CVS in Target RPh Raises

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ecrofom said:
Y'all know the pharmacists at Target make less. There's a rumor going around that pay will go up to match the rest of CVS. Any truth to it?
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LOL they are closing stores and reducing hours and you think they will increase pay of RPH's that do 750 scripts a week with no drive thru? I'd be shocked. Your techs make too much money to be profitable and most are not very good at least at CVS speed. Target tech new hires were 14/hr here in Cali while CVS techs and seasoned really good CVS techs are at around 12.50/hr.
 
ecrofom said:
Y'all know the pharmacists at Target make less. There's a rumor going around that pay will go up to match the rest of CVS. Any truth to it?
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Hahaha, no. It totally depends on your region and district.

When I got hired by target they gave me $6/hr than what CVS has been paying me.

I made more than cvs friends in San Antonio & s. Texas.
 
ecrofom said:
Y'all know the pharmacists at Target make less. There's a rumor going around that pay will go up to match the rest of CVS. Any truth to it?
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Target pay was always higher than the big chains here in the tri-state area. I don't know what you're talking about...and no...they're not going to increase pay...that's the last thing they'll do. There are plenty of grads and rphs looking for a cushy job at target doing 800 scripts a week..there's no need to increase pay.
 
I have had Target pharmacists apply for jobs with me, their pay appears to be much higher than CVS.


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ChalupaBatman86 said:
I have had Target pharmacists apply for jobs with me, their pay appears to be much higher than CVS.


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Yup....when I was in school everyone was clamoring for Target because no drive through and pay was typically $5/hr more than the other chains.
 
Aww man I got gypped with target! I'm gettin like $8/hr less than what cvs offered
 
Wickett said:
Yup....when I was in school everyone was clamoring for Target because no drive through and pay was typically $5/hr more than the other chains.
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I'm pretty sure every CVS pharmacist in the country had their application sitting on a desk in Target before the deal went through, and something tells me it had nothing to do with pay lol.
 
Isn't CVS generally the highest paid among the chains or really any retail pharmacy? At least for pharmacists... for techs it's the lowest.
 
WVUPharm2007 said:
And it never was.
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OK. I mean, I understand that you believe your opinion to be true, but you have no way to support your position with data & never worked for Target.

Executive staff RPh salary (that just means staff in Target-ese) capped at ~150,000 in our region.

CVS staff salary caps in the high 130s in our region.

When Target recruited me, right off the bat I got an 11% increase in pay.
At my 1 year performance review I got a 1.51% raise. PIC said that was a common yearly occurrence.
 
CetiAlphaFive said:
OK. I mean, I understand that you believe your opinion to be true, but you have no way to support your position with data & never worked for Target.

Executive staff RPh salary (that just means staff in Target-ese) capped at ~150,000 in our region.

CVS staff salary caps in the high 130s in our region.

When Target recruited me, right off the bat I got an 11% increase in pay.
At my 1 year performance review I got a 1.51% raise. PIC said that was a common yearly occurrence.
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Yeah, it's a common yearly occurrence when the pharmacists last no more than 5 years at a time.
 
CetiAlphaFive said:
OK. I mean, I understand that you believe your opinion to be true, but you have no way to support your position with data & never worked for Target.

Executive staff RPh salary (that just means staff in Target-ese) capped at ~150,000 in our region.

CVS staff salary caps in the high 130s in our region.

When Target recruited me, right off the bat I got an 11% increase in pay.
At my 1 year performance review I got a 1.51% raise. PIC said that was a common yearly occurrence.
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CVS was low balling your starting salary. Where are you that CVS's cap is in the 130s? It isn't even that low in WV. I was at $144k after only 4 years with the company before I went down to 30 hours. And I wasn't at max.
 
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1.51% is a weird increase. I've seen standard 2% for ME for both CVS and WM
 
WVUPharm2007 said:
And it never was.
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All I know throughout my pharm school days was hearing the breakdown each year of avg starting offers of the chains for new grads through the grapevine. Target was always the highest in my state/region, at least for new grads. This was for the past 4 years leading right up to the CVS takeover. I can't say anything for pay years down the line, but it was well known at my school that you went for Target if you wanted the highest big chain pay straight out of school. Basically, the all stars in our school that didn't go clinical all went to Target.
 
