General Everyday Suckiness

[MelindaJoy77]

Well I don't have a crazy story this time, and I apologize if I've posted this in the wrong place, but I've been having a difficult time with my job lately due to a number of different reasons. I'm in the process of looking for a new job. Anyway, I just wanted to vent about some of the everyday things that happen to probably every cashier everywhere...

crumpled-up money

money thrown on the counter instead of handed to me (although a friend of mine pointed out that in Germany, it is custom to place money on the counter instead of handing it to the cashier)

the magical whole-dollar total: Customer "wow that's weird!" My brain: "yep it happens at least once a day on one amount or another"

The guys who still think it's funny when I check the $50 and $100 dollar bills to mention that they just printed them this morning. It wasn't funny the first time, it's still not funny.

Guys who ogle me and smile like I'm going to take my shirt off for them right there in the store. Or ever. No.

Being called a "checker" - not sure why but I don't like that word

Being called "hun" or "baby" by other women like I am their friend or their daughter or their daughter's friend. Especially bugs me if someone younger than me does this.

People who have NO idea what they've just spent, as in "oh I only have <insert amount> on my card." These people are usually responsible for turning my nice little pile of returns into a heap that I have to get a cart for.

There are a million more, but that's all I guess. I'm just worn out today.

[wolfie]

Being called a "checker" - not sure why but I don't like that word

Perhaps they were trying to call you a cab? Or maybe they heard you singing The Twist?

[RealUnimportant]

money thrown on the counter instead of handed to me (although a friend of mine pointed out that in Germany, it is custom to place money on the counter instead of handing it to the cashier)

...

The guys who still think it's funny when I check the $50 and $100 dollar bills to mention that they just printed them this morning. It wasn't funny the first time, it's still not funny.

Re: these two -

Thrown != placed; when they just try and chuck it in your general direction that's plain rude. If you have your hand out & they put it down & don't count through it, just ignore your open palm, that's less rude or possibly ignorance of what's going on in front of them. When they sneeze into their open hand, wipe their nose on their palm, then pass you the money, that's time to dig out the hand sanitiser!

"I'm sorry sir, as you've just suggested this is a counterfeit note I am no longer able to accept it for payment; I must however retain it for inspection by law enforcement. Would you like to give me your contact details so they can return it if it turns out to be genuine? "

[bainsidhe]

People who have NO idea what they've just spent, as in "oh I only have <insert amount> on my card." These people are usually responsible for turning my nice little pile of returns into a heap that I have to get a cart for.

Some of the other ones don't bother me much, but this one always bugged me. I'm not talking about a customer that has to put one or two things back or didn't realize they forgot their wallet or something. I'm referring to those customers who know they have a set budget and fill their cart full of things they can't afford. How many $14 packs of chicken can you buy with $50? Do you think you can also buy your steak and other food that fills your cart to the brim? Why act surprised when the bill is $150 and gosh you now have to return almost everything? Due to policy, my store wouldn't return refrigerated goods to the shelves, it had to be tossed. Almost $100 in merchandise my store had to lose because of such poor planning.

[DGoddessChardonnay]

Why act surprised when the bill is $150 and gosh you now have to return almost everything? Due to policy, my store wouldn't return refrigerated goods to the shelves, it had to be tossed. Almost $100 in merchandise my store had to lose because of such poor planning.

Can't tell you how many times I've had to return cartloads of stuff b/c of that crap.

And there's a simple solution to that. Know those smartphones that you see at least half the folks walking around with? They have a handy dandy app called a CALCULATOR.

Or even if you don't have a smartphone but a basic phone, most of the recent ones (my old Nokia flip phone for example) have a calculator app. Hell even my Mom's basic cell phone has one built in.

Or if you don't have a phone, use a pencil and a piece of paper . . . my Mom does this on occasion and it works wonders.

[Dreamstalker]

People who have NO idea what they've just spent, as in "oh I only have <insert amount> on my card." These people are usually responsible for turning my nice little pile of returns into a heap that I have to get a cart for.

Let me guess, a lot of said returns are extremely-perishable items.

That's a special annoyance on our new systems with EBT cards. The old registers would simply prompt me "Insufficient funds/Retry amount?" If we hit Retry, it would run the card for whatever was on it and prompt for the balance due. The new system can't cope with automatically using the available balance (we have to type in how much to run the card for so need to know how much is on it and how much they want to use--that's too much math for some people).

We can only query a card balance before starting a transaction. See the problem? If they wait until prompted by the pinpad to say "Oh I think I only have [some amount that's way less than the total] on my card" then I have to either call a CDH over to have them suspend the order (which will then give me the available card balance on the receipt) or start voiding stuff and get popped for an audit due to excessive voids.

[OfficeSlug]

I work in a grocery store - and I get those all the time. As in Daily.

I guess there's no original retort to us checking the big bills. I suppose silence on the customer's end is just not possible, is it?

[Monterey Jack]

Due to policy, my store wouldn't return refrigerated goods to the shelves, it had to be tossed. Almost $100 in merchandise my store had to lose because of such poor planning.

How the hell does your store make any profit, then?! In my store, unless a refrigerated/frozen item is visibly damaged or has been sitting out for too long, then it gets put back lickety-split. Only sliced deli meats have to be tossed if a customer doesn't want them, which always pisses me off...put back that $5.00 box of kid's breakfast cereal, not the sliced ham or turkey!

