly to get in a fight over a price of an item.

I guess things are just different here in this small part of Texas.

Don't know what part of Texas, but if you have one go to HEB and ask about the Platinum Card they offer - something like $18 to get it --- well worth the cost Methocarbam (muscle relaxant) is $35/mo with my insurance --- $5 with the platinum card. I always ask the tech to price check insurance vs card and they will charge me the lower of the two. They have the $5/mo and $10/90 days; pluse for me it is 4 miles vs 28 to the nearest Walmart.

YMMV

DM

[Blastoff]

You must shop for your medical needs the same way you shop for a car or groceries or whatever. If getting the best price matters to you, you must ask for prices and comparison shop.

[summerthyme]

DustMusher... you can get your Methocarbamol at www*all*day*chemist*com (remove the *) and put the periods in the appropriate place- no sense in giving search engines any more help...

I don't know what a "Month's supply" is for you, but they charge around 16 cents a pill. (unfortunately, they're out of stock right now.. damn, and I need to get some ordered soon!)

And yeah, I do understand being pissed off if someone calls you a liar over price matching! That's just WRONG.. and I would report them to the main Walmart organization. I don't care what meds you need, you don't need to have a nasty, snarky pharmacist...

Summerthyme

[DrJerry]

I luv getting my meds in the mail. Cheap, no hassle. One phone call does it once I got account set up. Most generics are under $4 and they pay the postage.
My advice: Shop around on line.

Yes I am a "Doctor" Ph.D. not M.D.

[ivantherussian03]

I don't think it is as simple as just comparing costs. Each store has pluses and minuses for filling perscriptions at each store. The biggest factor might be simple convienence. In my situation, neither would work; the phamacy I use is far cheaper, fills pescriptions automatically, bills my insurance, and delivers for free. Plus they are more flexible than either Costco or Walmart.

Bottom line shop around

[Caver78]

In no way should a Pharmacist ever pull a stunt like calling someone a liar as all they had to do is call Costco to verify. Besides all the great cost comparison info everyone posted I'd like to add...
http://pharmacychick.blogpharm.com/
http://drugmonkey.blogspot.com/
http://www.theangriestpharmacist.com/

I have found a wealth of info on how the drug companies are screwing us, screwing them, and our Doctors are getting snow jobs to prscribe us the more expensive crap. Also buried in there are usually law changes that hose the little guy and make the whole system more complicated to navigate.

For anyone with a strong stomach is--
http://thehappyhospitalist.blogspot.com/

Even among other blogging doctors this guy has been voted a universal douche-bag. HOWEVER....he is absolutely stupid enough to tell you eagerily how he increases his revinues by playing with the medical codes ect.....

Yes it's apparently legal, but since I read his crap I can now prevent any of our Doc's from padding the bill and have at least some of the Billing codes to check for. You will have to go thru his older posts for this info but it was worth it. I have saved Medicare lots of money doing this, and reduced our co-pay by NOT paying for procedures we didn't have but were slipped into the bill.

Most Doc's are honest, but by the time your paperwork goes to the medical coders they almost have a ''set menu'' of things they assume the Doc did but never happened. One of the most egregarious is the ''smoking cessation consultation'' if your Doc so much as asks you if you are thinking about quitting it adds quite a fee to your bill. Since I also have a say in services I deem necessary or relevant to my visit I had a friendly chat with our Internist and it was no problem for him to help me make sure his coders weren't adding this to our bill along with a couple of other things so we only paid for actual services rendered.

He was suprised I read medical Blogs tho......and nursing blogs.

I don't think folks know how badly the medical people are being squeezed by healthcare systems to milk the federal laws for every last dime, or how unhappy they are about it as much as we are. Lots of the posts are about internal regs being changed, or law changes that screw us as consumers. Stuff we have no access to any other way if they didn't speak up. Two great ones are,

http://drgrumpyinthehouse.blogspot.com/
http://crasspollination.blogspot.com/

[Irish]

I am not happy with Walmart either. Hubby had his scripts sent there when we started traveling because they were supposed to be able to be filled at any Walmart. Well, not in AZ. They have to call the last Walmart that filled the script to verify how many refills etc. and it takes at least 2 days for them to do that. When we came back to Iowa for an emergency last winter - hubby forgot his meds and we went to the Iowa City Walmart and no problem - filled them right away.

He gets his scripts from the VA now - filled at Walmart and even though the last time he refilled his pain med it was $4 - now it is $150 - same script. Called VA and they changed to a higher mg and it was $4???? None of this is making sense any more.

[Josie]

A couple of years ago while on vacation, hubby developed a severe sinus infection. Called the doc back home and he "called in" a script to the Walmart closest to our hotel. I went in about 6:30 p.m. on a Tuesday to pick it up. I walk right up to the counter because NO ONE is there and give the name on the script. Well, it JUST came in (we called the doc an hour and a half earlier and his office was going to call it in asap.). It won't be ready for another 45 minutes!!! What?? I looked around to make sure and there still is no one around. They will text me on my cell when it's ready if I want. No where else to go, so I bum around the store and sure enough, 45 minutes later I get the text! Since when does it take 45 minutes to fill a perscription? Just a ploy to keep you in the store and buy stuff. Jokes on them. I only purchased the $5 script!!

[rafter]

I am not happy with Walmart either. Hubby had his scripts sent there when we started traveling because they were supposed to be able to be filled at any Walmart. Well, not in AZ. They have to call the last Walmart that filled the script to verify how many refills etc. and it takes at least 2 days for them to do that. When we came back to Iowa for an emergency last winter - hubby forgot his meds and we went to the Iowa City Walmart and no problem - filled them right away.

He gets his scripts from the VA now - filled at Walmart and even though the last time he refilled his pain med it was $4 - now it is $150 - same script. Called VA and they changed to a higher mg and it was $4???? None of this is making sense any more.

Must of been an idiot at the Wal-mart in Az. We traveled all winter and we had meds filled in Walmarts in Nevada, California, and Surprise Az with no problem...but I could have just as easily had them filled at Costco, as they are everywhere and we are members. I'll be checking out the prices.

[naturallysweet]

I love the way people check and double check to find the cheapest price and best quality and service for their prescriptions. Now if only people were allowed and encouraged to do that for the actual medical services. I'd love to see doctors advertising their prices and hospitals having pricing menus for comparisons.