Unfiltered Story #251248

It’s been a long day at the service desk. My throat is sore and my stomach is a little upset. Just normal winter time maladies. Add to that, just yesterday I discovered one of the girls in the grocery pick-up area seems to hate me. That’s another story.

Trying to hide all of this tension, I greet my next customer at the service desk. He seems to struggle with English and pushes his phone at me.

Customer: “It keeps saying problem. What problem?”

Me: *takes phone carefully as it’s a very new one* “Let me take a look.”

Normally, the old tried-and-true works, so I try to close our shopping app and reopen it. It becomes clear, however, that the way I closed it only minimized it and the app opens just as before with an error during the checkout process.

Me: “Can you close this app?”

Customer: *repeats what I did*

Me: “No, can you close it all the way? Here…”

I show him on my phone: I have an app open. I close it so that the next time I open it, I will be on the main page. He struggles swiping his finger across the screen a few times, still not totally clear on what I want or how to do it. I try to call for an associate from the electronics department who may be more familiar with the new phones that have no home button, but no one answers.

I turn back to my customer, who suggests I charge him for his groceries at the service desk. I notice his app is showing the purchase as tax exempt for retail purposes. Normally none of this is an issue. I pull up his loyalty card and scan it. It won’t allow me to remove the tax from this transaction.

So, I move to the ipad on my desk and pull up his account, which unfortunately shows no tax exemption paperwork saved. And his is not in the drawer with the rest of the forms.

I finally manage to close and reopen his app. That doesn’t fix it.

Fed up, because I now have a line and the phone is ringing, I page a supervisor. She heads over and manually removes the tax from his purchase after I show her he should be exempt from his phone, which I then return.

THEN electronics contacts me.

Electronics: “Did a customer need help?”

Me: *already max frustrated* “Never mind. I fixed it.”

Me: *to customer* “Your total is [amount just over $40].”

Customer: *reading card reader* “Pay with card? Yes…” *He taps the corresponding button.

Me: *sensing trouble* “Do you have the card with you?”

Customer: “No…”

Me: *fighting to stay sane* “Any card? I have to have a physical card…Your boss could always pay you back…”

Customer: “Oh, yes!” *pulls out store credit card*

Me: *stares in wonder* “Insert the chip, please.”

Customer: *puts card in backwards*

Me: *eyes very big*

Customer: “Oops! Wrong side!” *flips card and tries again*

Me: *trying not to headdesk* “Here’s your receipt. Have a good day, sir!”