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July 22nd
It was a long shift in Food Avenue as I worked alone, trying to keep up with
the high demand. That's when a man came through the line, and ordered a ham and cheese sandwich, hold the ham. I was completely
baffled by his request, and insisted that it would be cheaper to order a simple grilled cheese. He would hear none of it,
though, and went on to order his ham and cheese sandwich, hold the ham.
A few days earlier, while working at the Service
Desk, a woman came up and wanted to return something without a receipt. Unfortunately, I could not return the item, and told
her so. She walked away quietly, but then turned around quickly, saying, "Hey! I know I have it somewhere!" I thought for
a second. Hmmm, maybe I could just aim the scanner at random places around the service desk and I would eventually happen
to scan the barcode on HER receipt that probably wasn't even in the store. I decided against it, told her that I had to actually
HAVE it, and sent her on her way.
June 18th
Although only one memorable event occured in this long 12-8
Sunday shift, it was indeed a rather memorable event. A young plump lady, approximately 30 years of age, came through my line
with three young children, approximately 5 years old each. After they ordered I noticed they had continued over to the gumball/toy/etc.
machines. About two minutes later, she approached me and said, "My son had an accident. He did both." I didn't even need to
look over to the site to see what she meant, as the horrible stench had alrady begun to fill the store. I was left without
a bagger as he went to clean up the mess, and I laughed as I looked over and noticed the pile of feces near the gumball machine.
I tried to stifle the laughing, but the offended mother was already marching up to the service desk. Immediately my phone
rang, and my CSM, trying not to laugh herself, stated, "You need to stop laughing. She is up here and she is very upset."
I looked to the service desk and noticed the lady looking in my direction with a giant frown on her face. Apparently I should
have apoligized to her for her son's accident or something.
June 15th
A couple of strange events came to mind
in this long daytime shift. A man was approaching the checkout with his groceries, (I was bagging), he started to say, "Emma,"
out loud, repeating this every few seconds. His young child followed his example, chanting, "Emma." Later that day, an elderly
man came through my line. When his order was completed, his said plainly to my female cashier, "Have a rotten day." Either
the height of customer rudeness or customer sarcasm.
June 9th
12-8:30 has to be one of the worst shifts
to work. On the other hand, it gives you a lot of time for things to happen. A few unusual things happened today.
First
of all, a women with a huge cart of merchandise pulls into my line, unloading it all onto the conveyor belt, like usual. As
I am working on the women in front of the new arrival, the new arrivals kids, maybe 8 or 9, start to push all of my current
customers items towards me, to make room for their moms. Obviously, the conveyor is only so big, so the items start to spill
onto the floor and into the bag, without having been scanned yet. The kids start to laugh wildly, and the mom just smiles
at me, as if this is a normal thing. Forcing a smile, I choked down the urge to send the kids flying into the next register,
and instead shoved the items back onto the conveyor, pushing their mom's items back towards the edge. The kids stopped laughing
and looked at me, wondering why their mom no longer had priority. I just smiled, and went on with the order.
Also,
a woman and her husband came through my line, with a bunch of glass vases. Before I could even reach for tissue paper to wrap
them in, she orders me to "wrap them good." I once again reach for the tissue paper, but before I can get to it, she says,
disgustedly, "They USUALLY use tissue paper; it's right in the drawer by your hand." I tried not to laugh at her ignorance,
and went on to wrap her items "good."
--Steve
June 2nd
It was already a bad day, as I had been called
in for work on my day off to work a long 9-3:30 shift. Not too much of note happened this day, but one event in particular
came to mind. A couple came through my line with a WIC Check. WIC checks specify which items can be taken on it. As the lady
handed me her WIC check, I noticed it said she could have one gallon of milk and then one quart of milk. Scanning her gallon,
I then noticed she had a half-gallon for the other. We'll call this lady Patty.
Adam: "I'm sorry, ma'am, but the check
says one quart of milk, not half gallon."
