Your Compliance Goes Up In Smoke

(I work for a company that contracts out for compliance checks for tobacco and alcohol sales. Since it is the beginning of the month, our manager is on our case about passing the compliance check. Sometimes the people hired aren’t always the brightest.)

Customer: “I want a pack of [Brand] short 100s.”

(Catching the contradiction a smoker wouldn’t make — shorts being the king length cigarettes and 100s being a bit longer — I know she is either the compliance check employee or buying for a kid.)

Me: “I’m sorry, we have [Brand] shorts and [Brand] 100s. Which did you want?”

Customer: “100s.”

(I grab the pack of 100s from our rack behind the counter and ask her again, to make sure I have the right product.)

Me: “These, correct?”

Customer: “No, the short 100s!”

(I grab the other pack and bring both to the counter for her to inspect.)

Me: “We have [Brand] shorts and [Brand] 100s.”

(I indicate both packs to show the difference.)

Customer: “All right, the shorts.”

(I scan the barcode and instantly the POS asks for an ID.)

Me: “Ma’am, can I please see your ID?”

(She graciously presents it to me, and I swipe it on the POS to electronically verify it.)

Me: “Thank you. Your total is $5.95.”

Customer: “Congratulations, you passed!”

(She then hands me the green card for the compliance check. However, instead of the compliance check company name printed across the top of the card, it has our competitor’s name and logo from the opposite side of town.)

Me: “Um, this is for [Competitor].”

Customer: “I’m sorry about that! Let me get your card from my car.”

(She returned a minute later with the correct card. A week later, we found out that she wasn’t actually hired by our company; she was only supposed to check our competitor, so this compliance check didn’t even count for our store.)