Supermarkets... and the idiot public
Long time lurker, first time poster... anyway, I'm unfortunate enough to earn my food and beer tokens in a large supermarket. Checkouts to be precise, and I have to put up with being spoken down to, insulted and otherwise pissed off by complete idiots perhaps 50 times a day if not more.

However stupid the majority of service monkeys might appear, that's nothing to how stupid the public appear to us! ;-)

It's becoming increasingly apparent that while we are given extensive customer service training, NOBODY in this country is given any training whatsoever on how to behave in a retail environment, or how to go shopping without FAILING miserably and making a hash of it. My "pet peeves", in no particular order, are as follows:

1) Know your consumer rights. They DO NOT extend as far as telling me how to do my job, dictating to me, or allowing your kids to interfere. And yes I bastarding well WILL tell them off because I'm a grown up and well within my rights to do so. We are there to assist you with your purchases - we are not your servants and under no obligation to give in to your every demand.

2) Stay on YOUR side of the fucking counter. Don't lean over, hand me things, or put your hand anywhere near my precious buttons. Every part of the checkout is as dirty as every other. Put your items on the BELT where they can be dealt with properly.

3) Don't state "it's real" when handing me a fifty. I'll fucking decide. And also, NEVER question me when I check your twenties for authenticity. I'll do it at my discretion and make no apologies.

4) I NEVER want the "odd x-amount of pence". We've got perhaps eleventy-billion quid's worth of change in the cash office if I run out. It doesn't help, or make any difference to the smooth running of the store. If you don't want the change, then by all means give it to me. Don't give me the choice because I will politely tell you to stuff it down your urethra and stop holding the queue up by faffing with your fucking pennies.

5) Learn how to use your payment card. It is NOT our responsibility. Your name's on the card, you deal with it. Don't wave it in my face when the terminal is 4 inches from you. It even tells you which way around it goes, and yes, it's the same way every time. Don't rotate it around each of it's axes like a retard trying to work out how the square peg goes in the round hole, you just look dumb and hold everyone up. If you can't manage, carry cash (if you can work out how the ATM works). The technology's hardly new.

6) Checkout humour. Oh boy... No matter how clever the little one-liner you've just thought up may seem, rest assured I've heard it hundreds of times before. It's not funny, it just makes you look like a cunt. Which you probably are.

7) If you decide you don't want an item, don't just fuck it off onto the nearest shelf or hidey-hole you find. PUT IT BACK you lazy cunts. Or ask one of us to do it for you. Showing complete contempt for our working environment is one of the worst things you can do.

8) Plastic bags. Get over it. The only reason they present a problem to the environment is because you stupid consumers fling them all over the countryside. Don't get all self-righteous and say you're doing your bit. You're not. Because half your shopping is shipped in from other countries, and when it gets here, dirty great fuck-off hairy-arsed diesel trucks haul it around the UK. Just by shopping at supermarkets your actions contribute more harm to the environment than you can ever repair with your bastarding "bags for life". Blackberries from Mexico? Fucking pick them from the hedgerows like a proper Englishman!

I think that'll do for now.

While I consider myself rather good at my job (hard not to be, really. It's a piece of piss) I truly cannot wait to find something more attractive. Even going back to pharmacy seems appealing after 6 months of this bollocks. Oh, that reminds me, I could easily do a sequel based on the amount of stupidity witnessed from behind the medicine counter...

I apologise for the lack of humour, but not for length as I declare my posts a no-bandwagon zone.
(keyboardman, Fri 2 May 2008, 17:29, 13 replies)

It has to be said
you seem a little jumped up for a till jockey, don't you?

:P
( baw__bag contains traces of nuts on, Fri 2 May 2008, 17:43, closed)

One question....
Are you me?

Like these a lot
(lordy lordy, Fri 2 May 2008, 17:50, closed)

Agreed
I hate it when they bugger off to get something else, and just leave all their crap all over the counter, half rung up. It's all 'OOH, I just need to get some milk' then they fuck off before you have a chance to respond. Then they hold up the entire queue since it'd actually be MORE hassle to void the transaction and scan it all through again.

Also, someone leant over me and scanned their own fucking newspaper. And they were not five, they were fifty odd. Ugh... if you want to do my job, get behind here and DO it.
(Aruu does not put all her trust in root vegetables., Fri 2 May 2008, 17:53, closed)

Nothing much appears to have changed in the 18 years since
I did the job then. I'm a consumer and those very same things irritate me about other shoppers.
( Smithlick is often seen at the bottom of threads, Fri 2 May 2008, 18:21, closed)

4) The "odd change" is often very useful, especially on a busy nigth when you're running out of change. I know this because I've worked retail plenty of times myself. Besides which, when I offer it, the tilljockey usually says "yes, thanks", even pausing to wait for it. Hate people for being stupid and inconsiderate, not the opposite.