Patty: "They're the same thing!!!"
Adam: "Um, no, ma'am, a half gallon is
two quarts."
Patty: "Then what is a quart?"
Adam: "They're in the cardboard containers. Not plastic."
Patty: "Have
someone go get it."
Thcheck says one quart of milk, not half gallon."
Patty: "They're the same thing!!!"
Adam:
"Um, no, ma'am, a half gallon is two quarts."
Patty: "Then what is a quart?"
Adam: "They're in the cardboard containers.
Not plastic."
Patty: "Have someone go get it."
Then, as an employee came in with a load of carts, she shouted
out to him to come over and go get her milk. So all the carts were left there are her quart was retreived.
--Adam
May 9th
**Maintenance Story**
Working the maintenance shift(cart attendant, janitor, and carry-out
all mixed into one) you can get some pretty interesting stories. Here is one from my small 5-9 shift today:
Around
6:00 pm, I had finished most of my jobs and was standing around and chatting with the on-duty security guard. A woman in her
early 40's, we'll call here Jean, approached us and said, "Come quick! There's a dog trapped in a car!" After exchanging confused
looks, we followed her quickly to her car. Parked next to her was a large 4-door sedan, with a dog inside, laying down under
the glovebox. "They didn't even leave the windows open a crack! He could overheat and die!" she continued. She tried to get
us to do an overhead page(yeah, right. "Will the person who locked their poor dog in the car please come to the security desk
before the dog overheats and dies?"). We finally told her we would talk to the head security guy. He came out and talked with
her for about 10 minutes. He came back, and we found that since he could do nothing, she had called the police. About 10 minutes
later, the woman who owned the car with the dog inside left the store. The two exchanged words for quite awhile, but I was
watching from inside, so I couldn't hear what was said. They both left about 5 minutes before the police arrived. Since the
two women had already left, nothing could be done, and the officer took off. The new joke around the store: "Man, it's hot
enough to kill a dog!"
--Steve
May 3rd
A couple quick events put a spark into this small, 3 and a half
hour shift. One of my first customers was a rather large lady with approximately 4-5 items, in a basket. She had already partially
written out her check, so I thought that was probably a good start. WRONG!! Putting the basket aside and quickly bagging her
groceries, (I had no bagger,) she then requested a cart! She had not taken one. Annoyed, I had to rush over to the store entrance
to fetch her a cart, as my line continued to get backed up. Several customers later, a confused man that we'll call James
came through my line. He was approximately 70-80 years old.
James: "I want a refund. Can you do that?"
Adam: "Um,
that would have to be done up at the service desk, sir."
James: "No, I'm sure someone working at these registers can do
it."
Adam: "These registers can't do refunds. Only the service desk can do that. What do you need refunded?"
James:
"My wife wants an extra slip."
Adam: (confused) "Excuse me?"
(at this point, a manager of mine walked by)
James:
"He probably knows. HEY!!!!" (yelling to my manager, josh)
Josh: "Yes?"
James: "I want a refund."
Josh: "For what?"
James: "My wife wants an extra receipt printed up."
Adam: "Oh, you just need a duplicate receipt for your sale?"
James:
"Yes, that's it."
So after all that, I simply pressed the duplicate receipt button after the sale, and James went
home happily with his "refund."
--Adam
May 3rd
During the good-ol' early morning shift, around 8:00,
the doors opened, letting in our first customer. A man we'll call Bob, literally "ran" through the doors, sprinting down the
main aisle. He wasn't just stopping in from his jog either, because he had a suit jacket on. The few other cashiers and I
stared with confused expressions as he sprinted around the store. Finally, he came to my lane, and piled some milk and other
groceries onto the counter. He just stood there, not tired from his run. I bagged it for him, and totaled his order. But instead
of handing me the money, he insisted that I take it off of the counter where he set it. I did, and tried to hand him his change,
but he jerked his hand away, and spoke for the first time: "Set it on the counter!" I did, he grabbed it, and sprinted out
the door. Definitely not your average customer.
