I’ve been working as a pharmacy technician in training at Walmart since August 16. I was taught how to do most things, except how to properly understand people’s medical insurances, how to do the math when doing inputs for most medications, etc. The list goes on and on. I’ve yet to memorize any medications that people take and almost usually ask me questions about. I can’t seem to memorize any of the medications because I’m too focused trying to not look like a fool while I’m ringing up people for their medications. Anyway, the other day I apparently forgot to ring someone up for their medication that was thankfully only about $23. I don’t recall doing this, but because we’re logged on with our user ID’s that Walmart gave us when we were first hired, maybe that’s how I was essentially criticized.
My pharmacy manager speaks Vietnamese, along with the other majority pharmacists who speak it too and a pharmacy tech. The day of the incident, they were speaking in Vietnamese and mentioned my name. I said to them, “What mistake did I do now?” The pharmacy manager then responded, “You make many mistakes.” It was a mix of seriousness and humor, but mainly seriousness. Instead of telling me to be more careful when ringing up people for their medications, he tells me this? He did say after though my mistake was fine because he’d get money that the pharmacy has to pay for what was essentially lost. I had apologized for him to say that my mistake was fine.
I’m contemplating each day on quitting, but I desperately need this money. I’ve been searching for jobs as of recent. I hadn’t been successful in getting a job beforehand since graduating from college in May 2021. They’re setting me up for failure by not teaching me how to do the things I had mentioned in the beginning of this post. I know I applied for this role, but I’m not sure if they’ll ever teach me these specific things in order to be successful.
Because many people are getting different types of vaccines during this time of the year, people’s insurances are usually a mess. A pharmacist from a different Walmart criticized me recently at work, but calmly the entire day because I was too slow to figure out the problems people had with their medical insurances. For Medicare, there are different parts. I was never taught how to differentiate between each one, especially when I was never taught about medical insurances to begin with. That was the issue with vaccines because apparently I was supposed to choose one part over the other in regard to Medicare since one of them paid for vaccines while the others didn’t.
I spent at least 10 minutes with different patients, all while the line got bigger from behind. Even when helping out people for other reasons, she told me to help the next person so the line could get moving. Essentially she told me to give these people the middle finger and to get moving elsewhere. I told her I wasn’t going to stop helping them just like that because I was doing my best to get the necessary issues resolved before moving onto the next patient.
All in all, I know I recently started working here if you think about it. I don’t see myself doing any pharmacy tech work in the future because it’s really not for me. I noticed on the career section for my Walmart that they’re planning on hiring for pharmacy clerks. I told my pharmacy manager if this store has ever had it, and he said straight up they have and that it was my position. I told him I was considering being a sales clerk and nothing more to ease the responsibilities I had. He said he’d lower my salary, but not below the minimum wage of course. I told him that didn’t matter because I need my peace of mind. While I’ll still be stressed out, at least I can learn at my own pace and not have to worry about doing or be trying to do what my coworkers are doing.
Only me and another coworker speak Spanish. Apparently when I was hired, that lessened the burdens that my coworker had trying to translate for those who only spoke Spanish. I’ve seen the pharmacy struggle without me during my break. I always watch them from a distance, all while the line gets big, the phone rings nonstop, and they’re trying to fill medications, all the while there’s no one at the front able to help ring people for their medications. Two pharmacy technicians quit earlier this year in June, two weeks apart from each other. I wonder why. I’m clearly not appreciated where I am, but most likely it’ll be like that at my next job. I don’t care. I don’t want to leave because I’m not appreciated, I want to leave this job because I wasn’t properly trained and I am risking too much for myself and the pharmacy by doing inputs. If I make mistakes during the inputs and the patient follows my mistake, what happens next if they have some sort of bad reaction? I’m trying to avoid this from happening as soon as possible.