2/22/2010

What I've got in store today isn't really a rant, but I definitely found it amusing enough to mention. On this past Monday, a co-worker, "Katy," had the service desk covered, so I was on a regular register for most of the day.

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~ An older woman came up to my register with just two, large items in her basket. All she had was a bag of plant fertilizer and a roughly 2ft x 2ft, sturdy, glass-topped lawn table. After scanning I'd scanned both items, the woman looked at her total with shocked surprise. Upon inquiry, we found that the table had rung up for far more than she expected. The price it rang up for was $20.00 while she stated that a sign by the stack of tables, from where she got her's, displayed that it should have only cost about $6. The supervisor Monica was nearby, so I went out on a limb and asked if she'd check into the discrepancy for me. To my relief, she accepted the mission and headed off to the gardening area to find out what was going on. In the meantime, the woman paid for the fertilizer and moved off to the side so that I could check out other customers while waiting for my supervisor to return.

When she got back, Monica had with her the sign that the older woman had been referring to. It had, in fact, been propped up near the $20.00 tables and also displayed the price $6.98. Because of this, my super decided to go ahead and give the woman the table for the amount on the incorrectly placed price sign. During this time, I was still in the middle of checking out a different customer's items, so Monica led the woman to the customer service desk to quickly pay for the table there. Apparently, along the way, my super took a second glance at the sign she was holding and realized that it didn't have a decimal on it. The price it was displaying wasn't $6.98, but actually $698.00. The older woman was not dissuaded by this information and insisted that she still be given the table for $6.98. Since it was an honest enough mistake made by both of them at first glance, Monica relented and still agreed to still discount the table for her.

The epiphany over the price on the display happened during their walk up to the service desk, so my co-worker there still had no idea of what the situation was. Monica placed the sign on the counter as they arrived and reached for the table to make it easier to scan. Before anyone could explain what was going on, Katy looked down at the display price and said, "$698.00 for a table?!" That was apparently the final straw. The customer threw her arms up in the air, exclaimed, "Forget it! I just don't want the table anymore!" and left with only the fertilizer.

I found out the rest of the story because I noticed the table was still at the service desk when I returned later to send Katy on her lunch break. The sign that was the cause of all the fuss was most likely from one of the larger lawn sets that the store has available. All in all, the woman really should have known the price she thought she was getting the table for was too good to be true. Even my honey agrees that you'd be hard-pressed to find a glass-topped anything for under $10.00.

12/29/2009

Before I get into yet another story from the text archive, I'm compelled to share something that happened recently.

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~It was really slow yesterday morning and I was standing in front of the service counter with one of my supervisors while watching and waiting for a customer. It was so perfect that we were standing there, too because it was as if we had front-row tickets to the situation that soon happened in front of us.

A store manager didn't have a walkie-talkie with her, so she was at one of the closed registers up front to use it's phone. While she was standing there, an elderly gentleman walked up wanting to check out. When the manager politely mentioned that she wasn't cashiering, the man snatched up his small handful of items and yelled, "Well then why the hell did you have your light on!?"

