Boots are made for walking when it comes to price

YOUR CONSUMER QUERIES ANSWERED:A reader from Cork went to a Boots outlet in the Wilton Shopping Centre last week with a prescription. She asked that a four-month quantity of the item be dispensed. “The pharmacist said she could do this as the prescription was for six months but would have to charge €7 for each month of dispensing.”

Our reader asked about the price of the prescription item, as this was the first time she had been prescribed it, and was told it was €18.37 for a 30-day supply. “The four-month supply, for both the drug and dispensing cost, would have amounted to more than €100,” she writes. “I was taken aback that there would be a dispensing charge for each of the four months, but was told by the pharmacist that ‘Boots had lowered the costs of their drugs so much’, they had to make the dispensing charge.”

So she took her prescription to O’Sullivan’s Pharmacy in the same shopping centre – where she was told that the charge for the items for four months was €53.30. “There was no dispensing charge as ‘these had been done away with’. Caveat emptor.” Indeed.

Shoe moves to the other foot for Dublin sports store

Last week, we published an item about a reader who had a trying experience after buying a pair of shoes from O’Neill’s on Talbot Street in Dublin.

Well, another reader was prompted to get in touch after reading it. “I have purchased all my shoes over the years from O’Neill’s,” says Ann Gallagher. “I have had no problems, and very good service. I have purchased from different assistants on many occasions and each one has gone to great lengths to find me the correct shoe.”

Grand so.

SuperValu fights back over 'uneven playing field'

Alan Condron who owns a Super Valu outlet in Clane, Co Kildare was prompted to get in touch after reading our article on supermarket money saving tips last week. He found it incredible that we could not find “one positive thing to say about the two Irish supermarkets in the country”.

He says Irish retailers have had to fight on “an uneven playing field with planners” who treated their planning applications differently to those of Aldi, Lidl and Tesco.

“We also had the ex-head of consumer affairs Ann Fitzgerald telling customers to go north first and then shop in Aldi and Lidl. This office was funded by tax payers and for her to show bias towards any one retailer was a disgrace,” he claims.