Complaint Review: Wal-Mart - Chicago Illinois

I have been using the pharmacy at the Wal-Mart in Chicago at 2848 N. Broadway since the one farther north on Broadway, which had parking and was much closer to where I lived, closed earlier this year, and my prescription was transferred to this one.  I was not thrilled because it was much more inconvenient, being in a very congested neighborhood with little street parking, but after my first visit, I was informed that they validate parking in the attached garage, making it somewhat more convenient since I could drive there and just park instaed of circling around and around (and around) to find a parking spot.  I was even more happy to find out that the parking was free with the validation.  Over the past several months, I have continued to park, grab my prescription, get the parking validated, and leave without having to pay more to park while I ran in and out.

However, on August 8, this changed.  I parked, went in, got the prescription, went to the service desk and got the parking validated, returned to my car (all within about 10 minutes), and when I got to the gate and put in card, the machine said I owed $4.00.  Clearly that was a mistake as it has been free every time for the past several months.  I did not want to have to back up, re-park, and go back in since I was in a hurry, so I hit the help button and explained the situation to the woman who answered.  She was very rude and said that the charge was accurate and I had to pay it in order to get out of the garage.  I continued to insist that this was wrong, and she became ruder and ruder.  Frustrated, I disconnected the call and decided to pay it to get out of the garage and fight with Wal-Mart later since they clearly incorrectly validated the parking.

I did not want to pay with a credit card because that garage is fairly unmonitored and the machine looked somewhat battered, and with all the stories about credit card skimmers in the news, I was wary about sticking my card into this disreputable looking machine.  Fortunately, I had a $5 bill from the change from the presrciption, so I put that in and waited for the change.  Well, the gate went up and the machine spit out the receipt, but no change came.  After about 30 seconds or so, another slip of paper popped out of the receipt slot.  I grabbed that one and it said "Change Shortage $1.00" with no indication of what to do to get the change.  I hit the help button again and fortunately got a different person.  However, he was no help either and only gave me a phone number to call to get it figured out.  Furious, I left and when I got home, I called them number.

The person who answered was just as clueless as the guy who answered the help button.  He took my name and address and said he would "get it taken care of."  That was three weeks ago and as of the mail delivery this afternoon, I have not received anything.  No letter explaining the situation or giving more instructions, and certainly no check.  It has been three weeks, which is a ridiculous amount of time to wait for $1.00 in change.  I emailed Standard Parking and they sent an email back saying the "issue is resolved."  I don't know what "resolved" or "get it taken care of" mean to Standard Parking, but clearly it does not mean actually giving change that is due.

I realize that $4.00 is not all that much money, especially given what a rip off parking is in Chicago in general, but I was only in the store for about 10 minutes, and it doubled the cost of the prescription.  Imagine going to Best Buy, getting a home entertainment system, and then when you try to leave you get ambushed with a demand to pay the exact same amount as you just spent on the system in order to be able to leave.  This is the same principle.  On top of that, withholding change is an even bigger scam than parking itself already is.  That is another 25% markup on the cost of the parking.  Given that it is only $1.00, how many people are going to be motivated to pursue getting the change?  That could be 100 or so people a day going in and out of that lot, 365 days a year, resulting in hundreds of thousands of unearned dollars over the course of the year, on top of the outrageous prices they charge for parking throughout the city.  Someone needs to stand up.  When it is time to refill the prescription, I will be transferring it elsewhere, to a non-Wal-Mart pharmacy, and I will do my best not to park in a Standard Parking garage again.