This report is about Walgreen's baiting pharmacy students and new employees with sign-on bonuses and educational assistance. I took one of these bonuses for $20,000 for a 3 year commitment and then broke the contract because it is unbearable to work at some of their store locations.
Everything looks great when they get you to sign-up. They promise you a great store location and a safe work environment. They have reasonable work expectations and genuinely care about patient safety...
If only that were all true. In reality, their stores are understaffed. They do not care if your technicians call off or if you are violently robbed and have your life threatened for Oxycontin (security was eliminated for budget cuts). They also institute quotas to pharamcists to verify several hundred extra prescriptions (electronically) for other Walgreen's pharmacy locations on top of your regular workload completely throwing patient safety to wind.
The good pharmacists are the ones who "safely" click the enter button 300-400 times during a shift. I'm pretty sure they are not doing the best job checking for errors or investigating drug interactions since these tasks actually take time.
So, back to the shady contract. Of that $20,000 I received about $12,500 after taxes and most of it was used for moving to one of their "needed locations." 2 years later I'm gone and Walgreen's does not just want the $12,500 that they gave me. They won't negotiate for something reasonable and threaten to sue me for the money. They want the full $20,000 which I don't have because I only received $12,500 . Further more, they are charging me 8% interest on the amount to pour more salt on the wound.
I can recover some of the tax money I paid, but not all of it. In the meantime, Walgreen's is sitting back and collecting interest from their loan sharking business not only from me, but from all the other pharmacists they have screwed over.
There are plenty of other shady things that the Walgreen's corporation has done, but if they treat their own employees like cattle then what can you really expect from them as a customer?
I am now a big supporter of independent pharmacies and grocery store chains where you can get a better price on your drugs, safer prescription checking, and much better customer service.