Hello...
As a brand new user, I thought my first post should be confined to the Orientation - New Members subforum (regardless of the content of my post) so as to not interfere with the rest of the forum...
I've been reading customerssuck.com for over a year, but have never registered, because I am... well.. I'm a customer. Although I've worked in positions that place customers precariously close to me at times, I don't and have never worked in retail.
However, reading this forum has made me aware of many SCish things that I used to do before reading your posts, and has made me question a few other potential SCish things that I still do. Let me get to the point: I kind of need your help. I want to be that customer who makes the retail worker wonder why nothing went wrong. When every third customer seems to be a precarious minefield of tomfoolery, I want to be the guy with valid coupons who declared them too late -- AND the guy with invalid coupons who declared them too early -- all rolled into one unlikely, bewilderingly polite supercustomer.
Okay, that sounds a little ridiculous, so I'll just skip to the burning questions I've wanted to ask retail workers since I started reading here...
(#01) - "The Change Toss..."
I'll admit, as a customer, I am offended when the retail worker refuses to hand me my change, instead, placing it in a random pile of bills and coins on the counter. However, as a customer (and a poor one at that) I will often calculate exactly what I owe before I ever enter the cashier lane. I will have the amount ready, and politely (and slowly) place exact change on the counter.
Question: Is this rude? I find it rude when a cashier places my change on the counter without placing it in my hand. But there's a difference. I presume a cashier already knows how much change I'm owed. If I hand a pile of coins to a cashier, they must count it anyway, to ensure it's the proper amount, right? So... is politely placing exact change on the counter O.K.?
(#02) - "Tipping Trepidation..."
This question is specifically addressed to those who may work for the home of the grand slam breakfast. I'm not naming names. Suffice to say, the moon's over my hammy! It's a full service diner. Anyway, I want to know how tips work (this may end up applying to all full service diners). I ordered a meal that came to $25. I tipped $5 (20%) but.... I did it at the cashier's station. I paid cash, and the tip, at the cashier's station, but I did not leave any tips/cash on the table itself. What I really want to know is.... will she be aware that I (individually, as a table) tipped her? Ominously, will she be aware at all? Money can vanish. All I told the cashier was "My total is $25, can you keep the rest for the waitress?" and he said "Okay." But..... what is the process whereby that tip eventually reaches the waitress? Does she see the receipts from all the tables in her section at the end of the day? Could my tip have vanished into cashier oblivion? That would hurt me immensely.
(#03) - "Pillaged Plate Placement"
As an SC at a diner (and a member of a party) I used to create huge mounds of "cleaned" plates, ostensibly to help the waitress carry away used leftovers from the table with a minimum of effort. Plates covered on the top with uneaten food, but below that, "cleaned" plates with the uneaten remains of undiscovered food on top. Is that wrong? Since I've read CS.com, I've left my party's plates unstacked, at the edge of the table, with all non-kitchen items (such as used napkins, used straws, and exhausted coffee cream containers) in my own pocket, for disposal later.
As an addendum...
I did say I worked close to customers once. So I do have one short story about a customer, hee hee. Background: I'm working as an overnight stock-boy in a massive grocery chain in Canada, when an "oh hello, what do you mean you close at 10pm? bollocks!" customer accosts me in my section of the store:
Me: {stocking shelves and doing other hopefully non-customer related things}
SC: Ketchup????
Me: {i heard her perfectly, but was giving her a chance to interact politely as humans do...} Pardon me?
SC: Ketchup!!!!!
Me: {Shazbot! My first SC.........} Oh! Right here, ma'am! -points to the fifteen brands of ketchup we have for sale in our store... all of which she is standing in the middle of and could be drowned by if that was her wish...-
At least I didn't get a CBF.
As a brand new user, I thought my first post should be confined to the Orientation - New Members subforum (regardless of the content of my post) so as to not interfere with the rest of the forum...
I've been reading customerssuck.com for over a year, but have never registered, because I am... well.. I'm a customer. Although I've worked in positions that place customers precariously close to me at times, I don't and have never worked in retail.
However, reading this forum has made me aware of many SCish things that I used to do before reading your posts, and has made me question a few other potential SCish things that I still do. Let me get to the point: I kind of need your help. I want to be that customer who makes the retail worker wonder why nothing went wrong. When every third customer seems to be a precarious minefield of tomfoolery, I want to be the guy with valid coupons who declared them too late -- AND the guy with invalid coupons who declared them too early -- all rolled into one unlikely, bewilderingly polite supercustomer.
Okay, that sounds a little ridiculous, so I'll just skip to the burning questions I've wanted to ask retail workers since I started reading here...
(#01) - "The Change Toss..."
I'll admit, as a customer, I am offended when the retail worker refuses to hand me my change, instead, placing it in a random pile of bills and coins on the counter. However, as a customer (and a poor one at that) I will often calculate exactly what I owe before I ever enter the cashier lane. I will have the amount ready, and politely (and slowly) place exact change on the counter.
Question: Is this rude? I find it rude when a cashier places my change on the counter without placing it in my hand. But there's a difference. I presume a cashier already knows how much change I'm owed. If I hand a pile of coins to a cashier, they must count it anyway, to ensure it's the proper amount, right? So... is politely placing exact change on the counter O.K.?
(#02) - "Tipping Trepidation..."
This question is specifically addressed to those who may work for the home of the grand slam breakfast. I'm not naming names. Suffice to say, the moon's over my hammy! It's a full service diner. Anyway, I want to know how tips work (this may end up applying to all full service diners). I ordered a meal that came to $25. I tipped $5 (20%) but.... I did it at the cashier's station. I paid cash, and the tip, at the cashier's station, but I did not leave any tips/cash on the table itself. What I really want to know is.... will she be aware that I (individually, as a table) tipped her? Ominously, will she be aware at all? Money can vanish. All I told the cashier was "My total is $25, can you keep the rest for the waitress?" and he said "Okay." But..... what is the process whereby that tip eventually reaches the waitress? Does she see the receipts from all the tables in her section at the end of the day? Could my tip have vanished into cashier oblivion? That would hurt me immensely.
(#03) - "Pillaged Plate Placement"
As an SC at a diner (and a member of a party) I used to create huge mounds of "cleaned" plates, ostensibly to help the waitress carry away used leftovers from the table with a minimum of effort. Plates covered on the top with uneaten food, but below that, "cleaned" plates with the uneaten remains of undiscovered food on top. Is that wrong? Since I've read CS.com, I've left my party's plates unstacked, at the edge of the table, with all non-kitchen items (such as used napkins, used straws, and exhausted coffee cream containers) in my own pocket, for disposal later.
As an addendum...
I did say I worked close to customers once. So I do have one short story about a customer, hee hee. Background: I'm working as an overnight stock-boy in a massive grocery chain in Canada, when an "oh hello, what do you mean you close at 10pm? bollocks!" customer accosts me in my section of the store:
Me: {stocking shelves and doing other hopefully non-customer related things}
SC: Ketchup????
Me: {i heard her perfectly, but was giving her a chance to interact politely as humans do...} Pardon me?
SC: Ketchup!!!!!
Me: {Shazbot! My first SC.........} Oh! Right here, ma'am! -points to the fifteen brands of ketchup we have for sale in our store... all of which she is standing in the middle of and could be drowned by if that was her wish...-
At least I didn't get a CBF.
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