Kroger $17 Million Prescription Drug Pricing Settlement

Prescription Pricing · Claims Open

Current Status

Claims are open. The deadline to file is December 21, 2026, and the notice gives that date without a cutoff time or timezone. The Court granted preliminary approval and has scheduled a Fairness Hearing for January 11, 2027 at 10:00 a.m. EST before Judge Algenon L. Marbley in Columbus, Ohio; no final approval order has been entered, and no payment date has been announced as of August 15, 2026. If you paid for a prescription at a Kroger-owned pharmacy using insurance since December 9, 2018, the action to take now is to file a Claim Form — nothing is paid automatically, and doing nothing means receiving nothing.

What Changed Recently?

The Court preliminarily approved the settlement and the claims process opened, which is what turns this from a case being litigated into something a pharmacy customer can act on. The class period was also carried forward to August 23, 2026, so recent prescriptions count, not only older ones.

The underlying dispute is about a pricing term. Pharmacies report a "usual and customary" price — the U&C price — when they submit prescription claims for reimbursement. Plaintiffs allege Kroger inflated its U&C prices by leaving out the lower prices it charged under its Savings Club program, and that insured customers paid inflated amounts as a result. They brought claims for fraud, negligent misrepresentation, and unjust enrichment.

Kroger denies the allegations. It maintains it acted appropriately in reporting its retail prices as its U&C prices, and contends that the special prices available to members who joined the Savings Club, paid an annual membership fee, and met other conditions are not its "usual" or "customary" prices. The notice states the matter settled with no findings of liability or wrongdoing by Kroger, and the Court has not decided who is right.

Who Qualifies?

The Settlement Class is all individuals in the United States and its territories who, at any point from December 9, 2018 through August 23, 2026, paid in whole or in part for one or more prescription drugs from Kroger using their insurance.

Three parts of that definition do most of the work. You must have used prescription insurance benefits to fill the prescription — a prescription paid entirely out of pocket, or through a discount program instead of insurance, is outside the class. You must have paid something toward it, though paying "in part" is enough, so an ordinary copay counts. And it is nationwide, with no residency requirement and no requirement that you ever joined the Savings Club.

"Kroger" here means The Kroger Co. and all pharmacies owned or operated by The Kroger Co. or any of its affiliates, which reaches past stores carrying the Kroger name. The full list is set out in Exhibit A to the Plan of Allocation and Distribution on the official settlement website; check a specific store against that exhibit rather than assuming from the sign out front.

Excluded are the judges presiding over any portion of the action and their immediate families and staffs; Kroger's officers and directors, along with those of its subsidiaries, parents, successors, predecessors and affiliates, and any entity in which Kroger holds a controlling interest; anyone who timely and validly requests exclusion; the legal representatives, successors and assigns of those excluded individuals; and anyone who has separately sued, filed an arbitration demand, or participated in a settlement against Kroger over its U&C price determinations in connection with the Savings Club — though that last exclusion does not apply to someone who voluntarily dismissed such claims without prejudice.