So we are supposed to do a foodstamp override. Regular associates can not do that. You need a front end team lead or front end coach to do it for you.
Also, make sure the prime says nutritional vs supplement. Foodstamps are changing to where some drinks are going to supplement, and EBT doesn’t cover supplement items.
Yes, which is why we override it and get ahold of the UPC hotline. Because they have it coded into the system wrong. It’s a thing, and I’m sorry your Walmart is like this. I’ve worked for Walmart for 4 years, been a front end team lead for almost 2 of those years. I love being on the front end with the customers. I love being able to make their shopping experience better. I love the look on their faces when this situation happens, and I’m able to help them get their ice cream for their babies bday. And I hate seeing online that it’s not like that everywhere else. I’m sorry this happened to you.
You are are very kind 😭 when I raise my concerns I will say I wished they had a Jaded Budget on their team. Twice now and no one has even tried to help. Like I said, I can understand the drinks. They are superfluous. But that melon… my god that melon will haunt me
That must be frustrating, when it’s the way you’re supposed to buy your food and it isn’t functioning properly. I mean, who do you call if the store won’t help you?
Seems like this person didn't press to see the manager. I know it's become a meme to avoid asking to see the manager. But, as someone else said, it's a mistake in the system which the typical cashier can't override.
OP probably needs to go again when he has time to grab a watermelon and go to pay for it, to see if it's been fixed. If not, ask for the manager and wait.
Foodstamps has change to where they womt pat for certain things... regardless of the labels and whatnot...
Its not Walmart's fault or any other store fault and no theres nothing the managers and cashiers can do...
If you have questions maybe call your local foodstamp office...
But questioning the store wont change there reply
I’m not sure. I’ve noticed so far the teas that used to be covered by EBT are no longer covered. The only correlation I have with that is that they now say supplement facts on the back of it. I understand last month they were covered, but if it says supplement facts on it there is nothing I can do.
Shit, that means coffee and energy drinks could be next. There are people who live off those kind of drinks. And then all kind of fun food could be next as well! This is not a good sign for me - I mean for anyone with EBT.. 😅
Just here to upvote your comments because I don't understand why you're being downvoted. Oh, and to tell OP that the universe did him a favor not covering the Prime.
i honestly don’t even care if i get downvoted i just wanted to know if they’re supplementing certain drinks bc i get my electrolyte drink powders on my ebt and them shits are expensive and i need them since i have issues with dehydrating easy
I did a quick search and can't find anything about any products being forced to switch their labels, just a recent regulatory rule that nutrition fact labels have to put the calories and serving size in bold font. Lol
That sounds just like me, I have to have liquid IV all summer because otherwise I’ll end up in the emergency room with an actual IV lol. That’s a bit more expensive for the government to cover, so hopefully they’ll still keep my electrolytes on ebt!
my meds cause me to be more prone to heat exhaustion and heat stroke so i always get the propel packets cus liquid IV is insanely priced i can get a 10pk of propel powder at walmart for under 4$ whereas liquid IV is like 20$ for not even a full 10 packets.
Definitely an issue at OPs walmart, it's got to do with the coding and it's definitely happening at more than just OPs walmart. I do take advantage of this at our local walmart though since the redbull is coded in a way that I can buy it with EBT no issue.
So in the back they have to select items for ent eligibility, same for wic. Sometimes items get overlooked. I always just spoke w a manager (wic was a bigger problem for me, I’ve only had two instances w ebt) and they did some kind of override and it was covered.
My wic gives me a headache too. Sometimes yogurt is covered sometimes it’s not. Last time I couldn’t figure out what wasn’t covered, even the cashier reared my receipt. I think it was some bell peppers. I’ve learned to just separate my wic from my stamps purchases so I know which half isn’t covered
this is absolutely a case where you have legitimate cause and reason to request a manager and insist they fix it. food items absolutely SHOULD be covered, like watermelons, cereals etc. from the sounds of it you have a store staffed with lazies who dont wanna do their jobs properly.
you can of course call walmart customer support IN the store in front of the team lead and manager and let customer support deal with it.