--Steve
April 30th
Sorry for the lack of recent updates!
Work has been cut extremely short due to track, school, and national guard lately, but something rather notable happened on
the last day of April.
In this story, I will combine dialog with the explanations of what happened here. We will call
the man "George."
George: (comes up to my line) "Sir, I just bought those M&M Cookies and I went out to my car,
and I don't have them. Now I want my cookies."
At this point, I searched everywhere around the register for any sign
of the cookies. None to be found. This tipped me off that the man was probably just stupid or absentminded, but nonetheless,
rather than arguing, I took his receipt and looked to see which cookies they were.
George: "Don't you throw that away!!!"
Adam: (extremely annoyed) "I'm not throwing it away, sir! I'm looking to see which cookies they were!"
George: "Well,
I'm getting my cookies, whether you want to give me to them here, or I'll go take another one."
Now I walked over
to the cookies. They were on sale for $2.40 each. All the packages of cookies contained approximately 24 M&M cookies,
all the same size package.
Adam: (picking up a package) "Okay, here's another package of cookies."
George: "NO!
Those aren't big enough!"
Adam: (picking up another package) "How about these?"
George: "Those are smaller too! The
one I had before was bigger!"
Adam: (frowning) "Sir, no. There are no sizes for these. They are all the same size with
the same amount of cookies."
George took the package of cookies at this point, looked them over careful, growled and
stormed off with them.
--Adam
March 18th
A lady in my line came through with a very small and simple
purchase that should not have required a bag. Yet she requested a "small, plastic" bag from my bagger who complied. She headed
toward the door, and just as she reached it, she turned around and returned to our register, and said to my bagger, "I want
a small PAPER bag." Shocked, she nonetheless took the item out of the small plastic bag and gave the woman her item in a small
paper bag.
--Adam
March 23rd
Two notable events happened on this late 7-11 shift. First, a lady with
a "house charge" came through the line, a purchase in which the total is charged to a business, rather than cash, check, etc.
This lady had several dozen large eggs in her order. The regular price was 61 cents each. The following dialog will explain
the remainder of the event. We will call this lady Jill.
Adam: (Rings up eggs)
Jill: "Oh, by the way, Jeremy in
dairy said I could have eggs for 49 cents per dozen."
Adam: "Okay." (voids eggs, rings all egg dozens up for 49 cents
each)
Jill: "Did you void the first eggs off?"
Adam: "Yes, they were voided off."
Jill: (moments later) "Did you
charge me 49 cents for those eggs?"
Adam: "Yes, I rung them up 49 cents each."
Jill: (after the sale) "Now was I charged
49 cents per dozen for those eggs or the regular price?"
Adam: (annoyed) "Ma'am, I rung those eggs up for 49 cents per
dozen."
Jill: "Will it be on the receipt? I'd sure like to be able to see it."
Adam: "Yes it will be on the receipt."
Needless to say, this was quite annoying although falling short of rude. The rudeness was fulfilled later in the evening
by a young (gentle)man in a short but notable event. It was a fairly large order, and I rung up a 20 oz. bottle of Sprite
for him. Before I could even offer to leave it out, he bellowed, "GIVE ME THAT!"
I guess that would have been a yes.
--Adam
March 8th
As the end of my 8 hour shift neared, I was growing restless to leave. It was a little
after nine when a family of 5 or six approached my lane, and unloaded a decent sized order onto to the convayer. I rang everything
up as they pooled their money, putting all their bills together. I finished, and the order came up to about 119.50 or something.
