(In the mornings I go to a grocery store to get lunch for work. Sometimes people queuing have no idea how to queue, coming way closer than it is comfortable for the person using the pin machine at the register. This shop has enough space along the conveyor belt, but the actual register area is small. When people don’t wait at the conveyor belt, they are standing right next to the pin machine. This morning I have had enough. I am packing my stuff as quickly as possible, as there is very little space.)

Cashier: “It’ll be [amount].”

Me: “I’ll pay with a card, please.”

(Lifting my head I notice the next customer standing right in front of the card machine.)

Me: “…”

Guy: *looks at me, doesn’t move*

Me: “Sorry, did you want to pay for this?”

Guy: “Oh, no.” *still doesn’t move*

Me: *making shooing motion with hands* “Then give me some space, please.”

Guy: *takes one tiny step back, basically still looming over the pin machine*

Me: “Keep going…”

Guy: *reluctantly takes one more step back*

(After that I could pay. The register lady had an interesting smile on her face and gave me a look that said she’s seen people like the other customer a few times too many.)

(It’s Friday evening before Easter and I’m checking out my groceries at a busy local supermarket. I’m a bit in a rush, but the cashier is very young and it looks like she’s in her first days of work. Some guy in his forties behind me taps his feet nervously and stares at her slow scanning. Of course, this doesn’t improve the scanning speed at all. After about five minutes or so:)

Impatient Customer: “GOD! Can you hurry up? It must be painful to be so stupid you can only be hired as a cashier.”

Me: “I agree she’s slow, but why do you think she’s stupid?”

Impatient Customer: “All she has to do is scan some labels; how smart do you think she has to be?”

(Visibly offended, the stressed cashier scans one of my products twice by mistake. She calls a supervisor to cancel the double-scan.)

Impatient Customer: *superior* “See? What did I tell you?”

Me: “You were right. I bet you can do it faster than she does.”

Impatient Customer: “You bet I can!”

(The supervisor arrives to cancel the double-scanned product. I approach him:)

Me: “Hello. Can you please get me a manager?”

Supervisor: “Good evening. I’m the shift supervisor; what seems to be the problem?”

Me: “Your employee here scans the products very slowly and the gentleman behind me is in a rush. He’s a lot smarter than your employee and much faster at scanning products. Since the line behind us is quite big, I was wondering if you can let him check out his own groceries to speed up the line.”

Cashier: “…”

Supervisor: “Excuse me?”

Impatient Customer: *turning red* “I didn’t…”

(Silence. I showed a massive grin to the smiling cashier, paid, and waved the smarta** good-bye. All I heard was a faint, “I’m sorry,” while pushing my cart to the parking lot.)

(I am a student, working in the fifties-style diner in our college’s union. Normally, we are supposed to ask for student IDs to verify that the customer doesn’t have to pay tax, but if they look close, we’ll give it to them without asking. Our registers have very old touch screens, and sometimes you have to press a button multiple times to make it work. After the transaction has gone through:)

Me: “Thank you and have a nice day!”

Customer: “What is this?”

(She shows me her receipt, pointing to a line at the bottom. Apparently, her tax wasn’t taken off.)

Me: “I’m sorry; I guess I must’ve made a mistake.”

Customer: “Redo it.”

Me: “I’m sorry?”

Me: “Redo the order. I want my money back.”

(NO ONE besides our boss has the capacity to open the register outside of a transaction, let alone do a refund. I ask one of my supervisors, anyway, on the off chance they might be able to. No such luck. I tell my coworker on the only other register I’ll be back. My boss is nowhere to be found. I have to go all the way down to the accounting office to grab someone to help me. By the time we get back, the line is out the door. We redo everything, and the girl leaves with a nod, having gotten her money back.)

Coworker: “How much was the refund?”

Me: “Thirty-three cents.”

Coworker: “You’re kidding.”

Me: “I’m not. If I’d had my wallet, I’d have given her a dollar of my own money and told her to never come back.”