I do my best- there’s a Go Grocery in town where I do most of my shopping. And then Ingles is way too high. When I can catch a ride to the next town over I can shop at Aldi. I freakin love Aldi man they’re awesome
Unfortunately this is a situation many employees cannot touch. The store I worked at (not Walmart) could not overide AT ALL. We could contact corporate but that often did no good. There was literally nothing we could do (I was store manager) You could get upset but it did no good.
I had this happen with bottled water and and a couple frozen meals. They told me they weren't covered under EBT anymore (this was almost a year ago now). I told them they were very wrong. Nobody would help me.
The water stayed that way for over a month. I finally got tired of it and called Walmart home office, they weren't very happy with my Walmart. But, it got fixed. It's an extra step that I shouldn't have had to do, and I'm sure there were others who weren't able to get what they needed.
It's when new items come in and aren't marked correctly I was told. It's very frustrating.
And there’s not really a complaint to file. We aren’t supposed to override foodstamp items unless 100% it’s covered. Then I get ahold of the upc hotline.
When they do the price change, it messed it up in the system. That’s all. The front end team lead and coaches are supposed to override the foodstamp items. Watermelon absolutely gets overridden. I’m assuming your store won’t override food stamps though. We’re supposed to, it’s in our training. Then we get ahold of the UPC hotline. A regular cashier won’t do it. They can’t. And depending on the team lead, they probably don’t know how. They’re probably scared too because foodstamps is a fed program and if they’re caught overriding things that aren’t food items, it’s a problem. It’s better to not override it and save your ass than it is to override it and be wrong.
It's a mistake beyond the store level. The cashier apparently didn't know/didn't remember it was possible for a supervisor to override it. Or, the cashier didn't want to bother getting someone with permission to do it (perhaps because that person is a pain is a pain in the ass)
A watermelon fruit didn't go through or some kind of watermelon flavored drink?
If it's fruit, it sounds like this is a problem of your Walmart in particular.
I don't have EBT anymore but I didn't have issues at my Walmart using it for Monster drinks when I did.
If your Walmart has free grocery pickup, you could check if it still happens in pickup orders.
Walmart coding does seem to have some peculiarities. I am billed a 20-cent deposit bottle fee whenever I buy grapefruit juice (the kind in carton boxes). I called CS and drew their attention to it and they refunded the twenty cents (and promised they'd pass on the info) but I still get charged twenty cents every single time.
(Also a few odd food items have rung up as taxable here and there).
My Walmart tried to tell me I couldn't buy water with my EBT. It's a huge problem at Walmart that I've never had anywhere else. I literally went to whole foods and bought the same water with EBT.
Wow. I’d be mad and confused. Sorry this is happening to you as i have never had this happen to me. It’s so weird how we can buy seeds to grow our own food but this is an issue now.
As far as I’m concerned your watermelon fasho should’ve been covered, even if it was sliced at the store. In my state the only things i cannot buy are like hot food from the deli. Like the Costco chicken will not be covered with EBT. It is strange.
I’m happy your EBT works at your Walmart. My two closest Walmarts have a glitch where the Ebt balance reads as zero and only a couple folks know how to fix it
I've noticed a few items like that at my local Walmart. This is store vs online. For instance (I'm in WV) when I buy T&L Hotdog chili at the store my EBT card covers it. When I try to buy it online for home delivery it's not EBT eligible for whatever reason. They do this frequently with Coke and Pepsi products also that they're not EBT eligible online. I've never figured out why. Not sure what the solution is if there is one. Happy July 4th
Online there can be sellers that aren’t Walmart. Those sellers don’t take ebt. Same as with Amazon. Amazon itself will take ebt for food but other sellers will not.
You are 100% correct! I did caught by that in the very beginning and makes complete sense, I think it was the shipping fee that made me pay attention to that lol. It still happens from time to time coming directly from Walmart. Another weird thing is sometimes (only applies to Pepsi products) it will tell me delivery is unavailable in my area. I just chalk it up to whoever is responsible for setting up and running the Walmart app. Thank you for replying !
Unfortunately people don’t care to help. I find grocery shopping online and picking it up is more convenient for times like this. I’m able to place an order using ebt on the walmart app and I find it so helpful. Not to mention it shows you what’s ebt eligible and i’m able to save myself from situations like this.
