(This takes place in a well-known Australian supermarket. Our store takes online orders for people at home. My job is to pick items off the shelf and place them in crates on a trolley. Each crate has a name and a corresponding address. Each item is bagged and tied by hand in plastic bags.)

Customer: “Excuse me.”

Me: “Yes?”

Customer: “Are these items on special?”

Me: “No, these items are for online customers. They are not on special.”

Customer: “Okay, then.”

(The customer then wanders off to a different part of the store. My next item requires me to leave my trolley to find an item that’s out of stock. This takes no longer than five minutes. As I return, I hear the following conversation with my coworker.)

Coworker: “Excuse me, what are you doing?”

Customer: “These were on special! I’m taking them.”

(I walk around the corner only to find that the customer from before has taken EVERY SINGLE ITEM out of its bag and into her own trolley. This is well over 100 hand-picked and bagged items.)

Customer: “He told me they were on special!”

Me: “I did not. I told you they were for online customers.”

Customer: “Liar! You’re just trying to steal them and keep them for yourself! I bet you don’t even work here!”

Me: “I do work here because my shirt has the [Store] logo on it. Also, the trolley clearly advertises who I am shopping for. Online customers! Not specials!”

(Thankfully, the customer turned around and left in a huff. I spent the next hour rescanning and bagging the items.)

(I’m sixteen and in my junior year in high school, and I’ve been with my boyfriend for nearly two years at this time. After missing a birth control pill earlier in the month and using condoms in the meantime, my period still comes late. Panicked, embarrassed, and fearing the worst, I stop by a big chain grocery store fairly late at night for a pregnancy test. The “adult” items are all kept behind the customer service desk, so I quietly ask for assistance, hoping I can pay at this register to avoid the judgment of other guests. I’m instead directed to the only open — and surprisingly busy — cashier, with my little box that might as well say, “PREGNANT TEENAGER!” in big, bold letters. Two more shoppers line up behind me; mortified, I keep the box in my hand and place a lane divider down for the next guest. The shopper ahead of me finishes, and without saying a word, the cashier — a grumpy-looking, middle-aged woman — reaches for the next items on the belt as I’m handing her the box.)

Me: *sheepishly* “Oh, those aren’t mine…”

Cashier: *looking up for the first time and practically shouts* “Well, what are you buying, nothing?!”

(Before I can respond, she sees the box and grabs it from my hand.)

Cashier: *condescendingly, with a big sigh* “You have to put your items on the belt, or else how am I supposed to know what’s yours?!”

(Painfully aware of everyone’s stares, I mutter a quiet:)

Me: “Sorry…”

(She scans the box and tosses it to the bagger, a young man no older than me, who bags it silently. As I finish paying, he hands me the bag with an apologetic smile, and — to my absolute horror — loudly says:)

Cashier: “Good luck! I hope you get the answer you’re hoping for!”

(I practically ran to my car, wondering if giving up sex for the rest of my life would be easier than ever doing that again. In retrospect, I realize I made it harder for myself by being SO embarrassed, but who wouldn’t be at that age? Hey, at least I wasn’t pregnant!)

(My father and I are at the grocery store where I work. He goes to the end of the store, turns up one aisle, and then turns down the next, apparently looking for something.)

Me: “What are you looking for?”

Dad: “Cherry juice.”

Me: “I would try aisle five.”

Dad: “I don’t think so.”

Me: “Dad, I work here.”

(Dad looks for another moment and then goes to the end of the aisle.)

Dad: *unconvinced* “All right, we’ll try aisle five.”

(We go to aisle five, which has all the juice on one side. Dad looks around.)

Dad: “I’m looking for sugar-free cherry juice; it doesn’t look like it’s here… Oh. This looks like it.”

(He finds what he is looking for and puts it in the cart.)

Dad: “You win this one.”

Me: “Like I said, Dad: I work here!”

Related:
I Don’t Work Here, Does Not Work Here, Part 34
I Don’t Work Here… Doesn’t Matter Here
I Don’t Work Here, Does Not Work Here, And Also Needs A Toilet Break

I’m working on the shop floor of a supermarket, and one of my main jobs is handling delinquents — basically any item that’s been handed in as unwanted at the tills or left in the wrong place in the store.

Anyone who has worked in a supermarket will know how draining this is: people will leave things in the most ridiculous places. I’m in the frozen aisle looking out for any refrigerated items — so much milk and bread ends up in the freezers — when I spot a brown and black bag.

It’s a chicken, specifically, one of the hot, cooked chickens that we have for sale at the front of the store. Someone decided to buy a hot chicken, got almost to the other side of the store, and changed their mind, and then they decided the best place to put it was the freezer?

Granted, discarded hot chickens have to be wasted no matter where we find them, but we also had to waste the frozen item next to it because it was noticeably warm. The chicken remained the most amusing misplaced item until I left, only possibly matched by the half-drunk [Fast Food Place] coffee also found in the freezer.

(I have come to the self-checkouts. I notice a cash-only checkout that is free and walk towards it with intention to use it. A worker approaches me.)

Worker: “Excuse me. This is a cash-only register.”

Me: “I saw. I’m paying cash.”

(I put my things down on the shelf and begin scanning.)

Worker: “Excuse me! That register is cash only!”

Me: “I said I know.”

Worker: “Are you paying cash? That register is cash only!”

(I ignore her and finish scanning. I grab my loyalty card and try to scan it. The worker covers the scanner with her hands.)

Worker: “HEY! THIS IS CASH ONLY!”

Me: “I KNOW!”

Worker: “THEN WHY ARE YOU USING YOUR CARD?!”

Other Worker: “D***, [Worker]. Stop bothering customers. He’s scanning his loyalty card.”

Worker: “No, he isn’t. He’s going to yell at us for being stupid!”

(The other worker rolled her eyes and told the worker to move out of the way. The worker reluctantly did and I scanned my card and paid with cash. Before the receipt finished printing, the worker, now red-faced, took over the register, screaming that she was closing it before anyone else could use it with a card.)