Albertsons Pharmacy - Calabasas, California

The Gentle Gibbon

I disagree with the other review. Pharmacist Spencer went above and beyond to help me with my prescriptions. He was notably kind in person. Pharmacist Meri is also top-notch.

R Kumar

Excellent! Very responsive and friendly. They even go out of their way to get you your medications quickly. I have always been super happy with this pharmacy and their staff. Feel very secure they are here for us.

Steph M

Terrific. Not sure why the other reviews are so poor. They always answer the phone when I call, have worked with me to get prescriptions when stock was back ordered, know me by name and are incredibly friendly. I’ve had positive and welcoming interactions with everyone here. I don’t have to chase them down to contact my doctors for refill requests. The line is rarely long, even at peak hours. They quickly match prices with discount coupons. The only complaint I have is that I’m moving and can’t take them with me.

Jeneenies

This is a review for the Pharmacy and one specific pharmacist, Spencer Brown.

I went to Urgent Care yesterday at 10:30am. When I was discharged at 11:00am, the doctor told me that I had 3 prescriptions that he would call into the pharmacy right away. Cool. Albertsons is NOT my preferred pharmacy but it is in the same city as my neighborhood whereas my preferred pharmacy is not. Seeing as how I was at Urgent Care, I just wanted the medicine quickly.

Since it usually takes some time to make all of that happen, I went home and took a nap after my appointment. I had another appointment that afternoon and decided to stop by Albertsons pharmacy on my way to grab my meds. I thought my plan was pretty good. How wrong I was. Never again.

At 3:50pm, I stand in line and wait my turn. When I'm up, I ask for the medicine. The cashier looks. She can't find it. Asks the pharmacist for an "urgent fill". He tells her it's going to be 30 minutes; she repeats the message to me. Out loud, I say, "Oh, I'm surprised by that." The pharmacist hears and retorts, "Well, you shouldn't be." Yes, yes, it was a retort.

Feel my blood pressure rising right now after his comment. The cashier wasn't rude and neither was I. I wasn't yelling. I wasn't angry. I was bewildered. My Urgent Care discharge was at 11:00am. This was almost 5 HOURS LATER. It still wasn't ready and, when asked about it, it moves to the "urgent" category, delayed for another 30 minutes--which I didn't have.

This dude, who is an absolute BLOWHARD with zero, ZERO customer service skills, proceeds to medically mansplain how the process works. Our conversation goes a little something like this.

Him: You shouldn't be surprised because unless you call it in and tell us its urgent, it goes into a queue of a couple hundred people and we get to it when we get to it. Thirty minutes to fill 3 prescriptions is like really fast.

Me: Umm, so you're saying that I, as the customer, had to call in? I didn't know I had to call it in as urgent."

In a moment of sheer, unmitigated condescension, walking backwards as he walks away shrugging his shoulders, he offers this final retort, "well, now you know."

I have never wanted to go SCORCHED EARTH on someone so much but I did not have the time. I asked for the Manager (off-duty) and got the number for Corporate CS. Spoke to a lovely woman on the phone but was disconnected before I could finish.

A few things to mention here--
1) If I had walked into the pharmacy at 11:05, I could see him being annoyed that I would expect my meds to be ready. Again, 5 hours later, this was not the case.

2) I.went.to.URGENT CARE. I didn't forget to call in my acne medication. There's no internal expedition process? Wild.

3) If the UC team had forgotten to call it in (it happens), I can almost promise I would have told upfront. They didn't it. So, again, how was that request from UC not urgent--certainly 5 hours later?

4) Speaking of calling it in, according to dude, who was doing his best to shame me, I had to call it in. The implication: MY fault my medication wasn't ready. Ummm, no. I didn't treat myself. I certainly don't have the ability to call in any medication nor any RX forms from the doctor.

5) His language that I "shouldn't be surprised" is ridiculous at best as it does not match the explanation. Instead, it assumes that what he is explaining is commonly-held knowledge. The average person knows and I am the anomaly. Plus ...

6) The information he shared wasn't even relevant. He basically gave me a BS answer from start to stop, adjusting the timeframe to suit his needs. I think the UC facility did call it in. It got buried (which happens) and when I showed up, it was easier to speak to me like I'm an idiot and pretend that doing his job was doing me a favor. Do I believe that filling 3 medications in 30 minutes is fast? Sure. But that's not actually the point, sir.

I will never, ever, ever patronize (ironic choice of words) this pharmacy again.

Alyse Kisty

Less than incompetent, they told me the didn’t take my insurance randomly one day after having the same insurance for years that they always took. My kids needed the Medicine so bad so I said screw it I will just pay for it bc they need it asap. They had 4 hours to fill it and they said it wasn’t ready. As my sick kids cried at the pharmacy complaining they were so sick and going to faint. Since I had to wait i decided to call the insurance company Instead of them doing their job to figure it out they made me which ended up making the process longer and turns out there wasn’t a prob with my insurance they were the problem. I went back to get the medicine after waiting the whole day and doing their job for the second time I stood there in front of the pharmacy while being ignored. As my two kids waited in the car, I had to call her over to ring out the medicine and it still wasn’t ready. Even though I called before going to confirm all three of our prescriptions were ready. 3 days later we needed different meds for influenza and strep (very dangerous if not treated) my dr called something in two hours before they closed and they decided not to fill it and just close the pharmacy instead at 5pm. So we are stuck 8 days now without being treated because the first medicine was wrong. There will be a huge lawsuit coming their way if anything more happens to my kids because of their incompetence!!!!
Stay away and go somewhere else.

Sean

Calling them incompetent would be putting it nicely. There is obvious mismanagement happening at this pharmacy. I had my primary doctor send a high priority prescription request, TWICE, and they confirmed that they spoke with the pharmacy. The employees will give you a set of information about your prescription, let you know that it will be ready by a certain time, only for you to be told by the actual pharmacist that you actually already picked it up a few days ago. Really? I picked it up? That must have been one hell of a sleep-walking experience to get dressed, grab my car keys, drive to the pharmacy, stand in line, and get hassled by the employees. Even when I tried to explain that there is no proof of transaction on my credit cards, the pharmacist would not hear it. This is all for a medication that could potentially cause seizures if you stop taking it cold turkey. Believe me when I say they do not care about you or your well-being.

The times where they didn't send me on a wild goose chase to get my prescription, they would rarely actually have the medication ready for pick up, even though I would receive text messages assuring me everything is ready for pick up. I ended up choosing a pharmacy much farther from my home rather than deal with these poorly scripted drones.

Marina Tonkonogy

The worst pharmacy ever. Half of the time they don't have my Rx ready on time. For some weird reason the meds are often "out of stock". They'd often tell me to come the next day or a few days later and once even 2 weeks later! One of the ladies at the counter is snarky, makes unnecessary sarcastic comments instead of just doing her job. The only plus of this pharmacy is convenience since it's in my neighborhood, but I am now more than willing to drive farther to get decent service.

Pieceofcake32

Never been to this pharmacy, went to the one in Calabasas, CA. Had medication stolen while traveling and had to get replaced. Pharmacist was pretty nice, but did not have my most important medication in stock. I used to LOVE Savon, that is no longer. Not an Albertsons shopper, they are tooooo expensive and just not that impressive.