AARP Pharmacy

While I was on hold, I went to the online site, and resubmitted my eft info in about 2 minutes. The customer service call took over 15 minutes. I never received a proper explanation of HOW the company had managed to completely boggle my checking account number, yet still managed to receive EFT payments. A most unsatisfactory experience.

Why United calls it a tier 3 preferred drug instead of a generic is beyond me. I guess it all relates to the fact that they can make more money calling it a preferred drug instead of what it really is - a GENERIC. When I requested they send me information, in writing that supported their claim, they refused. Evidently they can't support the reasoning behind their decision.

On 11/1/2014, the price was $47.70 per month, which lasted for 2 months. On 1/1/2015, the plan monthly payment increased to $53.90 per month -- an increase of 13%. On 1/1/16, the plan increased to $58.80, which was an increase of 9%. I just went to pay my premium for January 2017, and the plan price increased by close to 25%!!! I am now obliged to pay $72.70.per month! In order to "do the math" I would have to spend HUGE amounts of time, but my best guess is that the AARP United Plan is a huge rip-off.

I need a ** prescription for a cough medicine for a persistent upper respiratory infection for which United pays virtually nothing. I've simply stopped getting the prescription as I can't afford it -- I hack and cough as I know it will not be covered. My physician has prescribed a non-generic medication. In order for him to prescribe a generic medication, It would take oodles of paper work. I go to a low-cost clinic which takes Medicare, and I imagine the paperwork would take several months.

IF -- big IF -- I had the time to "do the math" my best guess is that I would find that UNITED AARP Preferred Prescription Plan is making money off of me -- based on what I would pay for prescriptions WITHOUT the coverage: a near 25% increase in ONE year!!! They justify this by saying that: if you go to another plan you will have a big deductible to pay so this is still the "best plan." My bet is that there is "pay to play" involved here. Big pharmacies tell their customers that AARP United is the "best" plan out there. Far from the truth...Money involved??? I think of the title of a Tommy Lee Jones movie: "No Country for Old People." We're living it...

I feel like a guinea pig and am still in extreme severe pain. It is now radiating down my legs and they say the only way I can get ** is to file an appeal, and it still isn't a guarantee to be approved. This is how they are treating us disabled senior citizens, worse than non-American's. I will be switching to another prescription plan as soon as I can. Then I can't get name brand. It has to be generic. The generic form is always less effective than the name brand. Why do they treat us like this???

Checking with Optumrx this morning, they say no prescription. There is obviously a big problem at OptumRx. Called AARP/UnitedHealthcare who are the ones taking our monthly payment for Part D - the people who answer the phone there are just call service employees and could care less. Shame on you AARP - UnitedHealthcare and OptumRx. Can hardly wait until the new enrollment period because we will be making a change.

Because we are seniors, Big Pharma just hopes we will just cave in and give up. I have been waiting over six weeks for my prescriptions. I have been given 5 different fax numbers, 7 different addresses, and 6 different phone numbers for United HealthCare appeals. I am contacting the state insurance commissioner, the Medicare Rights Center, Sen. Barbara Boxer, and Attorney General Kamala Harris for assistance. I really need my medications.

Do they want a 40yr old father of a 10yr old son who cries and prays every night, that his father get this medicine BEFORE something bad happens, also have a wife that needs me. Before I joined AARP, I spoke with their prior authorization dept., and they told me as long as I have a letter from my Dr. stating my life is at risk w/o this VITAL medicine, but sure enough, they denied it, I filed an expedited appeal and I am awaiting their decision.

Six months later and a hospitalization, [I had to pay for], I ended up stuck on Medicare part D. I was given 10 days and ended up in hospital before I could sort through the two foot high pages of brochures to supposedly compare and contrast apples and oranges. I would say that 90% error rate of some kind or another has accrued with my AARP Prescription Solutions' orders has occurred, that includes sending medicines I did not order and not taking them back, sending overnight [I paid], that were ordered snail mail and vice versa on the others, that must have for many critical illness including a terminal illness diagnosis. It took repeated phone calls trying to get the other overnight due to their error with out success.

Usually, their errors are never corrected or at best one goes through their malfunctioning phone and computer systems [they usually always come to claiming the computers are down or being reconfigured] that do things like switch you to customer satisfaction surveys when you said you did not want to take one and even before you have talked to anyone to evaluate if you had agreed. Then, the inevitable holds while your cell phone bill adds up over time charges. The disconnections and yes even purposeful hang ups are massive. They clearly have no ability to pass information on or fail to do so nor provide remedial training that can ever experience be seen by me.

