MATH!

[Imogene]

Had a lady come in tonight, with her sister, who works at the store. I know her sister works at the store, because she also does the Self Scan... anyway, the lady was angry because her purchase didn't come out right, the usual complaint. So, I try to go through it with her line by line, explaining the math on the way, and all she does is repeats "No!" at me. So, seeing as my night cashier knows more about how the sales work, I bring lady over and have her explain the predicament to night cashier. NC agrees with my math, and tries to show the work to the lady, lady's having none of it still, so we offer to call the night manager up. And we try, and try, and try to call him to the front, not realizing he's out at the gas island outside, and can't be reached, until I see him walking back in, and rush after him to try to catch him, only to be informed he's doing a drop and he'll be over shortly. He takes over with the Lady, and they go off. I mention to Night Cashier, "This is why I HATE the night shift, customers who refuse to believe me when I say, 'I can do nothing'..." I go back to my self scan station, and see night manager and lady, and he's kind of gesturing me over, so I hobble my way over, only to hear him tell her, "Your receipt is marked exactly how it should be, the amount you bought has a lump sum discount at the end that takes the price down to what it should be." Meanwhile, I am distracted by the service desk phone ringing, so am only paying partial attention, and go to answer the phone, only to have night manager and someone else come up and ask me where the comment cards are? I tell them, only to find out lady said she was going to complain to the store manager tomorrow, and night manager said, "He'll say the same thing."

On top of that, she was complaining that, after the management and service desk go home, the grocery store SHOULD have a way for workers to be abe to do returns. And I agree, but they haven't cross-trained me in the guest services desk. So, returns I can't do.

[saturnz_dragon]

I can't tell you the amount of people I've had do that to me. They insist that their total is wrong and blah blah blah. I'll be the first to admit that I'm no math genius, however, all it takes is some simple addition to figure this shit out. I've actually had to whip out a calculator to show people how everything added up.

Oh, and I had an Asian couple who barely spoke any English get confused because they had no idea about taxes. They bought something that was, oh let's say $4.50, so with tax it came out to be $5.09 or something. Well, they insisted that the product was $4.50, not $5.09, so I had to go into great detail about taxes even though they could barely understand me. Eventually they figured out, but sheesh.

[earl colby pottinger]

Taxes

Oh, and I had an Asian couple who barely spoke any English get confused because they had no idea about taxes.

They could confused because where they came from there is no sales tax, one of our provinces here in Canada is like that.

Or the sales taxes is already embedded in the posted sales price, I believe England works that way.

[mikoyan29]

Back when I was a cashier I had a woman come up to my register and buy a bunch of stuff. Of course she was the typical "I only have $20" customer with the brimming cart of groceries. So I started to ring up her order and gave her the total, so she said, "I can't afford that" and then started having me void some stuff. The typical "I don't want this then". So after I void a bunch of stuff her total was still too high. So she said, "I don't believe it". At that point, I was going to need a manager to override my register anyway. so I voided everything to get to zero. I showed her the total was at zero and rang up her stuff again. Interestingly enough the totals matched. At which point she said, I don't believe it. So she took some more stuff off and at that point her friend was getting impatient when she was about to argue again. Finally they left.

I mean, I've blown over the total in my head a few times but that's because I end up doing the "Oh this looks good" thing and forgetting to account for those items. If I do that, I don't get all pissed off at the cashier.

[Jay 2K Winger]

Ugh, people who argue over prices are the bane of my existence sometimes.

Just as bad are the people who get all bent out of shape because our system at the wholesale club parses the tax into "food sales tax" and regular sales tax. But they are both listed on the receipt as "VA Sales Tax" and "VA Tax." So I've had some people get upset because we're "charging them the tax twice," because the amounts are identical.

When I first started working at the club, the rates for food and non-food sales were the same, 4.5%. Then sales bumped up to 5% and food down to a lower rate, but we still get Suck sometimes over it.

[BarbieGirl]

This kind of thing always make me laugh and think of the idiots who bought an air conditioner on their hardware store credit card and came in because they thought they had been over charged. There were a bunch of sales and returns like 4 or 5 of each because the cashier at first forgot to make it a pick up later and then when they did make it a pick up later forgot to take the discount off since it was a return, and then repeated that again before they got it right.... Had the idiots just stayed home they would have saved themselves like $60. I told them they weren't over charged, the total of what they owed on the card was fine they were just freaking out about all the activity. He bet me a steak dinner that it was wrong and I needed to fix it and that it would come out as him having over paid... so I 'fixed' it for him so that he paid the total sale price he was supposed to. And I never got my steak dinner.

[rvdammit]

Or the sales taxes is already embedded in the posted sales price, I believe England works that way.

The UK does work that way, but that's because the sales tax (VAT) is a standard rate all over the lands.

[Chromatix]

Actually VAT is more complicated than that, because the same VAT system is used all over Europe, but the rates are different in each country.

For example, VAT is normally 17.5% in Britain. But for foods it is 5%, for some other things there is a 0% rate, and then there are the exempt things. (I forget why there's a distinction between 0% and exempt.)

During the recent recession, Britain put the normal VAT rate down to 15% temporarily. I think some shops passed this on to the consumer by changing their prices, but others kept their prices the same and enjoyed a slightly bigger margin. Both ways it's good for the economy as a whole.

But here in Finland, the VAT rate is 21% for most things.

EU countries are allowed to set their own VAT rates anywhere between 15% and 21%. Even better, you can mail-order something from a different EU country, and the VAT will be charged in the vendor's country at their local rate, and you don't have to pay (or get a refund on) the difference with your local rate.

The EU has become a lot like the US in terms of broad political and economic structure. We just don't have an overall head-of-conglomeration like you Yanks do, and we're still expanding our territory.

[Geek King]

He bet me a steak dinner that it was wrong and I needed to fix it and that it would come out as him having over paid... so I 'fixed' it for him so that he paid the total sale price he was supposed to. And I never got my steak dinner.

What an ass! I have only a few times been so worked up as to make such a bet, and I did pay off the one time I lost* (hey, I make good bets, sue me ). Anyone who breaks a vow like that, even ill-thought, I wouldn't trust to clean my cat's litterbox.


*Payout: Five pounds of jellybeans. Shocked the hell out of them that I came back to deliver them, too.

[Kristev]

Thank goodness I add up what I'm spending with a calculator most of the time when I go shopping.

[DGoddessChardonnay]

Thank goodness I add up what I'm spending with a calculator most of the time when I go shopping.

And that requires having common sense and planning ahead, which SC's have never heard of.

I've run into that before but the only thing I can do is send them to the Customer Service desk, as our registers aren't set up for refunds.