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Unless Target is paying their top end people like $160-170k a year...they aren't getting paid "significantly" more than the top end at CVS like people seem to be thinking. Maybe starting salaries are lower? I started at $126k in 2011 at CVS...but by 2015 I was at $144k.
 
WVUPharm2007 said:
Unless Target is paying their top end people like $160-170k a year...they aren't getting paid significantly more than at CVS like people seem to be thinking. Maybe starting salaries are lower? I started at $126k in 2011 at CVS...but by 2015 I was at $144k.
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Cvs has started most people in georgia at 110-115k the past few years. I dunno last years class offers but do the last 3 excluding them
 
WVUPharm2007 said:
Unless Target is paying their top end people like $160-170k a year...they aren't getting paid "significantly" more than the top end at CVS like people seem to be thinking. Maybe starting salaries are lower? I started at $126k in 2011 at CVS...but by 2015 I was at $144k.
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damn you're all set! what part of US are you from?
 
WVUPharm2007 said:
Unless Target is paying their top end people like $160-170k a year...they aren't getting paid "significantly" more than the top end at CVS like people seem to be thinking. Maybe starting salaries are lower? I started at $126k in 2011 at CVS...but by 2015 I was at $144k.
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Obviously region specific, but your starting CVS salary in 2011 is almost 10k higher than what they were offering people at my school in 2016.
 
CVS pays well. In California new grads are going for around 136k for base. If you know what you're doing you can get raises and promotions fast. 2015 grad and now over 150k just base. Hoping to get over the 160k mark in a couple years. This isn't including OT which there is a lot of and that special double time.
 
rxdawg21 said:
Cvs has started most people in georgia at 110-115k the past few years. I dunno last years class offers but do the last 3 excluding them
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Yikes. Thats like mid 50's/hr. Good RX managers in California are making about 20/hr more that that.
 
You can't apply Cali rates to the rest of the country. Everyone there is making mid 60s-70s/hr and you actually get OT. In Texas only pharmacy managers or long tenured pharmacists crack the 60s. Offers for new grads for CVS here are about 57-58/hr overall. I live like a king here though with no state tax and low housing costs, so I'm not complaining.
 
WVUPharm2007 said:
California is its own universe though. A regular sized house costs like $3 million.
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Theres no way CVS is making much in CA. The amount spent on Payroll here is ridiculous but i'm not complaining lol
 
Wickett said:
You can't apply Cali rates to the rest of the country. Everyone there is making mid 60s-70s/hr. In Texas only pharmacy managers or long tenured pharmacists crack the 60s. Offers for new grads for CVS here are about 57-58/hr overall. I live like a king here though with no state tax and low housing costs, so I'm not complaining.
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I'm waiting for the loans to go away to live like a king lol
 
6GodPharm said:
I'm waiting for the loans to go away to live like a king lol
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Ha indeed. I'm not quite a king yet, but I'm paying off my loans in 30 months. Having a girlfriend/dual income def helps. Even paying 5k/month towards loans we still have about 5k left over. And for 1k/month, we rent a nice house on a lake. My friend going to silicon valley to work for CVS plans on paying 1500/month just to rent a room.
 
Wickett said:
Ha indeed. I'm not quite a king yet, but I'm paying off my loans in 30 months. Having a girlfriend/dual income def helps. Even paying 5k/month towards loans we still have about 5k left over. And for 1k/month, we rent a nice house on a lake. My friend going to silicon valley to work for CVS plans on paying 1500/month just to rent a room.
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In retail 30 months just fly by! I started around 175k and i'm down to 110k. Goal is to pay it off early 2018 around March or April.

Bay area and the LA area are the worst places to live. Highly over priced. There are great areas in CA that aren't complete **** holes where you can make really good money and live a good life style. Hell, you can take an hour flight to Vegas when ever you want if you want to live big. I'll never understand why everyone is desperate to move to the bay area, make less as a pharmacist, no OT and live in a closet for 1500 a month lol i'm sure in Texas $1500 gets you a seat with Jerry Jones lol
 