This is evidenced by glitches that even the customers can figure out, articulate and offer systemic improvement for between the order, the pharmacy and the mail room. Medicines will sit in the pharmacy because just one of numerous is out or needs more work and you are waiting overnight of course. They hold them all up till they solve the one in question to send on later. I have been willing to pay the overnight as it gives them less time to mess up orders in their hands. The instructions from order to pharmacy does not get passed on the the mail room. They will send all medicines that orders exist for verse the clear directions to send the ones only given that you need.

Complaints are useless to either AARP, them or the specialty pharmacies they phone some out to. I have shown many friends have them watch the getting sent in circles that never lead to anywhere. I had a doctor friend try to unravel the lack of clarity, getting sent in circles, getting a medication ordered an clarification of whom owns whom of which company and a chain of subsidiaries... subs of sub inities. Four hours later, he saw it was not my error or problem solving but a nightmare that could not be resolved or even averted. The companies of the companies don't even know whom each other are nor any central place to unravel or even give a valid phone number to the correct place [they even admit it on the phone]. The appeal rules go on for ever. They can string out for up to a year if time lines are followed and the sick patient or worse, confused elderly has no chance against the insanity.

Think of the money involved with millions of customers handed to them by AARP who does not step in and stop the madness regardless to people trusting the past reputation to make the insurance choice they did. Since they have been on the take verses advocating all respect and trust in them will soon be completely gone. They should just become a drug company and join big Pharmacy in milking America. It seems clear with the volume of unsuccessful services that so many have died or been injured and it seems there will be no stopping them till the class action and individual law suits shut them down.

Unregulated part D was a nightmare and suspicion should have raised a red flag when Republican spent the night twisting arms to pass it. Tonight, I set without medicines for three weeks although some did come overnight 8 days after promised [they did not even contact my doctor for seven days not the next day as promised on a second conversation with two previous hours spent being told that was not the process when it is.] Why only some and why the randomness of whom choose the ones that did showed up for eight days, not the next and why I got a phone call eight days later asking for a second approval for payment as the first authorization was not enough. Then them being dishonest of the week, it took to send the medicines list to the doctor for re-authorization and then being hung up on for explaining.

How crazy the latest in chronic dysfunctional services is experienced and what the consequences are and could turn into [insulin being one of the medications not sent. I will start the phone calls all over again three weeks into being out of most medicines and be put on extended holds, repetition of information numerous times, deal with a broken phone system that voice recognition does not work on while you repeatedly say answers, then key in then manual input repeating all to a real person who knows how many, the same information.Each three months when it is time to deal with them I go into panic attaches because I know it will never correct itself from there end and will just have to suffer the craziness.

Rather than a standard magazine renewal notice, which provides your expiration date and maybe a customer number, AARP sends out what looks like "membership" cards (plastic) with every renewal letter. They do bear a date and a number, but the tiny print says "reply by" next to the date, and "authorization code" next to the number. No where on the mailing does the actual expiration date or the member's real membership number appear.

Result? If you are not sure if you have paid up or not, you can't tell from the notice. There's not even the standard polite disclaimer: "if you have recently renewed, thank you and please ignore this request. "

If you pay up, do the mailings stop for a year? No, another month later, another identical mailing arrives with cards attached, new date, new authorization code.

We called earlier this year to complain to AARP, but the mailings have continued even though we are renewed. We now have fourteen cards from this year and last, four duplicates for myself, one for my husband, the rest are apparently junk but they look like valid cards and came with requests for more money. If nothing else, this is a colossal waste of resources and money. For the more senile AARP member, the potential exists for memberships paid up years and years in advance, perhaps long outliving the members in question.

I cannot sleep at all without this medication and am allergic to many other meds. My doctor has appealed and I am told now that I have to appeal to a medical review board that has never met me to review my chart or discuss this further with my healthcare provider. They obviously haven't considered the ramifications of sleep deprivation. This is unconscionable that the United Healthcare MedicareRX AARP medical board is telling my treating physician how to treat a patient.

I pay $90 a month for this Part D coverage and cannot even get medicine that is prescribed and medically necessary. This doesn't appear to be what's in the best interest of a patient, just what's in the best interest in their bottom line.