(I am the manager on duty at the store I work for. This particular store charges a $1 fee to get cash back from your debit card, and you are notified of this charge and must agree to it on the pin pad to receive the cash. I am in the break room when my cashier pages me to her register to help with an upset customer.)

Me: “Hello there. What can I do for you today?”

Customer: “I would like to do a return, but your cashier won’t help me!”

Me: “I’m sorry about that. She actually doesn’t have the authority to do returns, but I would be more than happy to help you. What is it that you would like to return?”

Customer: “This!” *she throws $10 onto the counter and crosses her arms*

Me: “I’m sorry, ma’am; I don’t understand. You want to return your cash?”

Customer: “That’s right! I just bought all this–” *holds up her bags* “–and got $10 cash back off my card, but didn’t know you charged me to get it. You’re stealing people’s money, so I don’t want the cash back anymore! Take it back, and just put that and the fee back onto my card.”

Me: “I… I’m sorry, ma’am, but I can’t do that.”

Customer: “Here. Take my receipt. It shows that I did, indeed, get the cash back, so you should have no problem putting it back on my card for me.”

Me: “I’m sorry, but we just can’t do returns on cash back. We can only do returns for items. If you want the money to be put back onto your debit card, then you will have to take it to the bank your checking account is with and deposit it there. But unfortunately, the fee will still be there because you still got cash back from us.”

Customer: “How do you think you are going to get away with this? You have some nerve charging me to take out my own money. You need to tell the customer if we are being charged for something! Otherwise, that’s just theft!”

Me: “I agree, that would be theft. However, on the pin pad, after selecting cash back, you were prompted with a message that let you know you would be charged a fee of $1 to get cash back, and you would have had to hit the agree button to receive it.”

Customer: “Well, I didn’t read it, so I didn’t know what I was agreeing to. And since I didn’t know what I was agreeing to, it doesn’t count. I have bills to pay; I can’t just have people taking my money without me knowing first.”

Me: “I’m sorry, but it works like any other contract. If you agree to the terms, then you are bound to them, whether you actually took the time to read them or not. You agreed to pay a $1 convenience fee, and you were given your $10 cash back. Unfortunately, there is nothing else I can do for you.”

Customer: “That is completely ridiculous! This is the worst customer service I have ever received! This is only my second time at [Store], and I will never shop here again. I’m going to tell everyone how [Store] steals from its customers! You will be out of business in no time!”

(She crumpled up her $10 bill, shoved it into her purse, and stormed out of the store. My cashier and I just stared at each other for a minute before getting back to work.)

Related:
Cash Back Attack, Part 4
Cash Back Attack, Part 3
Cash Back Attack, Part 2

(I’m a cashier at a pharmacy. Unfortunately, due to its rewards program, our chain is a haven for “Coupon Queens” to come buy a cartload of products for $3.00. I mean, do what you gotta do, but sometimes, the couponers get way out of hand. The customer in this story is a notorious regular, and he and his wife always make my coworkers and me go running when they come into the store. The customer, sans his wife, has been chatting to me while I ring him up, going on about saving this and saving that, occasionally snapping at me if I even look at one of the items he’s set aside for a third or fourth transaction. It takes fifteen minutes before I finally get it all rang up.)

Customer: “I’ll bring your cart back in when I get these out to my car. I just… Oh, s***!”

Me: “Is everything all right, sir?”

Customer: “I forgot to use my coupons on this stuff. Oh, my God, my wife is going to kill me. Here, you need to refund all of these so I can do it again and use my coupons.”

Me: “I… I’m sorry, sir. I can’t do that.”

Customer: “Well, why the h*** not? I have the coupons right here; there’s no one else in line right now.”

Me: “Sir, it’s against company policy. I cannot refund your items for full price, and then sell them back to you when you’re using coupons.”

Customer: “Well, I’m going to tell my wife you did this!” *storms out*

Related:
The Couponator 6: The Coupon Awakens
The Couponator 5: Online Decline
The Couponator 4: Deadly Discounts