Jun 19, 2009 6:13 pm US/Eastern
State Sidelines CVS For Overcharging Customers
BOSTON (WBZ) ―
State consumer affairs officials plan to meet with representatives of CVS to discuss what's been an ongoing problem -- overcharging. That's when an item scans at the checkout at a higher price than the one posted on the item, the shelf or a sale sign.
Surveyors with the state's Office of Consumer Affairs found far more
illegal overcharges at CVS than at its competitors last year. It was the most penalized food retailer in the state for overcharges.
"We have looked at CVS and they have come up on our radar screen," said Barbara Anthony, undersecretary for the Office of Consumer Affairs and Business Regulation. "We're going to be asking questions about their systems and why we're seeing some higher incidences of overcharging with them than we are with some other retailers, and hopefully we'll get some answers to those questions."
The state imposed fines on CVS in the six figure range last year.
Anthony hopes to collaboratively discuss a remediation plan to "get rid of these overcharging situations, which are detrimental to consumers and don't create a level playing field for the business community."
CVS spokesman Mike DeAngelis sent the following written statement:
"We make every effort to ensure that the prices posted in all our stores are accurate, and whenever a discrepancy between a posted price and the price being scanned is found, we always honor the lower price.
"Under Massachusetts' item pricing law, price labels must be manually changed on each product every time there is a change in price, including weekly sales and promotions. With more than 100,000 items in a typical CVS/pharmacy, this is a complicated, labor-intensive process that, unfortunately, is not immune from human error. We have made significant investments in technology and training to improve accuracy. We added price-checker kiosks for customers at all of our locations in the state and our cashiers have the ability to check the price of any item at the register at a customer's request. We also build additional hours into our store employees' schedules to help ensure full compliance with Massachusetts' item pricing law."
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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