BOSTON/Government Center - As part of its ongoing Cure CVS project, Change to Win, the newer of the two national labor federations, together with a number of community organizations, presented findings at City Hall Thursday from a recent survey that demonstrates several Boston area CVS retail stores failed to rectify overcharges, even a month after being notified of discrepancies. In light of the findings, both Mayor Thomas Menino and Councilor Sam Yoon reiterated support for Massachusetts' item pricing law.

According to a May report, Cure CVS surveyors were overcharged at 20 of the 22 stores they surveyed in the last week of April, 2009. In a followup survey, Cure CVS found seven of nine CVS stores were still overcharging at least one of the items to which the stores had been alerted the previous month.

In response to this report, CVS Director of Public Relations Mike DeAngelis said, "We strive to achieve 100% accuracy and move quickly to rectify any unintentional discrepancy." However, according to a Cure CVS report released yesterday, that group's June survey found ten Boston area CVS stores were again charging more than the shelf sticker price. A followup at least a day later found eight of those same stores failed to correct pricing discrepancies.

According to Faron Mclurkin, Lead Organizer for Cure CVS, "What the report shows is that even after the public attention around CVS' overcharging, they've continued to do so. They have not made earnest efforts to rectify this."

Currently, Massachusetts' item pricing law requires most items be individually labelled in retail stores, but there are already many exemptions, and several state bills being considered now aim to further weaken consumer protections put in place by the law. Councilor Yoon, a challenger for the Mayor's race, called on CVS to stop overcharging customers and said, "People are struggling to make ends meet in this economy, and we need to ensure that consumers are being protected and that the laws of the commonwealth are respected and enforced. Still, there are attempts to water down the existing laws in this area. This week, I am filing a resolution that opposes the pending legislation in the State House to weaken consumer protection laws, and I call on my colleagues in the City Council to join me in this act."

Mayor Menino said, "It is important to me that consumers in Boston are protected from unfair business practices, especially during these difficult times. People need to have the tools to protect themselves from being overcharged, and I have always supported item pricing and other reasonable consumer protections. I will continue to urge state lawmakers and the administration to ensure that every business in the Commonwealth plays by the rules."

According to DeAngelis, CVS complies with state item the pricing law, but he added, "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."

Such practices, however, do not provide the same immediate and accurate information to consumers as correctly marked shelf tags. Incorrectly marked items force customers to double check prices themselves, or to remember the identified price when at the register and bring the discrepancy to the cashier's attention. "Being able to see the price on the item while you're at the register or while you're checking the receipt at home," Mclurkin said, "is the only way that the consumer can ensure that they are paying or have paid already the correct price." Consumer attitude studies confirm a clear preference for checking prices on the items themselves (79%) and disapproval of stores' substitution of self-service price checkers for item pricing (64%).

Former CVS manager Aaron Weintrob questions whether CVS honestly intends to correct item pricing discrepancies which result in overcharging customers. "It's deliberate," said Weintrob. "If price accuracy was important, CVS would have the measures in place - signs, item pricing, employing people to maintain accuracy - to follow the law. Fines are simply looked at as the cost of doing business."

That cost, according to the Massachusetts Office of Consumer Affairs and Business Regulation, was $349,600 in 2008; the largest sum of fines for overcharging and pricing accuracy violations in Massachusetts, and more than twice the amount Walgreens, the next-most-fined retailer, paid. Asked how much CVS might be profiting from these overcharges, Mclurkin said, "One has to think if they were fined $349,000 and that was something they could brush off, that that's considered 'the cost of doing business,' one can only imagine that this is more money than $349,000."

In response to the Cure CVS report released Thursday, DeAngelis told Open Media Boston, "This 'survey' is the latest tactic in a misleading campaign by the union labor coalition Change to Win, whose primary goal is to increase membership, not protect consumers. Change to Win is continuing to paint a distorted picture of CVS/pharmacy’s store practices, and ignores the significant ways we are making pharmacy health care more convenient, effective and affordable in communities nationwide. For more than two years, Change to Win has been waging a campaign to disparage CVS Caremark – often using highly skewed or false information – because we refuse to waive the right that our employees have had for decades under federal law to vote confidentially in union elections."

But Mclurkin insists this is about protecting consumers who cannot afford to be nickel and dimed in a rough economy. "Fundamentally, what it comes down to is, are we going to be a commonwealth that protects consumers and puts legislation and regulations in place that ensure that consumers have the right to know that they're being charged the correct amount, and to help make sure that consumers are paying a fair price? Or, are we not concerned about consumers and if overcharging happens at places like CVS with such consistency? [...] We absolutely need to be opposing the pending legislation to weaken the consumer protections in regards to item pricing. We need stronger legislation, and frankly, we need higher penalties for repeat offenders."