Jeffrey Zeldman wrote a relatable post today about waiting at CVS while his prescription got sorted out. It reminded me of my own recent CVS experience, which had a few more moving parts.
I placed a free 8×10 photo order and somehow routed the pickup to a store in Haleiwa, Hawaii. I have friends there and we have visited that store before, so I suppose it made a certain kind of sense to my browser history, but not to my actual plans.
I emailed CVS to redirect it. No reply. So I called customer service, who said they would handle it but couldn’t put anything in the system. I would just have to call the store later to check. Then, feeling committed to the bit, I called the Hawaii location to let them know I would not be making it over. The woman who answered was very gracious. I imagine she thought I was strange.
A few days later I went into my local Bloomington store, browsed for the best deals, stacked my coupons and ExtraCare Plus reward, and felt pretty good about the whole trip. Until I got home and noticed I had been overcharged on two items.
When I went back to sort it out, the first employee I encountered was having a rough day and made it clear. But the manager who came over had actually checked me out the first time and remembered me, which smoothed things over considerably. By the end I had also picked up a Pokémon card on the advice of a stranger in line, because my son collects them.
Like Jeffrey, I find the people at CVS are generally good. The systems are another matter.
This post is a response to American healthcare by Jeffrey Zeldman.
