Look. I know you were yakking away on your cell phone while the cashier was scanning your groceries. I know you were glad the lines weren't really long, and that you managed to get reception inside the store so you and your friend Belinda could talk about "dat ho" that your brother is going out with. Seriously though, it is not our problem if you can't keep up with what goes into your cart.
This is how the system works. You, THE CUSTOMER, hereeafter referred to as YOU, push the metal cage thingies with wheels (buggies, carts, trolleys, shoplift-o-matics) up and down the aisles. You cast a gimlet eye over a selection of cheaply made merchandise produced in Chinese factories and tainted with botulism, melamine and a thousand other poisons. You put things you might possibly at some future point in the linear space time continuum intend to pay for in the metal cage devices with wheels. This process is know as SHOPPING.
After you've tired or bored (likely both), you push the metal cage thing up toward the front of the store and stand in a line with some other people with more metal cage things - all filled with useless plastic crap. Unless of course you're a scammer, then you just walk out past the greeter and pray you didn't pick up anything with a security tag.
You pile your selections on the piece of rubber which magically moves toward the cashier. Ohh. Lookee thar Myrtle! Rolling rubber. It's not magic. Just pissed-off Oompa-loompas chained to a treadmill. If you're at my store, there's probably a surly cashier barely speaking English that does her job of scan and bag - most likely badly and with an attitude - but what do you expect for $7.0o an hour from someone who has to stand on their feet for 8 hours a day and deal with whatever washed up on the beach of humanity?
If you're a decent human being who's intent on going to the good place after you croak from eating, using or wearing our footwear or merchandise, you might help the cashier bag. If you're intent on experiencing the Dante Alighieri version of the afterlife, you just stand there with your howler monkeys and watch or maybe talk on your cell phone and not even place the full bags into your cart.
Every move the girl makes is in full view of you and that black globe thing that hangs over her head. That camera is so sensitive it can read the names (and allegedly account numbers) on checks and the denominations on bills. Yeah. Wal-Mart don't play with the money. So she's not "adding things" to your total.
After said surly cashier fills up seventeen plastic sacks full of toxic off-gassing plastic crap and poisonous food for you, you sling some coupons, some wadded up cash you dug out of your Playtex CrossMyHeart Extra Underwire support bra and a nice dose of attitude across the checkstand, get your change and leave.
Then you decide to get off your phone, stop yakking to your friend and see what you actually paid for.
Cue the stupidity.
ME: "Can I help you ma'am?"
HER: "I didn't get this. I don't know what this is and I paid THREE WHOLE DOLLARS for something that is not in my buggy."
ME: "Can I see your receipt ma'am?"
HER: "I do not like this. I am not happy. I want to know EXACTLY what this item is and EXACTLY how it got onto my receipt because I am sure I do not have it." I'm not happy either. I have to listen to people like you all day who walk through life on a cloud and have ze-ro concept of personal responsibility.
ME: punches in numbers, reveals department 90, grocery. "It is a grocery item ma'am. What food did you buy?"
HER: "None. I didn't buy no food. I DEMAND AN EXPLANATION FOR THIS AND I WANT HER FIRED." Woman, I can see groceries. You just gonna straight up lie to me over three dollars? Do you need bus fare that bad?
ME: "OK. Let me come around and look at your buggy." Just leaning over the counter, I see food products, like crackers and some orange juice. She's obviously into making a scene.
ME: "Ma'am. Right here. It's the orange juice."
HER: "No it isn't."
ME: "Yes it is. Right here, this is the barcode for OJ. These same numbers are on the juice and on the receipt."
HER: "No. That is orange juice." And she points to something that is labeled ORG something on the receipt with a different UPC.
ME: I dig around and come up with some kind of Original Homestyle Chicken Soup or some mess like that. "No ma'am. That's soup. It's not the name. It's the barcode and the number."
HER: Holding the juice. "So this is the same as that?"
ME: "Yes."
HER: "Well, I guess I did get juice."
ME: thinking, "But obviously not any good sense."
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22 comments:
If you ever decide to rename your blog, please consider "Well, I guess I did get juice".
Okay, I've walked away without something I paid for, because I accidentally forgot ONE bag (usually the bag with the ONE thing I specifically came in for), but once again, WTF is wrong with some people, that they don't look at the goddamned screen while they're checking out?
Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ. Some people just need to be eliminated from the gene pool.
Working at stupid-mart reminds me of why some animals eat their young.
..."And I want her fired".
It never ceases to amaze me that people actually think that anyone would put their job on the line over stealing $3.00. Yeah it's a crappy job, but it IS a job and I'm sure the cashier is glad to have it. Anyway, if I'M going down for theft, I would make it for waaaay more and use one of the many non-obvious ways that I had figured out by like the second week there. Geez.
