A Veteran Issue With Retail

(I am a cashier at a large chain retail store. We are having a sale on 12-packs of Pepsi products. Whenever we have a sale on soda, we are supposed to limit each guest to 12 cases per guest so that every shopper had the opportunity to take advantage of the sale. There are supposed to be no exceptions. Even though they didn’t train us on it, we could still get spoken to about it, as I had been once. A gentleman comes up with a cartful of soda.)

Man: *cheerfully* “Hello, miss! I’ve got 18 cases here.”

Me: “I apologize, sir, but we have to limit each guest with 12 cases only.”

Man: *suddenly very angry* “Excuse me? Where does it say that?”

Me: “There should be signs in the aisle.”

Man: “Well, this is ridiculous! My money is good. I should be allowed to buy whatever I want!”

Me: “I understand that sir. I don’t make the rules. It’s so that everyone can get the sale price.”

(I wanted to say I disagreed with the rules myself, but I had gotten in trouble for that before.)

Man: “Nonsense. There’s still plenty back there! I’m buying them for my VFW in North Carolina! Y’all have cheaper tax here, so I’m taking it down there to save some money. Let me talk to your manager.”

(Note that we’re in northern Illinois, so why he chose to buy here was a mystery. The tax rate wasn’t THAT good.)

Me: “Sir, I am a supervisor.”

Man: “Well, get me YOUR manager. This is ridiculous.”

(I go ahead and page the main manager on duty. Meanwhile, the man continues to rant.)

Man: “You know, I am a Vietnam veteran. The forgotten war. When we came back nobody cared about us. They hated us. We didn’t get the welcome home that the young men get nowadays.”

Me: “I know, sir. It’s terrible that it happened to you and I’m sorry, but many people are now thankful for your service.”

Man: “Well, apparently [Store] isn’t! You know, my buddy said [Store] hates veterans! Looks like he was right!”

(I can tell he is just saying that to get his way, and allow my annoyance to come out a little.)

Me: “Sir, I assure you that this has nothing to do with you being a veteran. This has to do with the rules. My husband is a veteran, and he comes from a family full of veterans. If any of them were to come in here, they wouldn’t get to buy this many either. I don’t have anything against veterans. I was just told I can’t make any exceptions.”

Man: *ignores me* “I told him he was wrong, but I guess not! This is insane, limiting what a man can buy!”

(The head manager finally came up and listened to both of us. The minute he threw out the line “I heard [Store] hates veterans!” she immediately gave him the deal and made an exception, saying, “My great uncle was a veteran. Thank you very much for your service. I assure you we support our troops and the veterans here at [Store].” Eventually the policy was thrown out, thank goodness. I dealt with a lot of angry people due to it. I told my husband that the man said Vietnam was the “forgotten war” and he laughed saying, “Everybody knows about Vietnam. Korea was the one called the forgotten war!”)