Billed Them As A Scammer Before They Presented A Bill

(It’s Saturday and I’m on my till along with my other five coworkers trying to get the rush of customers down. It is about one o’clock and the line keeps at a steady thirty or forty customers. I only have about ten minutes until my shift was over. I decide that the young woman next in line will be my last for the day.) 

Me: “Hi. How are you?” 

Customer: “I’m great! Thank you!” 

(She places three small items on my counter and is already holding a fifty-dollar bill, prepared to pay. I scan each item and tell her her total.) 

Me: “Your total is $23.52. Cash?” 

(The lady nods and presents me with the fifty-dollar bill. I type in the amount and give her her change of $26.48. She smiles and leaves as I flick off my till light and begin to clean. I hear a knock on my register counter about five minutes later. It is the same lady, holding her change with an angry look.) 

Me: “Everything okay?” 

Customer: “I gave you a hundred-dollar bill. You didn’t give me all my change.” 

(Here we go. Either she honestly didn’t realize she was holding a fifty-dollar bill the entire time or it’s a scamming act I’ve seen many times before.) 

Me: “All right, I’m pretty sure you gave me a fifty-dollar bill, but I’ll print my till totals and count my drawer real quick.” 

Customer: “I don’t time for you to do that. Just give me my correct change. I know I gave you a hundred-dollar bill.” 

Me: “Oh, don’t worry; it will take less than two minutes. You see, I also work in our change office in the mornings as an emergency backup when our regular coworker doesn’t show up. I’ve had to get all the tills out in about ten minutes before we open.” 

(She sits there arms crossed and getting kind of nervous. Scam alert.) 

Me: “All right, my cash came to $1,678.77. Will you read me that top number on the total slip that printed in front of you?”

(The customer hesitates but grabs the totals and looks at the top number in bold.) 

Customer: “$1678.77…” 

(She ends balling it up and throwing it at me and storming off.) 

Me: “Have a great day!” 

(I took this particular customer because she is known for doing this and didn’t want any of my other newer coworkers to deal with her, because if your drawer is short five or more dollars it’s an automatic write-up. I ended up texting the manager of the store next to us and, sure enough, the same lady did the same thing after leaving my store.)