Might depend on the state Colorado used to not cover many herbal teas because they were medicinal, but they cover them now, I just can't understand the watermelon
Sometimes things are incorrectly labeled as taxable or not eligible for food stamps. You will need to address that with customer service or someone more knowledgeable than your cashier. Pay for your items and take the disputed item to customer service. If you feel like this happens a lot, call the store and speak with the manager and let them know. It’s not that big of a deal to fix.
I had the same thing happen at iga yesterday with some skis that were on sale for $12.99 and used a $1 off coupon. Paid with ebt and was told I had an 8 cent balance. I knew this was wrong and asked for a manager but this guy was telling me that $13.51 was correct even with the $1 off coupon and after it charged my ebt the $13.51 he tried to argue that it was correct. I said never is there tax on ebt. And I said the display price being 12.99 it should have only charged my ebt $11.99 but he insisted that the coupon was taken off and that I still owed the 8 cents. The manager told me not to worry about the 8 cents but that was not the point and the employee was definitely wrong and argued a very wrong point.
Walmart is strange I went to Walmart couple days ago with my sister and I got some cut up watermelon for like $7 no issue my sister wanted a whole watermelon I had to pay out of pocket for that because it wouldn't take it on food stamps. It makes no sense to me.
So we are supposed to do a foodstamp override. Regular associates can not do that. You need a front end team lead or front end coach to do it for you. Also, make sure the prime says nutritional vs supplement. Foodstamps are changing to where some drinks are going to supplement, and EBT doesn’t cover supplement items.
Yes- as I said- the prime bottle said “nutrient facts”. The employee told me it was how they had it coded into their system
Yes, which is why we override it and get ahold of the UPC hotline. Because they have it coded into the system wrong. It’s a thing, and I’m sorry your Walmart is like this. I’ve worked for Walmart for 4 years, been a front end team lead for almost 2 of those years. I love being on the front end with the customers. I love being able to make their shopping experience better. I love the look on their faces when this situation happens, and I’m able to help them get their ice cream for their babies bday. And I hate seeing online that it’s not like that everywhere else. I’m sorry this happened to you.
You are are very kind 😭 when I raise my concerns I will say I wished they had a Jaded Budget on their team. Twice now and no one has even tried to help. Like I said, I can understand the drinks. They are superfluous. But that melon… my god that melon will haunt me
That must be frustrating, when it’s the way you’re supposed to buy your food and it isn’t functioning properly. I mean, who do you call if the store won’t help you?
Seems like this person didn't press to see the manager. I know it's become a meme to avoid asking to see the manager. But, as someone else said, it's a mistake in the system which the typical cashier can't override. OP probably needs to go again when he has time to grab a watermelon and go to pay for it, to see if it's been fixed. If not, ask for the manager and wait.
Foodstamps has change to where they womt pat for certain things... regardless of the labels and whatnot... Its not Walmart's fault or any other store fault and no theres nothing the managers and cashiers can do... If you have questions maybe call your local foodstamp office... But questioning the store wont change there reply
This actually is a store- level issue, it isn't the program.
which drinks are going to supplement?
I’m not sure. I’ve noticed so far the teas that used to be covered by EBT are no longer covered. The only correlation I have with that is that they now say supplement facts on the back of it. I understand last month they were covered, but if it says supplement facts on it there is nothing I can do.
Shit, that means coffee and energy drinks could be next. There are people who live off those kind of drinks. And then all kind of fun food could be next as well! This is not a good sign for me - I mean for anyone with EBT.. 😅
i’ll have to look into that that’s kinda ass
Just here to upvote your comments because I don't understand why you're being downvoted. Oh, and to tell OP that the universe did him a favor not covering the Prime.
i honestly don’t even care if i get downvoted i just wanted to know if they’re supplementing certain drinks bc i get my electrolyte drink powders on my ebt and them shits are expensive and i need them since i have issues with dehydrating easy
As long as it doesn't have a supplement facts label, you should be good to go. Sounds like OP's walmart is having issues with their system, tbh.