Wickett said:
Ha indeed. I'm not quite a king yet, but I'm paying off my loans in 30 months. Having a girlfriend/dual income def helps. Even paying 5k/month towards loans we still have about 5k left over. And for 1k/month, we rent a nice house on a lake. My friend going to silicon valley to work for CVS plans on paying 1500/month just to rent a room.
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When your friend snag a gf tech multi millionaire there, you know who is winning...
Wickett said:
You can't apply Cali rates to the rest of the country. Everyone there is making mid 60s-70s/hr and you actually get OT. In Texas only pharmacy managers or long tenured pharmacists crack the 60s. Offers for new grads for CVS here are about 57-58/hr overall. I live like a king here though with no state tax and low housing costs, so I'm not complaining.
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CA wage and other state wages seem to be comparable, CA has 9.3% income tax, that's like $15k income tax every yr, translates to be $7.5/hr cut... Also, decent houses go for 600k for old 3 BR 25 mins drive from the beach, community closer to the beach expect to see minimum $1M+ for even smaller house... The cheaper housing and higher wage 70-75/hr for manager is in inland empire or central valley for 300-500k far from urban centers, you might as well move to TX if you live in 90-120F avg. So, when someone boasts their rate in CA it's actually comparable anywhere else. It's not like we are saving much once you buy a house here it's not common to spend $2500-3000/mo on PITI on crappy housing.
 
In the Central Valley, including Sacramento, $62 to $65 per hour is the norm starting out as a new grad depending on location, Sacramento metro on the lower end of that range. Walmart probably lower than CVS.
 
Depending on the location/market, it is easier to pick up extra shifts while working at cvs than it is working at target.
 
rxdawg21 said:
Cvs has started most people in georgia at 110-115k the past few years. I dunno last years class offers but do the last 3 excluding them
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I was told the exact same thing by a former CVS RXM who left CVS to start working at Publix recently. She said that when she graduated (before 2010), CVS was one of the highest paying pharmacy chains, but when she left recently, salaries had dropped to $110k in most areas of GA.
 
As somebody who hires retail pharmacists in 3 different areas of the country, Target is typically higher than CVS, a lot of grocery store pharmacists are higher than CVS too. Walgreens seems to vary a lot, could be high or low end of the spectrum. This is based on the salary they report on their job application. I assume they are being honest and HR verifies that info. There could be selection bias too, maybe CVS pharmacists getting paid a lot don't leave the company.


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In my area, WM pharmacists get paid about the same as CVS pharmacists. The actual hourly rate at WM is lower, but WM pays a $25 meal premium every time you take a 30 minute lunch, which ends up to ~$3/hr more. So that $60/hr pharmacist actually makes $63/hr
 
lt23 said:
In my area, WM pharmacists get paid about the same as CVS pharmacists. The actual hourly rate at WM is lower, but WM pays a $25 meal premium every time you take a 30 minute lunch, which ends up to ~$3/hr more. So that $60/hr pharmacist actually makes $63/hr
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Isn't Walmart rumored to be doing away paid lunches for pharmacists? I think a thread was posted Reddit's pharmacy forum last week regarding an upcoming company-wide meeting scheduled to take place in April that will supposedly be about reducing benefits, pay, etc.
 
this could be true because they did take away the Sunday Premium recently. But I haven't heard anything.

PAtoPharm said:
Isn't Walmart rumored to be doing away paid lunches for pharmacists? I think a thread was posted Reddit's pharmacy forum last week regarding an upcoming company-wide meeting scheduled to take place in April that will supposedly be about reducing benefits, pay, etc.
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I can see WM abolishing the meal premium. (This is for CA, not other states apparently.) That's $6,500 a year for your standard 260 days worked.
 
6GodPharm said:
CVS pays well. In California new grads are going for around 136k for base. If you know what you're doing you can get raises and promotions fast. 2015 grad and now over 150k just base. Hoping to get over the 160k mark in a couple years. This isn't including OT which there is a lot of and that special double time.
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"Promotions"

I think that's the little caveat that whoever I was replying to is leaving out.


Yeah, you might make the same at CVS, but only as a PIC, and you're gonna work several more hours off the clock compared to what Target RPhs did.
 
I got an EE but no raise. They said I reached my cap I got a small bonus 2k ish all metrics above average but negative script count due to target cvs conversion
 
So you'll never get another raise again?


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trailerpark said:
Then why not do the bare minimum.


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You still get a bonus based on performance, if money is what motivates you to do more than the bare minimum.
 
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