I told them the total, and they handed me a huge wad of bills. To my amazement, there where about 4 five dollar bills, and
the rest were all ones. It took me about 2 minutes to count everything out, and when I finished, I told them they only had
about 97 dollars. They got mad and kind of nervous, and they each counted it again. Then the wife said to her husband, "I
don't believe you! Let him count it!" She said, reffering to me. So I counted it AGAIN, and confirmed the total to be, like
before, 97 dollars. Well, by now, they were both frantic, and told me to void some stuff, like their shirts and shorts. So
I voided them, bringing the order to about 99 dollars. They counted and recounted it again, always saying, "Alright, this
time it's for sure!" But it never was for sure, and they counted it again and again. Finally, about 27 minutes from the time
they arrived, I handed them their change, which was about 12 cents. They had "found" another few dollars, and where able to
pay the bill. It was seriously the longest order I have ever had.
--Steve
March 5th
This incident is
best told by the dialog itself. So here it is.
(Woman writing out check while I bag. We will call her Mary)
Mary:
"Say, what are your hours today?"
Steve: "Um, I think we are open from 8 until 10, or 7 until 10. One of those two."
Mary:
(disgusted) "No. No, no, no. Not YOUR hours, the store."
Steve:(Blank stare) "Yes, that's what I just said. We are open
from either 7 or 8 in the morning, I'm not sure which, until 10 tonight."
Mary:(Annoyed laugh) "Okay. I guess I'm not
making myself clear. I don't want to know YOUR hours, I want to know the stores hours."
Steve: "Ma'am, I just told you.
Those were the hours that we are open."
Mary:(Annoyed beyond belief) Okay. Now tell me this. (Speaking slowly) What time
do you close tonight? When does the store stop working?"
Steve:(Speaking even slower) "T-E-N -O- C-L-O-C-K"
Mary:
"Good. Okay. Now, what time do you open?"
Steve: "E-I-G-H-T -O- C-L-O-C-K"
Mary: (Utterly disgusted) "Just forget
it, STEVE(As she reads my nametag)
The woman proceeded to leave the store, and left me standing, bewildered, at my
register. "What was she thinking?" I thought. I guess I will never know.
--Steve
March 2nd
Nearing getting
in a crash on the way to work was a bad omen. Then I got to work, where my first customer was a cross-dresser, a sure indication
that it was going to be a bad day. He had a red dress on and didn't say a word. The odd thing is, he had two normal looking
people with him. Okay people, I know not many of you do something like that, but if you feel the urge to cross-dress, CONTROL
IT!!! Especially males.....You wonder why we laugh at you when you come through the line along with everyone else. Well, it's
because you look like a total idiot. Another occurance this day as well. Our store has a no dogs allowed policy. Cleverly,
one lady decided to ignore this policy and be stupid, as she put her two small dogs in a baby carraige and rolled it throughout
the store! I have no idea what her motive was behind that.
--Adam
February 28th
Early in my shift,
an elderly lady had two orders, one regular and another simply a bottle of wine. We'll call her "Sally." Not wanting to have
another separate order for it, I asked anyway, being obligated to.
Adam: Would you like that wine on a separate receipt,
ma'am?
Sally: Uh I want to pay for that in cash. I'll write out a check for the rest.
Adam: Yes, but would you like
it on a separate order?
Sally: Um, I don't know.
Adam: If you take it on a separate order, there will be a different
receipt for the wine.
Sally: Oh, yes, that would be best.
I guess she couldn't quite grasp the concept I was trying
to explain to her.
--Adam
February 27th
I was nearing the end of my shift, when a lady came through
my line with a relatively small-medium order of groceries. Like any other order, I rang up the groceries and politely reported
the total to the lady, which was approximately $25. Suddenly, she screamed, "DAMN! I KNEW I SHOULDN'T HAVE BOUGHT ANYTHING
I WANTED!!!!" Needless to say I was a bit taken aback. I asked her if there was anything she wanted to put back, and she put
back about 7 dollars worth of groceries, bringing her total to about $18. She then wrote a check for 10 cents over. And then
she started to cry! A bit embarrased, I simply stood there, took her check, handed her the 10 cents and sent her on her way.
--Adam
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