A little rant about Walgreens

It seems like EVERY time I go into Walgreens to do a deal I somehow end up getting "screwed."  Either I end up spending more than I thought I should have or the employees are rude or the store coupons don't work and on and on!  They just lost me as a customer because of it!

I know that I just started "strategic" shopping not too long ago, but feel like I have done it enough to be able to come up with a list of what I am getting, the coupons I am using and how much I should be paying at the end.  EVERY time I go to Walgreens the total is more than what I have figured.  I don't know if it is because I am missing something (which I kind of doubt I would EVERY time, since it usually only at Walgreens that this happens) or if they are not entering a coupon, or if their ad is wrong or if stuff is ringing up wrong.  I suppose I could go through the cryptic receipt to try to figure out what is going on.  And if this were the only problem at Walgreens, I would do so.  But it isn't.

The second issue I am having with Walgreens is the totally inconvenient and misleading "Register Rewards."  It says right on the front that it is a $ amount off your next in store purchase.  Well, apparently they are not good on ANY in store purchase.  There can not be more items in the transaction than manufacture and Register Reward coupons (SO, if you were to buy something, use a manufactures coupon on that item, you could not use the RR).  They are not rolling with the same item (like you can't buy something, get the RR, then turn around and use those RR to buy another one), which I knew, but apparently (this is what the cashier told me at least) it isn't rolling toward a whole brand or manufacture (like all P&G items).  Like I said, this is just what I was told, so it could be totally wrong.  But seriously-how much harder can you make it to redeem the incentive to get a customer into the store!  Which brings me to the next issue I have.

The employees at Walgreens are usually pretty nice, but not always.  I would say 75% of the times I have been in there they have been reasonable and tried to be helpful.  But there is the 25% of the time when the cashiers have been rude or have told me that I could not do certain things with coupons when the coupon policy clearly says you can or they have been unwilling to work with me to figure out why a coupon won't take when it should, etc.  And they don't really know what they are doing at all when it comes to coupons, even their own in store coupons (like RR)!  Even the managers I find don't know the coupon policy and what can or cannot be done/used in their own store.

This afternoon I went to Walgreens and got an item that was FREE after RR and a couple more things that had good RR attached to them.  The transaction was SUPPOSED TO be $7.99 plus tax.  It ended up being a little over $10.  This could be right since you normally get taxed on the amount before coupons.  I got back a $10 RR and a $6 RR.

Tonight I went on a "quick" trip (it ended up being an hour after all was said and done) to finish my other two transactions that should have been less than a dollar total before tax.  The first transaction wouldn't take my RR, so they cashier had to call the manager, void the transaction and then we had to do it in 2 separate transactions in order to take the RR.  Because of this, one of the transactions was like $5 for some reason!  And the second one was over $2!  DEFINITELY NOT UNDER $1!  Anyway, I got back (2) $5 RR for these transactions.  Then for my supposed 2nd transaction-one of the coupons wouldn't scan, so the cashier had to call the manager AGAIN and she almost gave me the run around until I told her that the Walgreens earlier today was able to do it somehow.  She did give me the coupon.  But then, once again, when it was time to ring out, they would not take both RR!  They ended up having to void it AGAIN!  I told them I would just take the stuff to equal the one RR and leave the rest.  I was totally apologizing this whole time for making it so difficult for them.  I really did feel bad for them since it wasn't their fault the stupid RR wouldn't work.  As I was finishing I told them I really appreciated their patience and the manager said, "Yes, but we are definitely done here; no more transactions tonight."  What the?!  Nice.  I was done because I was tired of trying to figure it all out, but that was totally out of line in my opinion.  It wasn't my fault that the rules for each RR aren't written on them!  I really feel like they should have been apologizing to ME, the customer, for making their coupons so hard to use!  

Trips like this totally turn me off to strategic shopping/couponing.  I LOVE to do it, I LOVE saving money, but seriously, I spent some time last night figuring out how I could best use my RR for the least amount of money and ended up spending WAY more than I had planned (NEVER going to do that again) and for not even getting what I had planned.  AND I still have $11 in RR.  I might not even use those just because I am SO done with Walgreens.  I think I am going to write the company a little note I know that I am definitely going to stick with Rite Aid from now on!!