[wolfie]

The old registers would simply prompt me "Insufficient funds/Retry amount?" If we hit Retry, it would run the card for whatever was on it and prompt for the balance due. The new system can't cope with automatically using the available balance (we have to type in how much to run the card for so need to know how much is on it and how much they want to use--that's too much math for some people).

We can only query a card balance before starting a transaction.

What sort of moron would GET RID OF a useful feature (would come in handy for gift cards, in addition to EBT)?

Due to policy, my store wouldn't return refrigerated goods to the shelves, it had to be tossed.

How the hell does your store make any profit, then?! In my store, unless a refrigerated/frozen item is visibly damaged or has been sitting out for too long, then it gets put back lickety-split. Only sliced deli meats have to be tossed if a customer doesn't want them, which always pisses me off...put back that $5.00 box of kid's breakfast cereal, not the sliced ham or turkey!

Sounds FAR more sensible to put back items that are still in the appropriate temperature range (carton of milk that still feels cold, or carton of ice cream with frost on the outside of the box, goes back on the shelf - carton of milk at room temperature, or carton of ice cream that feels squishy and is "leaking", goes in the garbage) - what's the point of having a policy "if it leaves the fridge/freezer, and it doesn't get bought, it gets tossed"? I assume the sliced deli meat gets tossed because it's not in a sealed, tamper-evident package - am I right?

[EricKei]

For the auto-toss policy...? My guess is, they know that serial returner SC's and similar undesirable custy's would likely not hesitate to let such an item sit out and go bad, then re-chill it before returning the item to make it look like it was bad when they bought it.

[Dreamstalker]

What sort of moron would GET RID OF a useful feature (would come in handy for gift cards, in addition to EBT)?

The new system does still run gift cards that way (take what's available and then prompt for a balance due); I have no idea why it doesn't work for EBT. With the latter, the only message we get with an insufficient balance is "Not Authorized" which could mean a few different things (no/not enough money, invalid PIN, magstripe can't be read, etc). There are quite a few 'improvements' in the systems that are anything but.

[MelindaJoy77]

Thrown != placed; when they just try and chuck it in your general direction that's plain rude. If you have your hand out & they put it down & don't count through it, just ignore your open palm, that's less rude or possibly ignorance of what's going on in front of them. When they sneeze into their open hand, wipe their nose on their palm, then pass you the money, that's time to dig out the hand sanitiser!

And yet when I'm ready to hand them their change, they always have their hand out for it...I've been seriously tempted lately to just toss it on the counter but since I'm nice I hand it to them. Ahhhhhh people....

[MelindaJoy77]

Let me guess, a lot of said returns are extremely-perishable items.

That's a special annoyance on our new systems with EBT cards. The old registers would simply prompt me "Insufficient funds/Retry amount?" If we hit Retry, it would run the card for whatever was on it and prompt for the balance due. The new system can't cope with automatically using the available balance (we have to type in how much to run the card for so need to know how much is on it and how much they want to use--that's too much math for some people).

We can only query a card balance before starting a transaction. See the problem? If they wait until prompted by the pinpad to say "Oh I think I only have [some amount that's way less than the total] on my card" then I have to either call a CDH over to have them suspend the order (which will then give me the available card balance on the receipt) or start voiding stuff and get popped for an audit due to excessive voids.

THAT super sucks. Our system goes like this, if there's not enough on the EBT card then a little slip will pop out showing what the balance is, and then we can type the amount in and have the customer run their card again. It's still annoying but it doesn't cause a huge fuss.

And yes it's weird how people always seem to "put back" big packages of meat and gallons of milk and other perishables before anything else. Most of it has to be tossed and written off because we just don't have enough people to run everything back. I have occasionally run back a gallon of milk if it's slow or I'm relieved for break around the same time but that's rare.

[Dreamstalker]

Once I was coming back from break when I saw a nearly-full cart abandoned in Produce, close to the SCO paystation. There were no free CWs to do the return and everything was still cold, so I decided to take ten seconds more on my break to push the cart into the produce back room cooler so at least some of it could be saved.

FEM E (who numerous people have butted heads with over her oftimes-impractical zeal for policy) sees me and barks "Get back to selfscan! Your break's over and you can't leave selfscan!" Nevermind that I wasn't officially 'back' yet, was taking the cart to an area where I would still be 'watching' SCO and would be back as soon as I did this. FEM actually herds me back to SCO while I am trying to tell her that the cart needs to go back immediately as it's full of perishables.

Guess what I find up front at closing two hours later and need to damage out? Yup. The dry goods had been put back, but all the pricy meat, etc, had been left to get warm and unsellable.

[ComputerNecromancer]

What sort of moron would GET RID OF a useful feature (would come in handy for gift cards, in addition to EBT)?

I dunno, but the store I live next to changed something a couple months back.

This is on the self-check out.

Before then, if you didn't have enough money on the EBT card, it'd prompt you asking if you wanted to apply the remaining balance to the total. You could click yes, and then get prompted to supply the rest of the balance by some other means.

But that changed. Now, that still works if you have an EBT "food" account. But if you have an EBT "cash" account, you still get the prompts but the transaction will hang forever trying to get the funds from the account.

And there's no way even the store manager can make it work. You have to void out the transaction, and go a real register.

Royal PITA all around and what'
s *really* annoying is that the managers don't think it's worth reporting as a "bug".

GRRRR.