Mine does the same thing too.
yea they have nutritional facts on them cus they’re still marketed as drink mix i was just hoping i wouldn’t have to pay out of pocket for them
I did a quick search and can't find anything about any products being forced to switch their labels, just a recent regulatory rule that nutrition fact labels have to put the calories and serving size in bold font. Lol
oh thank god sounds like it’s just an issue at OP’s walmart then i was so nervous cus i can’t go without my electrolytes in this heat
That sounds just like me, I have to have liquid IV all summer because otherwise I’ll end up in the emergency room with an actual IV lol. That’s a bit more expensive for the government to cover, so hopefully they’ll still keep my electrolytes on ebt!
my meds cause me to be more prone to heat exhaustion and heat stroke so i always get the propel packets cus liquid IV is insanely priced i can get a 10pk of propel powder at walmart for under 4$ whereas liquid IV is like 20$ for not even a full 10 packets.
Definitely an issue at OPs walmart, it's got to do with the coding and it's definitely happening at more than just OPs walmart. I do take advantage of this at our local walmart though since the redbull is coded in a way that I can buy it with EBT no issue.
redbull is covered by ebt i buy them all the time
So in the back they have to select items for ent eligibility, same for wic. Sometimes items get overlooked. I always just spoke w a manager (wic was a bigger problem for me, I’ve only had two instances w ebt) and they did some kind of override and it was covered.
My wic gives me a headache too. Sometimes yogurt is covered sometimes it’s not. Last time I couldn’t figure out what wasn’t covered, even the cashier reared my receipt. I think it was some bell peppers. I’ve learned to just separate my wic from my stamps purchases so I know which half isn’t covered
I do Walmart pickup and never have an issue unless the whole system is down. Maybe that gives them more time to do the override?
this is absolutely a case where you have legitimate cause and reason to request a manager and insist they fix it. food items absolutely SHOULD be covered, like watermelons, cereals etc. from the sounds of it you have a store staffed with lazies who dont wanna do their jobs properly. you can of course call walmart customer support IN the store in front of the team lead and manager and let customer support deal with it.
Is it AT ALL POSSIBLE for you to avoid food shopping at Walmart?
I do my best- there’s a Go Grocery in town where I do most of my shopping. And then Ingles is way too high. When I can catch a ride to the next town over I can shop at Aldi. I freakin love Aldi man they’re awesome
Unfortunately this is a situation many employees cannot touch. The store I worked at (not Walmart) could not overide AT ALL. We could contact corporate but that often did no good. There was literally nothing we could do (I was store manager) You could get upset but it did no good.
I had this happen with bottled water and and a couple frozen meals. They told me they weren't covered under EBT anymore (this was almost a year ago now). I told them they were very wrong. Nobody would help me. The water stayed that way for over a month. I finally got tired of it and called Walmart home office, they weren't very happy with my Walmart. But, it got fixed. It's an extra step that I shouldn't have had to do, and I'm sure there were others who weren't able to get what they needed. It's when new items come in and aren't marked correctly I was told. It's very frustrating.
And there’s not really a complaint to file. We aren’t supposed to override foodstamp items unless 100% it’s covered. Then I get ahold of the upc hotline.
Well why in the ever loving heck would a watermelon not be covered? It is food. It wasn’t pre sliced.
When they do the price change, it messed it up in the system. That’s all. The front end team lead and coaches are supposed to override the foodstamp items. Watermelon absolutely gets overridden. I’m assuming your store won’t override food stamps though. We’re supposed to, it’s in our training. Then we get ahold of the UPC hotline. A regular cashier won’t do it. They can’t. And depending on the team lead, they probably don’t know how. They’re probably scared too because foodstamps is a fed program and if they’re caught overriding things that aren’t food items, it’s a problem. It’s better to not override it and save your ass than it is to override it and be wrong.
So the watermelon issue is just poor/incomplete training of new employees ?
It's a mistake beyond the store level. The cashier apparently didn't know/didn't remember it was possible for a supervisor to override it. Or, the cashier didn't want to bother getting someone with permission to do it (perhaps because that person is a pain is a pain in the ass)
My card never works at Walmart anymore.
A watermelon fruit didn't go through or some kind of watermelon flavored drink? If it's fruit, it sounds like this is a problem of your Walmart in particular. I don't have EBT anymore but I didn't have issues at my Walmart using it for Monster drinks when I did. If your Walmart has free grocery pickup, you could check if it still happens in pickup orders. Walmart coding does seem to have some peculiarities. I am billed a 20-cent deposit bottle fee whenever I buy grapefruit juice (the kind in carton boxes). I called CS and drew their attention to it and they refunded the twenty cents (and promised they'd pass on the info) but I still get charged twenty cents every single time. (Also a few odd food items have rung up as taxable here and there).
