It’s summertime again. Warm nights. Sandals. Sunshine. And dead end jobs. This summer I am working as a cashier. Yay! I don’t mind being a cashier- the time goes by fast and it is vaguely tolerable. I enjoy talking to all kinds of different people and maybe making them smile. If I’m stuck in a stupid barely minimum wage job, someone ought to smile.
But then there are those customers that ought to burn in hell.
First off, it is never ever ever acceptable to be gabbing away on your cell phone when you are buying something. It really just isn’t okay. But every day I get some ass-jerk that walks up to me and starts talking to someone or another on the cell phone about how Sandy had the nerve to bring white whine to Roberto’s party or some other stream of inane, pointless chattering. In order to buy something, you have to pay attention. Money is changing hands here. There are things to negotiate, things to talk about, things to give and things to take. You’ve got to pay attention or else the whole transaction is going to take five times longer. I hate having to work to get them to pay attention to me so I can give them their change or whatever. And I hate being treated like a vending machine. I’ve had people finish their transaction and then just sit there, leaning on the counter, chattering away while the cashier and everyone in line just stands there staring at them. Urg!
And then there are the people that know my job better than I do. Now days, most cash registers are somewhat high tech, and keep track of things like inventory along with ringing up purchases. So if something goes wrong (which it often does) it’s a bit more complicated than you’d think. For example, if the UPC code on a purchase doesn’t ring up, it really doesn’t help if the customer screams the price to me and then huffily demand that I open the register and make the transaction without scanning it in. I can’t do it. The fucking machine won’t let me open it without thinking I’m doing something legitamate. Plus, if I don’t scan it in, the machine will think all that stuff is stolen, and it will probably also think that I stole money because my register won’t count up right at the end of the day. I know this. I know how my machine works. I also know what things will get me in trouble if I do them. And I’m not gonna do them!
Then there are the careful consumers. These people tend to treat cashiers as banks. They will give the cashier strange combinations of cash that seems to have little to do with the actual total, so that they can get the kind of money back that they want. These people hate pennies, but assume that we love them. So they will check every pocket, every wallet, every crack and every crevice for pennies that they can slough off on us. The particularly delight in coming up with sixty seven cents all in pennies and nickles. When they are not using strange alchemy to get us to give them quarters (because everyone knows that cashiers love giving away their useful, often demanded quarters just so that people don’t have the dread affliction of walking around with a couple of dimes in their pockets- the horrors!), they are obssessing over exact change. They will spend literally ten minutes turning their purses and wallets inside out so that they can have exact change. They have zero regard for the line that is forming around them on their holy quest for the specific sum. If the charge is a buck’o’four, there is no way in hell they’ve ever give up and give me a dollar and a nickle. I guess you gotta have principles.
The only thing worse then the careful consumers is the lazy consumer… These customers will drop a pile of coins on the counter and then stare at you as if you are supposed to sort rhough the coins in order to get the amount that the purchase costs. These strairng contests can last a long, long time. Lazy customers are a particular pain when it comes to bags. Most of my customers can do without bags, as they mostly get one or two smallish items. But the lazy customer always demand bags, Then, they just sit there looking at me with a vague smiles across their face as I juggle money, products, pens, credit card reciepts and all the other stuff I’m having to deal with in order to put their crap in bags. They won’t even help in the smallest way- like taking their products out of the handbaskets. All I can think of is that they like to watch me work, and enjoy seeing lines piles up behind them. Then they stuff these bags in their purses which are inevitably the size of SUVs. Why do they need a bag for a couple items when they are just going to put it in their gigantic body-bag-disguised-as-purse, I’ll never know. I think the bag gives them psychological pleasure in knowing they are the consumer and therefore they get bags.
And then there are assorted jerks who want to break hundreds and write checks for their ninety-five cent purchases. Really the list is long and tedious and I’ve only been on this job four days. Please, take this to heart. Please don’t act like these people! It’s not cool! It’s not even okay! Not even if you are rich! You are entitled to service, but your not entitled to be an ass. Alright?
