A teenage-looking kid walks up to me at the till with about $90 worth of sweet vodka drinks.

Me: “Can I see your ID?”

Customer: “Oh, I don’t have my wallet with me.”

He’s mumbling everything, and I can barely hear him.

Me: “Sorry man that sucks.”

Customer: “Can I come pay for it later?”

Me: “Yeah, sure, I’ll hang onto it for you.”

Customer: “No, I gotta take it now.”

Me: “Uh, no, I can’t do that. Also, I still need to see ID.”

Customer: “Can you get it for me?”

I had to ask him to repeat it because I thought I heard him wrong.

Customer: “Yeah, can you pay for it from your pocket?”

Me: “Uh, no?!?”

Customer: “Bro, I can’t take no for an answer.”

Me: “Well, I can’t give you free alcohol with no ID!”

Eventually, he got the message and left, but holy s***, do you know how stores work? Did he really think that was gonna happen? I can’t believe people sometimes.

Related:
We Can’t Believe They Thought That Would Work, Part 8
We Can’t Believe They Thought That Would Work, Part 7
We Can’t Believe They Thought That Would Work, Part 6
We Can’t Believe They Thought That Would Work, Part 5
We Can’t Believe They Thought That Would Work, Part 4

Our hotel’s check-in age is eighteen, which is pretty much the norm for every hotel in our region. This is clearly written on every single booking website. 

It’s about 11 PM when this young lady comes in for her reservation.

Guest: “I’ve been driving all day!”

Me: “No problem, I’ll check you in quickly so you can get some rest.”

Except that when I check her ID, she isn’t 18. I inform her of this.

Guest: *Shocked.* “I’ve been able to check into hotels before without being eighteen.”

Me: “I’m sorry, but at our particular hotel – and pretty much all hotels in the city – this information is clearly written on the booking website you made the reservation on. Are you travelling with your parents?”

Guest: “Nope, I’m alone.”

I call my manager, who tells me no, this is the one rule I can’t bend.

The guest calls her mom, who calls me at the reception. Turns out her mom is in a city that’s five hours away.

Guest’s Mom: “My daughter is an extremely responsible and respectful young lady, and nothing will happen if you check her in.”

Me: “Ma’am, I believe you, but rules are rules, and I’m pretty sure there are legal matters involved here.”

Guest’s Mom: “So you’re going to leave her all alone out on the streets then?”

Me: “Well, ma’am, maybe you should’ve thought about that before making your reservation at my hotel, where your daughter could not check in by herself?”

In the end, after some back-and-forth long phone calls, my manager agreed to let the young lady check in, because it was late at night and nowhere else would take her.

I was just bewildered. What kind of parent lets their not-yet-eighteen child travel all alone without checking whether they can check into accommodations?

I’m a police officer, and I got a call for a loud house party. I showed up and contacted the resident. I advised them that I was well aware that there were underage kids drinking, and I told them to get sober drivers and kick the kids out.

We got another call to the area. I gave them one more chance. The third time was because of a fight on the front lawn.

I’d had it.

Other officers were interviewing the involved parties out front. I was walking around the back looking for stragglers. The back door came flying wide open, and about a half-dozen kids came running out of the house.

I gave them the “Stop, police!” and all that jazz.

The kids obviously kept running, so I announced that I was in a foot chase and started after them. I was catching up to the person in the back of the group when, out of the blue, he stopped and sat on a stone bench in the neighbor’s garden. He turned to look at me.

Kid: “Oh, good evening. I think they went that way.”

Me: *Completely bewildered* “Are you high?!”

Why, yes. Yes, he was.

I worked in a betting shop – over eighteens only. We often got underaged kids asking people to come in and put bets on for them in the same way they’d get people to buy them alcohol from a shop.

This is, of course, totally illegal but if I didn’t know, I didn’t care. I wasn’t exactly checking outside for kids holding football coupons or asking every customer “are all these bets for you?”

A guy comes in with a few football coupons but one of them was filled out poorly. He had selected a seven-fold but only filled in the boxes for six teams.

Me: “Mate, you’ve only picked six teams, is it a six-fold you want, or have you missed out a team?”

Customer: “Aw, I dunno mate, it’s for the wee boy outside.”

Me: “Aye, the wee boy outside who’s not getting his bet on now.”

Little Voice From Outside: “Idiot!”

This story takes place in 2017.

Customer: “Pack of [brand cigarettes], please.”

Me: “Can I see some ID?”

Customer: “I don’t have any on me.”

Me: “When were you born?”

Customer: “1999.”

Me: “What date?”

Customer: *Eyes flick over to the clock/calendar quickly.* “September 7^th.”

Me: “That took too long. Come back with ID.”

Customer: “I meant… uh… 1899.”

Me: “…”

Customer: “…”

Me: “You’re 118 years old?”

Customer: “No, that’s just ten years… wait…”

Quick mental math.

Customer: “S***.” *Leaves.*