(During a very busy hour of my shift, I get one customer who comes through my line. She comes in quite regularly to the point that I recognize her, but I don’t I know much about her. As I ring her up she starts speaking Spanish. I’m unsure if she’s even speaking to me, since she is with her daughter, so I don’t answer. I notice she keeps repeating the same phrase, so I reply:)

Me: “No hablo español.”

Customer: *mutters under her breath* “Well, you should learn.”

(Working in a community that is mostly Mexican, this isn’t an uncommon comment. I continue on, and she gives me a coupon that my store offers. As she is about to pay she looks up and says:)

Customer: “I want the $3 off on just the food.”

(She’s paying with food stamps.)

Me: “I’m sorry, but I can’t do that, ma’am; the coupon takes off the amount overall. I would have no way of focusing the coupon on certain items.”

Customer: *looks at me for a minute* “Okay, then separate the transactions!”

(I take out all her non-food items, which leaves her with less than the required amount that the coupon dictates – it’s $3 off a $30 minimum purchase.)

Customer: *starts to shout* “This is ridiculous! Where is your supervisor?”

(I point to myself, since I just happen to be the front-end manager. She gets even more angry.)

Customer: “I would like your corporate number; I shouldn’t be treated this way! I’ve been coming here since the beginning!”

(I’ve been working for the store since it opened, so I knew THAT was a lie. I gave her my name and the number, and let my coworker handle the rest since he actually spoke Spanish. I hope she actually wastes her time trying to get me fired, because I put in my two weeks notice a few days ago.)

(It’s springtime and the weather has finally gotten warm out, so naturally, as a home improvement store with a garden center, we are busy for the day. It’s the week before Memorial Day, so we have deals going on. Our particular company has special deals for contractors and professionals, so they get coupons. I’m working at the contractor’s end of the store as their cashier. [Customer #1] places his items on the counter.)

Me: “How are you today, sir?”

Customer #1: “I’m okay, thanks.”

Me: “Did you find everything okay?”

Customer #1: “Yeah, yeah, I found everything fine.”

([Customer #1] then punches in his phone number at the pin-pad so that the transaction is recorded on his professional account.)

Me: “All right, your total is…”

Customer #1: “Hold on! I have coupons.”

(The customer proceeds to pull out his phone and show me an email advertisement for deals we have in the store.)

Me: “I’m sorry, sir, but those aren’t coupons. Those are just advertisements telling you what is on sale currently.”

Customer #1: “No, these are coupons! I shop here all the time; I usually get a discount. Hold on. Let me find them.”

(He proceeds to show me ANOTHER email advertisement that he received.)

Me: “Sir, those are the same thing. They aren’t coupons; I can’t accept them.”

([Customer #1] then proceeds to shoot me a nasty glare. My line has started a queue with two more customers behind him.)

Customer #1: “Well, I guess that means you’re going to hold your line up until I find a coupon!”

Me: “Would you like me to suspend—”

Customer #1: “Nope! They can wait until you give me some kind of discount!”

(Both customers are looking at him rather disgustedly, like they can’t believe what they’re hearing. [Customer #1] then proceeds to point at the piece of MOULDING I have in my hand that he’s purchasing.)

Customer #1: “See? Thirty percent off of paint accessories! That’s a paint accessory!”

(The moulding is $9. I’m fed up with this customer, as are my other customers in line.)

Me: *takes 30% off of the item* “All right, sir, there you go! Your total is $89.36.”

([Customer #1] pays, giving me a triumphant look before leaving. [Customer #2] approaches.)

Customer #2: “I’m glad you dealt with that, because if you didn’t I was going to say something.”

Customer #3: “That guy was an a**hole. I got the same exact email ad, and I’m not running around purposely holding up lines and blaming the cashier!”

Me: “Thank you both for being patient with that situation!”

(Both customers paid and left, complimenting me on a job well done as they went by. The fact he threw a fit over non-existent coupons just to get $3 off was the real kicker!)

(I am the customer in this story. I decide to get some snacks after getting gas. I walk into the convenience store, where I see a sign that says, “Now hiring happy people!” I walk up to the counter after selecting my items.)

Me: “I’m just waiting for the lawsuit for discrimination because you only hire happy people.”

Employee: “Yeah, discrimination against sad people.”

Me: “I should start a business where I only hire sad people.”

Employee: “I wonder what kind of business that would be.”

Me: *after thinking a second* “Political!”

(The employee cracks up, and so does customer behind me.)

Customer: “Well, at least they can’t tax humor!”

Me: “They can try!”

(I’m standing in line at the supermarket checkout. In front of me is an elderly woman, and in front of her, checking out, is a young woman. Her purchase includes a couple of boxes of tampons.)

Elderly Woman: “Excuse me, dear? You do know you can buy those at the pharmacy, don’t you?

Young Woman: “Yes, but they’re cheaper here.”

Elderly Woman: “It’s far more discreet to purchase them at the pharmacy. In my day, we were always very discreet about buying anything that had to do with ‘down there.’”

(She waves her hands in the general region of her waist.)

Young Woman: *looking in the elderly woman’s trolley* “Is that so? Then I guess you’ll be putting that toilet paper back on the shelf and purchasing it online, instead?”

(The cashier let out a snort of laughter and then abruptly stopped. I, along with the others in the line, had no such qualms. We all erupted with laughter, and the silly old lady kept her opinions to herself from then on.)

(My friends and I are on a road trip and we stop to get snacks. The store is bustling, and we go through the self-checkout section, thinking it will be faster as we each just have a drink and a food item, and the lines are long at the staffed registers. These self-checkout registers state at the beginning that they do not provide cash back, and you have to hit a button that says you understand before you can go through with scanning and paying. I check out and then wait on my friend, who is taking an extra long time to ring up her couple of items. After a minute or two, I go over to see what’s taking so long.)

Friend: “It’s giving me an error! All I wanted was cash back.”

Me: “You asked for cash back? Didn’t you see the message at the beginning?”

Friend: “Oh, I saw it had a message, but I just hit okay and didn’t read it.”

Me: *facepalm*

Friend: “Oops.”

(An associate ended up having to come over to clear the message, and then they had to open the machine to pull out the cash back that had been calculated by the machine already. She didn’t seem too happy, but we apologized profusely for being THOSE customers. I’m sure her Saturday had been full of people like us already!)

Related:
Cash Back Attack, Part 5
Cash Back Attack, Part 4
Cash Back Attack, Part 3