America’s Best Contacts & Eyeglasses

This is part of a chain, they have a decent selection of frames, offer free eye exam with the purchase of two glasses.
The staff is friendly, they take appointments (can be made online).
While I don’t use spectacles myself, I have brought my son to this location for a few visits.

Made an appointment to see the doctor for an eye exam, arrived 10 minutes early and was told it would be 30 minutes as there were many walk ins. Ran an errand and then came back to be told another 20 or 30 minute wait. the receptionist said all doctors run behind. I left. I can’t seem to leave a zero star review

If you have to do bargain glasses/​contacts in Madison try jcpenny or Walmart. This store, its policies and its employees are awful.
I arrived 10 min late for my appt and a nasty employee went on a power trip. She scolded me like a child in from of other customers then proceeded to bump my name down the list of appointments — right in from of my face. She put 4 walkins ahead of me… Even though I made an appointment. I understand I was late, but I would have had to wait an hour until meeting with the doc. I told her forget it and that I would be taking my business elsewhere.
But! I had to stay since my fiancé already had a prescription there and needed glasses. Warning: 2 for 69.95 is a lie. It’s great if you want lens-​less frames. Expect to pay an additional $ 100-​$ 200 per frame. As we were deciding what to get, another employee said we could get a second pair for «basically» free. We kept asking what «basically» meant, and she avoided the question with some jargon. So we picked out a second pair.
We sat down, she rang us up and informed us that their guaranteed 1 year warrantee will only actually be a 6 month warranty for some behind the scenes reason. Okay, fine, whatever.
At this point we just wanted to get this stupid experience over with. Then she gave us our total which was three times as much as we expected. Again, I asked «how much more is it for the second „basically free“ pair?» She avoided the question again. My fiancé asked again «how much less would it be if we just got 1 pair?» She finally told us the difference and it was a SIGNIFICANT amount. Not even close to free. We opted out of the second pair immediately.
Do not let them take advantage of you — it seems to be how they train their staff.
I know this is «budget» eye care, but it shouldn’t mean being treated with disrespect or being taken advantage of.

This should be a one star review, but the folks who work here are so pleasant and do seem to care that I couldn’t give only one star. But, I’ve had my glasses back to the store five times, and I’m still not entirely happy with them. Crazy distorted vision, loose lenses, frames that won’t fit right.

Eesh. This place is just not good.
My sister had 2 years of great service at an America’s Best location in New Orleans. So I thought that the Madison location would be similarly good. Nope. This goes to show that a shop is all about its people. While the general salespeople are fine, the DOCTOR is horrid. And, sadly, there is only one doctor there. So when the doctor refused to give me a stronger prescription than what he said was «good enough» on my first visit I couldn’t do anything. And after I came back after having my trial pair of contact lenses that were ill-​fitting and understrength (aka: he insisted my old prescription was actually too strong, when my eyes and my own knowledge of my body told me it was now too weak), he refused again to do more than change the prescription by an infinitesimal amount — and only for one eye.
In the end, I didn’t have totally clear vision on my wedding day — which was the big reason I went in to get a new contact prescription. After 2 tries of being very clear and blunt that what he felt was «good enough» was in fact NOT at all strong enough for my eyes and the doctor just pooh-​poohing me about my eye shape (I do have strong astigmatism, but have been wearing contacts for nearly 20 years. I know my eyes) and telling me this was «as good as (he) could do.» I ended up not even returning after getting the 2^nd trial pair and since I was moving shortly thereafter decided to just see another eye doctor (and, of course, spend another $ 60 – 100) to actually get some proper treatment.
If you just need new glasses and have your script already, maybe go here. But if you need a new prescription and want to be treated with respect and with the understanding that you know better than anyone else when your vision is clear or not, just STAY AWAY.
EDIT: (29 Jan 2013) — In response to the comment below. Yes, James K. was in touch in Nov. 2012 after my initial posting of this review and got my contact information & further details to pass on to management. In good faith, I believe he did this, but no other person from America’s Best has ever been in touch to try to right this very poor service situation. Although I appreciate James’ responses via Unilocal,I still would not personally recommend this particular America’s Best location.