We all double check our resteraunt totals right? I find errors well over 10% of the time. Often in my favor, so I assume this doesn’t indicate deliberate gouging.
Drive up window, burger and 'rings came to $5.18. Pulled up to window, gave girl 10.00 and dug 18 cents out of the ashtray. Yup, needed to use a calculator. Got the wrong answer first time, had to do it again, and then once more just to be sure.
Actually, I find that giving them that .18 or whatever, nearly always causes an “unexpected exception” crash.
It used to be common for gas stations to give .04/gal discount for cash. Guy at the corner station was always amazed that I could make it come out to exactly $10 after the discount. (Back when giants walked the earth, we had purely mechanical pumps that could only handle the one price)
Finally he asked how I did it. “Well, the pump displays how many gallons, so I multiply that by four, and pump that many cents over 10.00, then I take the new gallons and repeat the process…It only takes one iteration, because after that, the additional gas is less then a quart, so it doesn’t change the total”
“You multiply by four? In your head? and we sell by the gallon, not by the quart”
“Actually, I multiply by two, twice”
“Oh, I see, because two plus two is four!”
“yeeeeeeah, something sorta like that”
Golf story above points out the fact that NOT being able to do it in head, or with a pencil, means that you don’t even know how to do it half efficiently when a calculator IS available.
Working retail in college, I had a manager who insisted that I couldn’t possibly come up with the right answer for “total with tax” using:
TWT= (1+taxrate(pre-decimalized)) * price,
and that the only right way was:
TWT= [taxrate(in %)/100] * price + price.
Oh yeah, he was sure it would come out wrong if you didn’t put in the " point zero zeros" too. He also thought I was thick because I was slow and deliberate when using a non-RPN calculator as supplied by store.
Same manager insisted that 25% off sale + 10% employee discount was same as 35% off. Couldn’t understand how I came up with 32.5%, Insisted register was wrong when it agreed with me…he’d also bitch at me for counting back the change the (ONE AND ONLY!) right way. I’d punch amount tendered into the register, but then count it back to customer as a double check. I’d also prompt customers for change so as to reduce calls for coins, ones, etc.
It was fun to screw with him…the store was in an area where I’d been a paper boy for several years and worked in a pharmacy for a couple more. I had him thinking I was a mind reader when I’d just write a customers name, and then thier address on the refund forms without asking them. (refunds required his approval, so I’d always page him before starting) Customers would sometimes freak out, but I’d always give my secret up to them after Steve was out of earshot.
Counter story: I lived in Austria (Alps, not 'roos) for a while. Kids there still learn basic arithmetic. They are, in fact, better at it than I am… every last one of them over 10 yrs. old I think. Kids waiting table would scribble down the prices of 8-10 items (from memory usually) multiply in thier heads (eg. 3 rolls at OS.35 each) and add them up in maybe 5 seconds. Never caught a single mistake, and they pretty much expected that you’d be checking. If the VAT had not be inclusive, I doubt they would have used a tax table. The few times I did see a calculator used, they looked as retarded as I do with a non-RPN unit.
)— where all the work was done on a computer/calculator and NOTHING was done by hand.
