Oh hah I don't know what I'm buying

[bean]

My store has a large bulk section. ALL OVER the bulk section are signs saying you need to write the PLU somewhere on the container. Pens and stickers are every few feet.

It's relatively common for the mouth breathers to ignore that and bring me items without the PLU. It's not THAT big of a deal, I have a typical PLU codebook at my disposal.

Today someone brought me 10 things from bulk. All with the stickers helpfully attached. BLANK stickers. No PLU on them, but she obviously saw the stickers. She spoke perfect english when I greeted her, and as soon as I asked her for the name of the items so I could look them up, she went into "I no speak English, I no know name English" (yes she said this.. after we'd conversed in English) mode.

Oh wait.. she was able to recite the price per pound fine with no accent. I told her that I couldn't ring items up like that, I had to either have the name or the PLU. She started telling me things were "oh.. it flour" in a very thick asian accent (we sell 20 different flours in bulk) for most of them, even things obviously not flour (pistachios? quinoa? seriously lady? do you think I'm that stupid?)

By the time I figured out what everything was, I had a line... 10 people deep. A $10 transaction took almost 15 minutes.

Also, I've dealt with her before and she's always spoken unaccented English before.

I need a fucking vacation.

[wagegoth]

I hate scammers.

[RayvenQ]

Can't you call her out on her lying about not understanding?

Her: "Me no speaky English"
You: "Funny, you did a minute ago."

[GiftShopGirl]

I would have told her I needed to call over a manager to help identify the items. I think she might have suddenly remembered how to speak english, or at the very least your manager would know what kind of a nut-job you were dealing with.

[BowserKoopa1]

I actually had a customer come through my line who spoke english so-so, but his accent was so strong, I could not understand what he was saying. I was very polite and patient through this whole thing.
SC: Can you not understand my english?
Me: I'm sorry, sir. I did have a little trouble understanding you.
SC: My english good.
Me: Ok, tell me again what it is you needed?
So he tells me again, and I still have trouble understanding him. I look around for another employee who might be able to help me, but no one is there. I try again for a 3rd time, and he starts to get annoyed with me. I finally was able to find someone who could help me out.
The customer proceeded to tell the other employee that I was mean. Yeah, sure idiot. I'm mean because you think I'm putting you down in some way, shape, or form because I can't understand you?!
I've also had several instances in the past where a customer comes in and gets all snotty with us, simply because we don't speak their language! I'm sorry, but in my opinion, if you are going to come into our country (United States) then you need to learn to speak our language (english). It doesn't work the other way around. It really pisses me off to no ends when they actually get mad because we don't speak their language. Its almost as if they expect us to learn their language! Yeah right, like that's gonna happen!

[Sheldonrs]

"I no speak English,.."


Next time, you should reply, "Neither do I! NEXT!".

[BarbieGirl]

I would get people that would do that with the nuts and bolts before we switched from bulk to bagged. I would find the most expensive stainless steel ones that were around $1-3 a piece. Then all of a sudden they remembered that they wrote the sku's on a little piece of paper they forgot they had in their pocket.

[poofy_puff]

I saw someone try to pull that at a farmer's market recently:

Tomatoes for $3.50 PER POUND, THREE POUNDS for $10.50. One of those scales with a keypad where you enter the price per pound and it shows the unit price AND TOTAL on a little display facing toward the customer's side of the bench. So the man behind the table is telling her what the total is, and the woman customer keeps shaking her head and pointing to the number $3.50. As though the price was for as much product as you want! I know she was faking not being able to understand because she could read the NUMBERS just fine and she understood what the guy was saying when he was asking for PAYMENT, but it looked to me like she was trying to get him to give her the whole thing for $3.50 just to get rid of her. Eventually, she paid $10.50 and left, which, if you didn't understand and thought you were being "ripped off" you would just leave and buy them somewhere else.

As soon as she left, the guy saw me rolling my eyes and said "You noticed it too, huh?"