We find many people are surprised to find that popular stores such as Costco, Walmart, Target, and Sam’s Club offer eye exams. We get many questions from our visitors about the difference between local supermarket eye exams vs eye exams performed at a hospitals. Some of the popular questions we get from our visitors are the following : Is there a quality difference between eye exams performed at a supermarket to the ones done at local hospital? Can i use my insurance at local supermarket optical center and is it cheaper to go to a supermarket optical center vs a local hospital? In this article we plan on answering all these questions and more so keep reading to find out if you should have your eye exam done at a local supermarket or visit the store.
QUALITY OF EYE EXAM
We wanted to start with this topic because this is something that most people get wrong. They think that supermarket eye exams are done by a regular supermarket employee that gets a few weeks training and therefore is not as good as one done at a local hospital. This could not be further from the truth. Your local Walmart eye exam or Costco eye exam is done by a optometrist that went to med school and has same if not more experience than the one at your local hospital. In fact often times Walmart , Costco, and other supermarkets will hire optometrists that previously worked at hospitals. So if you are wondering about the quality of Supermarket eye exams don’t be, they are just as good if not better then the ones done at a hospital.
EYE EXAM COST AND INSURANCE
If you are looking to save money then you should definitely go with supermarket eye exam instead of hospital eye exams. Its no secret that hospitals tend to overcharge for their services. There are plenty examples of patients being charged $20-$30 for one Advil pill so its no surprise that the cost of eye exam at a hospital will be higher then that from supermarket. Another popular question we get is can i use my vision insurance at supermarket optical centers and the answer is YES. Most popular supermarkets such as Walmart , Costco , and Target have partnerships with almost all vision insurance companies so chances are they will accept your insurance as well but we still recommend you contact your local supermarket optical center ahead of time to ensure that they will in fact work with your insurance.
FINAL VERDICT
Supermarket eye exam quality is just as good as hospital eye exam and at a much lower cost. Supermarket eye exams are also very convenient because most supermarket optical centers do not require an appointment for eye exams where hospital optometrist in most cases do require advance appointments for eye exams services. Another benefit to having your eye exam done at a supermarket is that you can buy eye glasses, contacts, and different eyeglasses frames right after your eye exam where such a thing is not possible if you were to have your eye exam done at a hospital.