Just hit that green button there...

[Setsunaela]

Okay, so the story that sticks out the most in my mind from my new job wasn't really a sucky customer so much as a brain burpy customer so, here goes my first post from my new job.

I am working at a national chain dollar store. I cashier, I stock, I clean.. I do a little of everything. This day, I was mostly at the register. Our Register 2 EFT touch screen is broken, has been for a while. Some days a really hard push will make it work, some days (like this one) it refuses to respond and I walk our debit customers through pushing the physical buttons, because the machine doesn't indicate that you can even use them at all. Usually I have to repeat myself a few times because they aren't really listening to me at all, but this lady took the cake.

Me: Your total is 40.48
Customer: That'll be debit, please.
Me: Okay, go ahead and swipe. I'll warn you the touchscreen isn't working.
Customer: Oh, okay. *swipes card, proceeds to jab with increasing violence at the touch screen with the stylus*
Me: Sorry, the touchscreen isn't working today, did you need cash back?
Customer: No I don't need no cash back..
Me: Okay so you can just push the red X button?
Customer: *jabs some more at the screen* I'm trying!
Me: No, ma'am, the actual physical button, over here *points to the side of the machine with the row of colored buttons*
Customer: Oh, okay. *presses red button* Oh! It worked! *puts PIN in as normal, presses green button*
Me: Alright so just press that green bottom button one more time and we're all done.
Customer: *presses a button*

My machine makes a horrid beep, and a big red CANCELLED pops up on my screen.

Me: Okay looks like you accidentally hit the red button, we'll need to start over. Go ahead and swipe, please.

We go through the whole thing again, complete with her AGAIN trying to use the stylus on the screen. She puts her PIN in and hits the green button, then stares at the screen.

Me: Alright. Hit the same button you just hit to enter your PIN, the green one on the bottom.
Customer: Hits red button.
Me: (internally ) Looks like you cancelled it again. Let's try it again. (We do this I kid you not FOUR MORE TIMES. Every time, she hits that damn red button. Finally her kid comes over to see why she's taking so long, and on the sixth total time we've gone through this, grabs her mom's arm as she goes to hit the red button AGAIN, and says "It's the GREEN one, Mom.. " and jabs the right button.

[EricKei]

The red, CANDY-LIKE button! Will she resist?! CAN she resist?!

her: NO I CAN'T! *jabs red*

[notalwaysright]

The definition of insanity, yes?

[felinegurl]

Oh my goodness...yeah, this totally just made my day. My thoughts are with you.

[wolfie]

But if she cancels the payment transaction, the merchandise is free, right?

Hey, you're supposed to use ROTTEN tomatoes, not FROZEN tomatoes!

[dalesys]

Hey, you're supposed to use ROTTEN tomatoes, not FROZEN tomatoes!

(Reloads turkey cannon)

[drjonah]

Customer: Oh, okay. *swipes card, proceeds to jab with increasing violence at the touch screen with the stylus*

I HATE this with a passion. It's usually older men that feel the need to stab with great vigor and then give you a butthurt look when you explain to them how expensive those stylus pens can be and that if the pen isn't working, you can use your finger.

[MelindaJoy77]

This kind of thing happens ALL THE TIME at my store, even when the machines are working just as they are supposed to. It's like people have never been in a store before. Ever. Sometimes I just turn it in my direction and push the buttons for them. They don't know what to do, they don't listen, and I just get tired of it.

[AccountingDrone]

(Reloads turkey cannon)

As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly .....

[dalesys]

As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly .....

Their flight is much more impressive after the soaking in LOX and passage through the ring of fire...

[Seanette]

I get customers (not always elderly) who think they need to use the pen to punch physical buttons to enter a PIN.

I do politely point out it's probably easier to use a finger.

[TattooedMommie]

I HATE this with a passion. It's usually older men that feel the need to stab with great vigor and then give you a butthurt look when you explain to them how expensive those stylus pens can be and that if the pen isn't working, you can use your finger.

OMG, all the freakin time! I keep waiting for one of them to crack the screen, slamming the stylus into it. I've taken to explaining to folks that the touch-screen buttons need to be "pressed" not "hit", and recommend the finger rather than the stylus.

We actually have a scrolling message on our electronic signature screen which says "Do not use ink" because we had such a problem with little old ladies whipping out their ball-points and actually signing, in ink, on the screen...

And I cant count the number of times people press "Cancel" or "Clear", instead of "Enter" or "Accept"...grr...

(EFT is a major bane of my every work-day...lol)

[notalwaysright]

(EFT is a major bane of my every work-day...lol)

Okay, I'm guilty of hitting EFT on accident once. Just once! So, I get food stamps, and I'm self conscious about it. The store I was at only takes debit cards, cash/checks, or EBT cards, but if you use EBT you have to let the cashier know. Some cashiers will say "on EBT?" or "food stamps?" loud, and I just don't like it. Anyway I avoided the cashiers, by going through the SCO. Then messed it up by hitting the EFT, not EBT. And the SCO lady already had to come over because the terminal wouldn't register the bag I brought (even though I did push the "I brought my own bag" option) and now she's had to help twice for one tiny transaction.

When I shop with my mom she makes me run her credit card. She literally can't figure out which direction to swipe the card. If she magically runs it right, then when she gets asked questions like, is the total correct, she is thrown by it. Or, she'll sign and not hit accept. She just stands there. I promise she isn't dumb... But she has a kind of mental block regarding technology.

[XCashier]

We do this I kid you not FOUR MORE TIMES. Every time, she hits that damn red button. Finally her kid comes over to see why she's taking so long, and on the sixth total time we've gone through this, grabs her mom's arm as she goes to hit the red button AGAIN, and says "It's the GREEN one, Mom.. " and jabs the right button.

Thank heaven that sane, sensible kid was there or you'd still be there, trying to get it through this customer's concrete skull which button to press.

One thing I absolutely cannot stand is deliberate stupidity. When you tell someone, more than once, the correct way to do something and they still can't be bothered to do it correctly. If they would only focus on the task at hand for a few seconds, they can do it right the first time and everyone would be happy, but no....

[Jetfire]

On the flip side, there are some Debit terminals that drive me nuts because of how the screens are set up and the buttons are used. Every time I use a terminal from that bank/company, I have to slow down and watch what I press.

Most of the terminals have 4 buttons just under the screen, so the screen will indicate which buttons are active and what they mean.

One, the first screen comes up:

OK CAN

Which makes sense, but it throws me off (and other people off) because CAN is more obvious (3 letters to 3 letters), and people will think that means Canadian Dollars (why we think that I don't know but it happens a lot). So fairly regularly people will cancel instead of going to the next stage.

Another terminal style reverses the button order on you when we get to the CHECKING/ SAVING choice.

So it starts off:

OK CAN

Then goes:

SAV CHK

Meaning you have to push the opposite button from what you just picked for the most common operations. It hasn't tripped me up yet, but it does give me a pause every time I see it.