5) Those things can be confusing, especially as a (a) they're often cunningly concealed behind the bloody lotto cards, (b) they're not remotely standardised, so it's a different arrangement in most shops, and (c) my debit cards are nearly symmetrical, what with the hologram and chip being placed exactly opposite each other, and my being colourblind.

All other points are pretty valid though. Especially the one about putting things back on the wrong shelf - the bigger the shop, the more people think they can do what they like.
(The Ghost of Stephen Foster, Fri 2 May 2008, 18:38, closed)

swapped
when I see a misplaced item I like to think that the customer left it there to pick up a different item. AS in "I'd rather buy that than this, so I'll leave this here instead and take that."

The best I saw was a rather skimpy ladies underwear set in a space where someone had taken a bottle of vodka.
( sandettie light vessel automatic New Twitter - @bollocksreally, Fri 2 May 2008, 18:41, closed)

Swapping vodka for underwear is by no means unusual where I'm from . . .
(The Ghost of Stephen Foster, Fri 2 May 2008, 18:46, closed)

I did have to laugh :)
I'm as grumpy as the day is long, I think i just found someone on my wavelength.

I work in customer service. That does not mean i work fucking miracles, but you would think it did considering some of the things i have been expected to sort out.

Be nice to those who serve you folks, it will help make things run more smoothly, not to mention you will get the best service they can offer (if they are arsed about their jobs atall).
( catswhiskers the cats mother, Fri 2 May 2008, 18:55, closed)

...
Nice to see I didn't get flamed to buggery :-) Maybe I'm just bitter because this is all I can get at the moment... but still, it pays for the beer! Which is about the only thing that keeps me sane. That and the sheer amount of hotties I have the pleasure of working with! :-D

@ baw bag - given the abuse some "till jockeys" have recieved in other QOTW's, I think it's only fair one of them fights back! ;-)
(keyboardman, Fri 2 May 2008, 21:59, closed)

O_O
Well how very rude. Strange what having a jolly rant about your job can lead to people assuming about you, isn't it.

1. I was a student, very briefly, many years ago. I was not wealthy enough to carry on with it. I have lovely, spot-free skin, but I am a cunt ;-)

2. Passing things over the checkout means I can't see what I'm doing. I'm fine with social interaction but not fine with people getting in my way. And if YOU got in the way of doing my job, I'd tell you so. And if you kicked off, I'd simply not serve you! Good Day.

3. There's never any forgeries on my watch because I am so very anal about it!

4. Live and let live. You don't want my shrapnel, I don't want yours.
Plenty of charity boxes if you can't be bothered with it. Doesn't stop it holding the queue up.

5. Yep, I'm the till muppet. And it's my job to give customers what they need. What some people need is to get a fucking clue. I assist with this when required.

6. Again we're working on assumptions about my personality here. Which I'm afraid are all false save for the one we mentioned earlier.

7. I used to. Working in retail soon gets rid of those bad habits.

8. Actually I DO pick my own! I know I'm part of the system but then, I just accept it and get on with it instead of going on moral crusades every five fucking seconds about the environment.

Failed pharmacist? I never WAS a pharmacist. Healthcare assistant (posh till muppet!), which isn't nearly as cool. Right now, till muppet is about as hard as I need to work to pay for my lifestyle. Given that I outright own my house, have no debt and very small bills. I've never been fucking happier! Except when I have bad days triggering my initial rant. Which if you didn't like, you didn't have to read.

Anyway, what is it you do for a living?
(keyboardman, Sat 3 May 2008, 13:20, closed)

I demand
the sequel from the medicine counter.
(grandmasterfluffles Come to my Armageddon party on, Sat 3 May 2008, 14:39, closed)

what gmf said
@spimf - Christ, you're a miserable cunt. I think I'm going to join Legless on this one, welcome to ignore.
( emvee cruor deo cruoris, Sat 3 May 2008, 16:04, closed)

spimf
Ignore.
Someone has to do the fucking job! It's people like you who make us checkout workers so bitter about our jobs. Keyboardman, I agree wholeheartedly. Especially the "witty" one liners. Ugh.
(Captain Communism isn't any sort of communist., Sun 4 May 2008, 2:38, closed)