She Won’t Last Long… Hopefully
I go to the store to pick up something for my mom who gave me a gift card but did not tell me how much was on it. At the checkout, my total comes to $80 and I hand the cashier the gift card. She scans it and then sets it back down on the counter.
Cashier: “Okay, it looks like it’ll be $4.”
I swipe my debit card and it looks like everything goes through fine from the terminal.
Cashier: “Oh, it looks like your card didn’t go through. Try swiping again.”
I go to swipe again and I see that the terminal says that my total is now $76.
Me: “I thought you said it was $4?”
Cashier: “Oh, no, that’s how much was on the gift card.”
This is red flag one, but I decide to just swipe the card again and look at my receipt to see what happened. The gift card is still sitting on the counter so I go to reach for it, but before I get to it,the cashier grabs it and sets it under the counter. Red flag two.
This store no longer gives paper receipts, only email, so I go out to the car and pull up the receipt. It says that my debit card was charged twice, once for $4 and once for $76. She did not use my gift card at all.
I go back in and get back into the cashier’s line. There is one woman in front of me and the cashier gives her change. The woman realizes that the cashier has short-changed her, so a supervisor is called up to the register. That is sorted out and I approach the register, the supervisor still nearby.
Me: *Shows the receipt* “Hey. I checked my receipt and you didn’t use my gift card at all. You just charged my card twice.”
Cashier: “Oh, uh, sorry.”
She kind of just stands there and looks at me. The supervisor starts talking to her.
Supervisor: “Do you still have the gift card? You have to give her the card back. There’s still money on it.”
The cashier reaches under the counter and pulls out a pile of old gift cards. Luckily, I am able to find mine on the top.
Supervisor: “I’m sorry about this. You can go up to customer service and they will get this sorted out for you.”
I go to customer service and explain what happened, and they refund my purchase and repurchase my items with the gift card.
Customer Service: “Can I ask you a question? Did the blonde girl check you out?”
Me: “Yeah, she did.”
Customer Service: “Okay. She’s new, but this is like the seventh time this has happened this week.”
This fact and the fact that she short-changed the woman in front of me the second time tells me this cashier is doing something suspicious. I thought about calling the store to talk to a manager but it seemed like the woman at customer service was going to handle it.
This story was featured in our May 2020 roundup!
Question of the Week
Have you ever served a bad customer who got what they deserved?
