I switched to Lens Crafters when the price just got too high at the place where I used to go. I'll stick with them. On reflection, I think the old place was pulling a scam, saying they took my insurance, but they actually didn't. It worked like this:

The doctor (who I still see) charged the $35 copay, as my insurance allows. Then next door (used to be Pearl, now it is something else, don't remember the name, not a big chain) they would fill it.

The woman at the glasses shop who took my simple Rx last time "figured" the price this way: Since I have insurance, I get no half-price discount, the price is based on all full prices. The coating on the lenses is extra, as is the no-line bifocal, and the frames weren't in the lowest end, so I paid above the "allowance" price on those. Her end figure: $490. I asked her to then figure the price as if I had no insurance at all, were walking in off of the street getting all of the 1/2 price stuff. Her total: $495. Now I pay a enough each year for my vision benefits to not appreciate that $5 savings she was offering, and I realized that she had no intention of sending any claim to the insurance company because they in fact HAVE NO RELATIONSHIP with that insurance company. I walked out of there and straight into Lens Crafters. I'm going to run this smell-test again this year when I get glasses, and this year, figures in hand, I'm going to report them to my insurance company and to the appropriate department at the state attorney general's office that covers this sort of thing. I paid $165 at Lens Crafters for the exact same things I requested across the street, they feel good and are ground correctly. This year I'll bring that price down more for a couple of reasons: I've realized I'm not hard on glasses, so I don't need all of the expensive flexible stuff in the frame. And I've decided that the coatings are sometimes more of a problem than the reflection they're meant to reduce. They scratch easily and then the marks on the coating are more of a nuisance than the reflection ever was.

SRS