Sounds like the customer is a total f*cktard and hopefully she doesn't have a whole zoo full of howler monkeys at home. We honestly don't need more morons in this world..we need less. Anybody else feel like we're really heading towards a "Logan's Run" type of society so that we can actually survive to the next millenium?
I suppose a cashier could have a couple of bar codes cut out, and swipe them if the customer isn't paying attention, but why would a barely-past-min-wage cashier participate in a scam like that? Simple logic suggests that if it's been scanned, it was in your cart/buggy/whatever.
Sure, an item could get mis-scanned… or a bar code label might have been switched (unheard of!). But that's what the customer service counter is for, to fix those things. If you catch them.
"Just pissed-off Oompa-loompas chained to a treadmill." LOVE IT!
bbc- Rent "idiocracy" next time you're in the video store. It's about a future society all descended from your typical wal-mart customers. (the idea being that the stupid are out-breeding the smart) You would totally appreciate it.
I don't like the implication that if the customer doesn't bag groceries, then they are a bad person. It's not the customer's job, it's the employee's job. But whatever.
Also, to be fair, a few years ago 20/20 or Consumer Reports or someone caught a lot of big box companies overcharging customers a few cents each on purpose.
However, this lady was just dumb.
"I don't like the implication that if the customer doesn't bag groceries, then they are a bad person. It's not the customer's job, it's the employee's job. But whatever."
Whoa, some good old fashioned american entitlement going on there.
Meh,maybe things are different in different counties, but it's classed as rude and lazy to be incapable of bagging your own things over here.
What, are you frail, elderly, disabled? fine.
Lazy? get screwed. These people on minimum wage arent here to treat you like a princess so you wont ruin your manicure.
Amen yoyo...amen. Still laughing about the oompa-loompas!
I understand that the wal-mart employee can't yell at these smacktards for being idiots, for fear of losing their jobs.
How about we create a volunteer team of idiot-chasers, to tell these retartds off, in lieu of the wal-mart employee doing so. One hour per day in stores across the country may go a long way to addressing the balance between good behavior, and acting like a moron (as so aptly described in this posting).
Just a thought.
How about we create a volunteer team of idiot-chasers, to tell these retartds off, in lieu of the wal-mart employee doing so.
I'm SO in!
you're amazing. as a merchandiser for a certain blue and red soda company i get to deal with these same WONDERFUL wal-mart customers on a day to day basis. the best part about my job is i get to cut them off ever-so-rudely and tell them they need to find a associate that actually works here. i feel for all of those underpaid employees. for the most part, they're all incredibly nice and yet they have to deal with the biggest idiots on the planet.
That is one of the best parts of my job as vendor employee as well. "Sorry ma'am/sir, I don't work here."
Some of them continue to rant and rave, like I am somehow supposed to commiserate with them.
"Whoa, some good old fashioned american entitlement going on there.
Meh,maybe things are different in different counties, but it's classed as rude and lazy to be incapable of bagging your own things over here.
What, are you frail, elderly, disabled? fine.
Lazy? get screwed. These people on minimum wage arent here to treat you like a princess so you wont ruin your manicure."
Wow. Self-checkout lanes aside, I've never been in any store where I've been expected to bag my own items. Seriously. It's a courtesy extended to a customer that just makes sense to me. When I worked retail, I never expected the customer to place their items in the bag; in fact, it annoyed me when they tried, since I saw it as, you know, part of the farking job. Are we really getting to the point where we shouldn't even expect simple courtesy from our retail experience? Sounds like it's in short supply wherever you are.
/flame off
i hate when people bag for me but I get pissed off when they don't take their bags off. Maybe he was saying that but still the cashier can bag the stuff
You have to admit, Wal-Mart has infinitely more confusing descriptions than your average store, but that doesn't constitute license to create a scene. What is wrong with these people?
As for the bagging, my local Wal-Mart has a carousel type thing with bags on it so that the cashier scans and bags in the same motion. I think any attempt on the customer's part to bag for her would be seen as some kind of violation.
I'm in for the "team of idiot chasers" thing!
There has to be way, kinda like a designated driver button that chasers could wear while in the store. An employee could flash the sign and request Chase-Team assistance.
Yeah, that's it. We need pins/buttons.
What about Thongs? I can't count the number of people who came to my Service Desk after looking at their receipt saying "What is this here? I only bought some shoes."
I avoid a particular large grocery chain here because they typically only have one bagger for five checkout lines. I had no idea that I was unAmerican.
Bag your own groceries.
What? You need someone to PUT your stuff in your cart while your shopping also?
Are you that lazy/bored that you'd rather stand there and watch someone else bag what you just threw in your cart? Is it that entertaining?
Oh, and don't tell me that you paid to bag it for you. Not at Wal*Mart you didn't.
I'm betting you insist that someone carry your stuff to your car as well. Right?
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