As he stormed off to a different register, all the manager could do was try not to laugh too loud until he got out of earshot. Keep in mind she never, at any point, turned the lane's light on. Another employee falls victim to Grumpy Old Man Syndrome, and I got to watch the whole thing with a witness. It was a great way to start the day!

~~~

Now back to the archive:

~This situation was a double whammy. Not only did I view something that I did not want to have seen to begin with, I also got a song stuck in my head because of it. The song was Bad Moon Rising by Creedence Clearwater Revival. Just from that, some of you may already to able to guess what I got to see, but here is what happened for those who don't:

I was walking to the back to clock out for lunch when I passed this lady who was squatting down to look at some clothes on one of the lower shelves. Unfortunately for me, she had on a pair of low-rise jeans and half of her rear-end was hanging out. There wasn't even the slightest hint of underwear, either.

I almost took a picture with my phone for the sake of "pics or it didn't happen," but I didn't in case someone else was looking. I really didn't want to have to explain why I:

A. Had my phone out while on the floor,
B. Was taking a picture with said phone of a woman's bottom,
And most importantly -
C. Had my phone out while taking a picture of a woman's bottom while still clocked in.

It felt as if the rewards didn't outweigh the risks, so I kept on my merry little way while leaving the lady blissfully unaware of the fact that she had scarred me with a horrible image and an extremely catchy tune in my head for the rest of the day.

I hate people so much...

12/22/2009

I hope you're enjoying these little excerpts of my life thus far. Before I even considered working at the service desk, I was fully aware that I would have to put up with some of the more annoying situations available in the store. I'm also willing to admit that there have been quite a few instances that have made me want to just be a plain-ol' cashier again. It even seems as if some of the worst scenarios reserve themselves until I, specifically, am working at the desk by myself.

I've stuck at it, though, for some ungodly reason. Whatever driving force that has kept me at that abomination of a position still has me cemented behind that counter. But enough about that. Here's a tale about another grandma with an uncanny ability to piss me off.

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~This particular woman had three pairs of pants to exchange. She had the receipt, and already had with her the pants she wanted to swap them out for. Mundane enough, right? Of course! Those types of exchanges don't bother me in the least. No, it was the $217 worth of merchandise she had me checkout for her afterward that made me want to strangle her. It didn't feel right to tell her no because she had dug most of the items out of her basket and set them on the counter to get the pants out of the bottom she was exchanging for.

On top of that, she was in one of the electric scooters and parked at a retarded angle to the desk. Because she refused to use those two convenient little walking devices called legs and stand up, she had to reach an uncomfortable distance every time she went to place something on the counter.

On top of that, she was on the phone with about 8 different people the entire transaction. She didn't have an ear bud or Bluetooth, either, so she was doing everything with only one hand.

I would also like you to bear in mind that they do not have us set up at the service desk to handle large purchases with ease. All we have is a hand-held scanner and a stack of bags which we fit on a hanger because we don't have anything made specifically for holding them.

By the time I was able to send Little Mrs. Granny on her way, I was greeted by a line of customers who had accumulated during this lovely performance as well as the dirty looks they were shooting at me for putting up with the woman in the first place. Why do the elderly have to try my patience so?

12/16/2009

Before I start this next installment, I just wanted to throw the little F.Y.I. out there that you guys are more than welcome to post comments. In fact, I might even encourage it. O_o
Also, I'm off today, so here's yet another story from the text archive. Its another short one, but still worth posting.

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~On this particular date, it was brought to my attention that there was an elderly woman in the store shoplifting. I know this because one of our asset protection guys had seen her leave behind three packages that turned out to be empty: some rather expensive chocolates and two over-the-counter medications out of the pharmacy. To add insult to injury, she was doing it while scooting around in one of our motorized carts.

What is the world coming to when you can't even trust a little old lady who is too frail to walk around the store on her own two feet?

To my dismay, he wasn't even able to knock her for stealing. He had noticed them in her basket, but she had already ditched the empty cartons by the time he was able to throw another glance at the old hag. Unless we searched the rest of the store, there was no way to prove that she hadn't left the items he had spotted her with somewhere else. Due to these circumstances, he would have needed to have seen the person physically remove the contents from it's receptacle to be able to accuse them of anything. It seemed as if he had already been suspicious of her before that day, too.

Crappy little grandma stealing our merchandise while navigating the store on one of our complimentary scooters... I'm surprised she didn't try to fit that in her purse, as well.

The Beginning.

Greetings and Salutations!
I am a 23 year old, very antisocial woman currently employed at my local superstore. I began as a cashier, but am now working at the Customer Service desk. Now, you may be asking yourself, "Why would someone who's antisocial be working as a cashier and/or customer service representative?" That is a very fine question of which I have two answers for:
Reason #1. Both are on the higher-paid end of the entry-level positions that aren't overnight.
Reason #2. I sometimes have too much patience for my own good.

Now, on to the whole reason for this blog!
(Queue dramatic, royal-sounding trumpet fanfare.)

After a long day of work, dealing with all the lovely patrons who choose to grace me with their presence, I tend to build up quite a bit of tension and/or hatred towards some of the situations I end up having to endure. So, for the past few weeks, I've gotten in the habit of typing up some of these stories and texting them to friends. These wonderful little tales have gotten such good feedback that I've been saving them in my phone and have decided to dedicate this whole blog to them. I've never fiddled with a blog before, so you'll have to bear with me if things start off a bit slow. I'm going to start with the oldest rants and, over time, work my way up to the current date.

So, without further ado: My first stories, gripes, grumbles and tid-bits from working as a cashier:

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~ One of the first amusing and ironic situations that lead me to keeping track of all this nonsense is when I was cashing out this old grandma and her two grandchildren. The entire time I was ringing up this woman's items, her phone was ringing constantly with different, obnoxious ringtones. She seemed very savvy with the phone (which doesn't seem very common for the elderly) and I don't think I heard the same ringtone twice. As she was paying for the items, the phone rang once more, at which point the little grandson, who couldn't have been more than four, looked up at her and said, "That's why I don't like your phone, Grandma. Its noisy and you're on it all the time." All I could think was, "Srsly? Shouldn't it be the other way around?"

~ Also, I must have missed this class somewhere, but how in the world do some women fit so much stuff in those grocery baskets? I'm pretty freaking good at packing stuff, but I've had some who've walked up with one basket so packed and stacked full that, after I've bagged it all, I would have to distribute it back between two carts and end up filling both to the brim.
It always gives me this cartoon image in my head of some lady with a basket piled 8ft high where she calmly looks at the dumbfounded cashier and says, "Oh don't worry, hun, it'll all fit back in there. I don't wanna have to push two baskets out."

~~~

And last, but not least for the evening-
~ What in the world is with old people jabbing the ever-loving crap out of the card readers' screens with the stylus? Yes, I know the screen isn't always calibrated perfectly, so when you write your name, it won't look beautiful. I can understand that. But if you don't have to press that hard to write your name, why do you have to jab the "Yes" or "OK" button as if you're trying to ram a stake through Dracula's heart to confirm your signature or amount of cash back?
Every time someone mentions that our debit/credit card readers suck, it takes every ounce of restraint in me not to say, "Because elderly people like to use them as dart boards."