When I was in high school, I had a job working in a grocery store. In my few years there, learned to rotate dairy, fruit and vegetables, slice cold-cuts, stock shelves, bag groceries and run a cash register.
The cash registers were the old kind where you had to punch specific buttons for dollars and cents. Counting change was the first thing to learn.
- Politely tell the customer the total.
- Accept the money from the customer and place on the shelf above the cash tray.
- Open the cash drawer, and starting with the total of the bill, count up to the amount of money that the customer had supplied.
- Place the money in the customer's hand.
- Thank the customer.
- Place the customer's money into the cash drawer.
- Help the customer with his bags if necessary.
All I need is $8.00 cash.
To which I received the angry retort:
I know how to count change.
Which obviously was not correct.
Possessing a short temper, I held back and in an equally angry tone said:
Excuse me?
Another employee scooted over at that moment, presumably to support the angry dumb one, so I eased up, took my lunch and moved to a table, sitting facing the cashier.
This is more and more common, I understand that cash registers are more advanced, in that there has been no need to teach employees how to count change. In most places these days cashiers enter the amount of cash received, count out the change and thrust it out there without a word or even a smile.
So, a skill that required a pleasant exchange between the cashier and the customer has been forgotten. We have no choice to accept that young people are too fucking lazy to count, but I draw the line at rudeness and absolutely let them know when they've crossed it.
Funny thing is, I usually make to extra effort to be cheerful and helpful to cashiers and servers.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Show me the love. Serious, even disagreeable comments are not moderated.