Many A Slip Twixt Cup And Scam

(I work the registers at a big box retailer. At the end of every transaction, I look down the line to make sure there aren’t any special attention items coming my way. A customer has a large stack of $1 cups in his basket the first time I look at him, but they are gone the second.)

Me: “Hello! How are you doing today? Did you find everything okay?”

Customer: “Yeah, I’m okay.”

(At this point I’ve already scanned three items, and sure enough every one of them has rung up as a cup. My favorite way to deal with shoplifters is to pretend to be completely dense, while talking loudly about their shoplifting.)

Me: “Well, that’s very strange. Somehow those last three items got the wrong label on them. Let me just take a moment and fix that.”

Customer: *looks up from his wallet* “Oh, um. That’s fine.”

(I continue to scan his order, removing every single cup label from every item.)

Me: “Boy, this is just so strange. I don’t know how this could have happened. But strange things seem to happen around here from time to time.”

Customer: “Uh… haha, yeah. I… I don’t know how that happened either.”

Me: “Well, your total comes to $245.50.”

Customer: “Hey uh, I… I left my uh, wallet in the car. I’m going to go get that.”

Me: “Okay, well, we can hold on to your order for up to 24 hours.”