Since I have 60 days to submit an appeal to your threat to deny coverage for my prescription for ** and/or not fill one other medication, I am submitting this letter to your office today. After 4 to 5 years of struggling to control my multiple diseases and their symptoms, I have just started to do well using my current medications. I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS) in 2001 and have been on SSDI since 2005. Because we moved to South Dakota, I got a letter from my prior Part D carrier (Aetna) that said that I had to change my Medicare Part D insurance carrier.

I chose AARP United Healthcare Part D thinking that AARP provided oversight for the quality of the products they endorse. My coverage started on August 1st of this year. There have been no changes in my diagnosis or the kind or amount of the medications that I need to prevent the progression of my MS, treat my immune deficiency, control my asthma, or prevent my alpha1 antitrypsin deficiency from causing liver and lung disease. In 2004 I was required to submit a complete package of medical records and was subjected to an SSDI evaluation that included a review of all of my medical records and a face to face assessment.

I have been using ** for over 8 years. In 2001, I was prescribed **. My physicians (8 MDs) and I submitted detailed records of the evolution of my disease processes, the results of extensive medical test and MRI results to people who are not qualified to make a decision about the complex nature of these diseases and the unique synergistic effects that threaten to accelerate the progression of my MS.

Fortunately, the Social Security Administration and my previous insurance companies agreed with my physicians' findings and treatment recommendations. In August and September, I had several of my less expensive medications refilled at Walgreens Pharmacy under my new AARP United Healthcare Part D insurance policy. It was not until I attempted to refill my prescription for my ** through Prescription Solutions that I began to run afoul of AARP United Healthcare Rx. Aetna's specialty pharmacy had been sending my ** to me every three months. My next refill was due in October.

In late September, I called AARP United Healthcare's Prescription Solutions (specialty pharmacy) to arrange for a refill of my **. I have had several conversations with the Prescription Solutions staff over the past three weeks. To date they have not shipped the ** that I need to keep my MS from progressing. On Saturday, October 23rd at 7:15 am, I received a prerecorded message from AARP United Healthcare, Prescription Solutions that said that the pre-authorization for my medication, **, was denied. I need ** to prevent my multiple sclerosis from progressing and crippling me more than I already am. Later that same day, I received a letter from AARP Medicare Rx Plans that informed me that you will not fill another of my medications. The letter states that the drug they are refusing to refill is either not included on our covered drug list or is subject to certain limits.

This particular medication is one of a limited number of alternatives available to me. Because of my alpha1 antitrypsin deficiency, I cannot take any medications that will damage my liver. In addition, I have to inject medications 13 times a week and I do not want to have to inject another medication when a transdermal delivery system works well for me. I have worked since the age of 12 (swept parking lots and cleaned bathrooms). After I graduated from CSU Sonoma and UC Davis, I worked in professional positions until I was forced to retire in 2003. I often worked more that one job and had to pay insurance premiums at each for over 35 years.

I do not know what the total of the premiums I paid to the insurance companies were but the money that went to the insurance companies benefited them many times over when they invested that money. Throughout my life. I lived responsibly. I gave all I had to my family, community and country. You have no right to withhold my medications from me.

On the same day (Saturday October 23rd ) I received the United Healthcare 2011 Annual Notice of Changes that lets me know that I can change my coverage between November 15 and December 31st. I also want to note in this letter that, although AARP United Healthcare Rx Plans have been authorized to provide coverage to residents of South Dakota, AARP United Healthcare's administrative offices are located in Hot Springs, AR. In addition, the letter I received says that I have to file a grievance with an entity in Cypress, CA and that my physician should send his request for an exception to Costa Mesa, CA.

In addition, the email function on the AARP United Healthcare site does not provide the United Healthcare email address and other functions have been disabled. I want the staff at AARP United Healthcare to be aware of the problems they create for those of us who need the care and medications to prevent, treat, or control the devastating diseases that can have a catastrophic impact on our health, our lives, and the lives of our friends and families by using these tactics. Before I was diagnosed with MS, I worked at the California Department of Health Services as a Consultant and, during my employment there, was involved in fraud prevention and fraud investigation. We called the strategies you are using both artificial barriers and soft barriers.

Before HIPPA these and other more cruel strategies and devices used to prevent people from accessing the care and resources that they needed when they got sick. From what I have observed this past three weeks, it does not look like much has changed. I will not tolerate an increase in my premium or co-pay to offset any perceived compromise on your part. If you continue down this path, I will be forced to seek the services of an attorney. I will be documenting every interaction I have with AARP United Healthcare Rx. Using plausible deniability in my case will not be a viable defense for you. If my MS progresses in any way, may God help both of us. Sincerely.