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No, I didn't ask. Does that mean you can't simply TELL me?

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  • No, I didn't ask. Does that mean you can't simply TELL me?

    The past few days at the store have been pretty crazed. I don't know whether we're getting all the people who now only shop every month, all at once, or whether there are rumours of another lockdown and people are panic-buying ... again. At any rate it's been nonstop. I'm starting to do the autopilot thing more and more.

    So today I'm scanning and packing one customer's groceries and ... after she empties her buggy she pushes it up to where I'm standing. And she's got her own bags in it. By this point I've packed 4 or 5 bags.

    "Oh, I've got my own bags."

    Me: "Sorry, I didn't realize that."

    Customer: "Well, you didn't ask me."

    No, I didn't. Does that automatically mean you are incapable of TELLING me? Some customers (not nearly enough, but some) do say "I'VE GOT MY OWN BAGS" as they start to unload their carts. (The upper-case letters don't mean they're angry; between the masks, the background noise, and the damned canned music, people have to SPEAK UP to be heard.)

    Customer: "I don't want to pay for these bags."

    Me: "Okay."

    I keep ringing stuff through. She looks at the groceries that are now piling up and then ...

    "Oh, you might as well keep packing."

    Me: "Okay."

    I don't remember apologizing (again) so it's likely I didn't. By this point I was sufficiently annoyed with her that I couldn't be bothered. Her attitude when she said "You might as well keep packing" suggested that I had made such a pig's breakfast of it already that she had just given up on doing the remainder 'properly.'
    Customer service: More efficient than a Dementor's kiss
    ~ Mr Hero

  • #2
    Here, right now the standard is: You can bring your own bags but you have to pack the bags yourself. The clerks only will touch the clean in-store plastic bag.

    There is no info about where your own bags have been or what you have had in them before.

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    • #3
      Even worse -- You know that they've been touched by...by customers! O_O
      "For a musician, the SNES sound engine is like using Crayola Crayons. Nobuo Uematsu used Crayola Crayons to paint the Sistine Chapel." - Jeremy Jahns (re: "Dancing Mad")
      "The difference between an amateur and a master is that the master has failed way more times." - JoCat
      "Thinking is difficult, therefore let the herd pronounce judgment!" ~ Carl Jung
      "There's burning bridges, and then there's the lake just to fill it with gasoline." - Wiccy, reddit
      "Retail is a cruel master, and could very well be the most educational time of many people's lives, in its own twisted way." - me
      "Love keeps her in the air when she oughta fall down...tell you she's hurtin' 'fore she keens...makes her a home." - Capt. Malcolm Reynolds, "Serenity" (2005)
      Acts of Gord – Read it, Learn it, Love it!
      "Our psychic powers only work if the customer has a mind to read." - me

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      • #4
        Quoth earl colby pottinger View Post
        Here, right now the standard is: You can bring your own bags but you have to pack the bags yourself.
        That's how it is here....at least when towns started allowing reusable bags. Cashiers/employees could not touch them at all (I assume that if I bring bags I will pack them myself). We've now been told that we can bag in customer-provided bags, but the only reusable bags that I am touching myself are the store bags that I can see are purchased new as part of the transaction.

        I've caught a few mild nasties from handling SC-owned grocery bags in The Before Times, and now I do not want to risk bringing any cooties home.
        "I am quite confident that I do exist."
        "Excuse me, I'm making perfect sense. You're just not keeping up." The Doctor

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        • #5
          Here the cashiers ask if you want bags before they start ringing stuff up. Probably exactly because of this scenario.

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          • #6
            Well, before the whole pandemic, plastic bags had been banned for something like eight years so generally if you brought your own bags you put them at the front of the belt. If you didn't, the cashier would ask if you wanted bags because they do cost five cents so some don't want to pay. Others just don't want bags because they're going to pack the groceries from the cart into bins or whatever in their car.

            Now it's all over the place. Some places are fine with reusable bags. Some say you have to pack them yourself. Some places have no baggers, and for a while they made you bag in the cart, but now you can bag in the bagging area. Most still have plastic bags, but some have switched back to paper. It's never the same, and always a surprise when you get through the line. So saying "you didn't ask!" would get you absolutely nowhere here, it's up to the shopper to figure out what the store rules are. Sometimes they have them posted, other times not, and some places (Trader Joe's) will tell you the rules proactively if they see you carrying a bag.

            I've been doing curbside for nearly all my shopping but I forget something here and there, and am forced to play the game.
            Replace anger management with stupidity management.

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            • #7
              We banned reusable bags for a while, then maybe two months back allowed them again, provided the customers did their own bagging. Now I just slap on a pair of disposable gloves and do them myself to keep things moving.

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              • #8
                Any more, I just load the groceries back into the cart. Wheel out to my car, and pack everything there. At least I know my refrigerated stuff goes into the insulated bags that way... Plus if I use the SCO, nobody else will have touched them at all (at least at that moment).
                “There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged.
                One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world.
                The other, of course, involves orcs." -- John Rogers

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