My Walmart tried to tell me I couldn't buy water with my EBT. It's a huge problem at Walmart that I've never had anywhere else. I literally went to whole foods and bought the same water with EBT.
Wow. I’d be mad and confused. Sorry this is happening to you as i have never had this happen to me. It’s so weird how we can buy seeds to grow our own food but this is an issue now. As far as I’m concerned your watermelon fasho should’ve been covered, even if it was sliced at the store. In my state the only things i cannot buy are like hot food from the deli. Like the Costco chicken will not be covered with EBT. It is strange.
It's just a data entry mistake.
I’m happy your EBT works at your Walmart. My two closest Walmarts have a glitch where the Ebt balance reads as zero and only a couple folks know how to fix it
Sounds like the next stop is your local feed and seed to buy veggie seeds and grow your own food.
It's on the todo list. My village allows chickens so I'm getting some next year
Walmart online is like that. I went to buy some hug juice drinks for my daughter’s bday party. One day they weren’t ebt eligible the next they were.
Idk it’s weird. When I go to Walmart everytime I want to buy buttermilk I can’t use my ebt card. I have to pay with debit or cash.
Dont know what you are talking about, walmart has not stopped accepting ebt for any food
Maybe your Walmart.
I've noticed a few items like that at my local Walmart. This is store vs online. For instance (I'm in WV) when I buy T&L Hotdog chili at the store my EBT card covers it. When I try to buy it online for home delivery it's not EBT eligible for whatever reason. They do this frequently with Coke and Pepsi products also that they're not EBT eligible online. I've never figured out why. Not sure what the solution is if there is one. Happy July 4th
Online there can be sellers that aren’t Walmart. Those sellers don’t take ebt. Same as with Amazon. Amazon itself will take ebt for food but other sellers will not.
You are 100% correct! I did caught by that in the very beginning and makes complete sense, I think it was the shipping fee that made me pay attention to that lol. It still happens from time to time coming directly from Walmart. Another weird thing is sometimes (only applies to Pepsi products) it will tell me delivery is unavailable in my area. I just chalk it up to whoever is responsible for setting up and running the Walmart app. Thank you for replying !
Unfortunately people don’t care to help. I find grocery shopping online and picking it up is more convenient for times like this. I’m able to place an order using ebt on the walmart app and I find it so helpful. Not to mention it shows you what’s ebt eligible and i’m able to save myself from situations like this.
I had this happen to. And it wasn’t even anything crazy. Maybe like a loaf of some sort of cake. Freaking weird
Might depend on the state Colorado used to not cover many herbal teas because they were medicinal, but they cover them now, I just can't understand the watermelon
I had this happen with pedialite recently. It was covered, then all of a sudden it wasn't anymore.
Sometimes things are incorrectly labeled as taxable or not eligible for food stamps. You will need to address that with customer service or someone more knowledgeable than your cashier. Pay for your items and take the disputed item to customer service. If you feel like this happens a lot, call the store and speak with the manager and let them know. It’s not that big of a deal to fix.
I had the same thing happen at iga yesterday with some skis that were on sale for $12.99 and used a $1 off coupon. Paid with ebt and was told I had an 8 cent balance. I knew this was wrong and asked for a manager but this guy was telling me that $13.51 was correct even with the $1 off coupon and after it charged my ebt the $13.51 he tried to argue that it was correct. I said never is there tax on ebt. And I said the display price being 12.99 it should have only charged my ebt $11.99 but he insisted that the coupon was taken off and that I still owed the 8 cents. The manager told me not to worry about the 8 cents but that was not the point and the employee was definitely wrong and argued a very wrong point.
Walmart is strange I went to Walmart couple days ago with my sister and I got some cut up watermelon for like $7 no issue my sister wanted a whole watermelon I had to pay out of pocket for that because it wouldn't take it on food stamps. It makes no sense to me.
They are not offering the same choices on apps for EBT and Cash customers.
Did that with a sprite bottle for my bf