Even if the only change I’ve got coming to me is a lowly 1¢; it is still better in my pocket than in your cash register!
I must get asked this question at least a couple of times in the run of a day out: “Do you want your penny?” No, stupid, I was standing here with my hand out waiting for you to slap me five.
What’s the deal with this question? If your store wants to charge $1 for an item, then be upfront and put $1 on the damn price tag. But don’t put 99¢ on the tag and then ask me to give you an extra cent for it! If you don’t want to deal with pennies at all, then price your shit in 5¢ or 10¢ increments so you don’t have to deal with them!
Maybe I’m just too old-fashioned, but then again, I’m also the type to pick up pennies off the ground. There used to be this guy at work that would just dump his pennies on the break room tables for anyone to grab. He didn’t want them. His reasoning? They wouldn’t work in the vending machines.:smack: I bet I got at least 50¢ per week from him. Funny thing is, the guy was always complaining about being broke.
Tldr: If I tell you to keep the change, feel free to do with it as you please. Otherwise, I want my change back, all of it, including the lowly pennies.
Many people don’t like pennies, and lots of stores (at least her in CA) have a little dish by the register for people to take or put a penny, depending on the situation. I always throw my pennies in. That being said, it’s best to just leave it up to the customer.
Better not come to Canada, then – or Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Finland, Israel, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, or the UK, where equivalent amd even larger-value coins have been discontinued for years.
Small coins like pennies just don’t exist there any more. Cash payments just get rounded up or down. AFAIK, it hasn’t enriched or reduced anyone to poverty yet.
P.S.- someone once told me a story about buying something in a convenience store in Washington, DC, and accidentally gave the clerk a Canadian penny. The cashier shoved it back at him with the comment, “that’s no good, got another?” You don’t by any chance work as a cashier in a Washington 7-11, do you?
If there’s a dish there. the cashier can just give you the penny. It will then be up to the customer what to do with it. By asking if you want the penny back, it can come off like an implication that the customer is a cheap ass for waiting for his change, or for answering yes. I say just leave questions out of it and hand the penny back.
This pitting is pretty weak in my opinion. There is no harm in asking, and a reasonable answer is “no thanks, keep it”, which makes it a reasonable question.
If I’m paying cash for something I’m typically buying lunch, and all coins in the change get dumped in the tip jar. I find it mildly irritating when I get coins as change at places that don’t have a jar, because I don’t really have a convenient place to put them. I’m not sure where they all end up. I think I pull a good amount out of the washing machine from time to time.
Luckily this isn’t a big deal, because most non-lunch places take card.
OP reminds me of our dearly departed cg16 (I am not suggesting a sock, just the making a mountain out of a molehill). I assume the cashier isn’t psychic; just because YOU want to weigh your wallet down with every last penny you come across doesn’t mean everyone wants to. By asking the cashier avoids getting a penny out of her till, handing it over, being told “no thanks” and putting it back.
‘Do you want your change?’ is just one item on the list of stupid questions you now have to answer to complete a transaction. There is also-
Would you like to add this counter top promotional item to your purchases today?
Would you like to donate a dollar to…?
Would you like to complete this questionare on your receipt?
Can I have your email address?
Do you have our club card?
Would you be insterested in signing up today, we’re running a special…
It’s a job, I’m sure they would rather not ask me if they had a choice, but damn is it stupid. It turns the clerk into a machine, makes me feel like a robot just hurrying to his next task and all of reality is one large maze of hassle.
Buying something at a non-profit place is one thing; but McDonalds cashier who’s just handed me my milkshake, Yes I would like my 1 or 2 pennies in change. I’m careful w/ my money b/c my experiences in life have shown me that money equals control over my life and I’d rather keep that to myself.
Last night I was buying a pint of ice cream in a newly opened supermarket. It came to 3.78 and I just happened to have exactly .78 in my pocket, as well as exactly 3 singles and two hundreds in my wallet. The young checker handed me back a Canadian penny and said he couldn’t take it. I told him sure he could. It used to be not unusual to get one, and no one ever refused one. Finally he asked the checker next to him who said he could take it. Good thing as then they probably wouldn’t have taken a hundred dollar bill for a 3.78 purchase.
In 2008, when gas prices were at their highest ever, I worked with a woman who also worked at a gas station, and she couldn’t get over the people who would yell at her for the gas prices (as if she had any control over it :rolleyes: ) and then didn’t want their pennies.
Better not come to Canada, then – or Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Finland, Israel, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, or the UK, where equivalent amd even larger-value coins have been discontinued for years.
Small coins like pennies just don’t exist there any more. Cash payments just get rounded up or down. AFAIK, it hasn’t enriched or reduced anyone to poverty yet.
/QUOTE]
Eh? The UK most assuredly does still have pennies. There is the occasional suggestion about dropping 'em, but they’re still very much in circulation, and still being minted afaik.
You can get as pedantic as you want about the name, but what do you think the zinc is clad in, magnesium? They’re not solid copper, but copper is most certainly used in their construction.
