No Problem? I got a problem with that.

[BookstoreEscapee]

What's the problem with "no problem"?

Many especially dislike hearing “no problem” in commercial transactions and from folks in customer service jobs, since, as the customer is always right, nothing a customer could ask for could ever be “a problem.” “I assume my business is not a problem,” huffed one complainer on the message boards at the Visual Thesaurus. Others on the Internet have taken the same tack: “Why would it be a problem? It’s her job, isn’t it?” and “It better damn well NOT be a problem, because I just gave you my money.” Some dwell on the counterfactual: “I always wonder if the person would have helped me if they had known it would be a problem.” And from Twitter: “I know it’s no problem. You rang up my orange juice. How could that be a...problem?”

(Bolding mine)
I think people need to find better things to worry about.

Perhaps the “no problem” of service workers is a way to reclaim some measure of power - “no problem,” after all, does remind the customer that her request is technically within the power of the employee to grant or refuse. It’s subtle reminder of the control workers often do have over a customer’s experience - especially in the face of the customer who is always, or perhaps simply needs to be, right.

And here I thought it was just a variation on something that gets repeated a hundred times a day in a retail setting. It gets old saying the same thing over and over again, even if it is just "you're welcome"...silly me.

[Calud]

Ah, the joys of people that have simply too much time on their hands and no life of their own. Why not do something worthwhile with your time, like see how long you can hold your breath, before you suffocate, measure the amount of blood in your body, preferably in a tub of some sort or see if you can outrun a train.

All of these are certainly more useful and entertaining than thinking about what these completely meaningless words mean, coming from a retail slave.

[AnaKhouri]

I always say "You're Welcome." To me, "No problem", in any setting, whether you're working or just doing someone a favor, says, "If it was an inconvenience to me I wouldn't have bothered."

I don't get all upset when people say it to me, but I don't really use that phrase myself.

[Nurian]

I'll admit, "No worries" is more informal than I would like at a business, but who cares? This doesn't warrant a huge rant.

I like this comment:

There are a boatload of idioms in the english language; sometimes words don't take their literal meaning. Shocking. Get over it.

Or even better, have a conversation in spanish, where the counterpart to "you're welcome" literally translates to "it's nothing". The guilt-tinged implication may just make your head explode.

[Broomjockey]

"If it was an inconvenience to me I wouldn't have bothered."

Wow, that's about the exact opposite meaning I ascribe to it while I use it. To me, when I say "no problem," I mean "Your task was neither an inconvenience nor an exorbitant use of my time, please think nothing of of what I've done for you."

Granted, it's a little self-effacing, but most of the time, what people ask is so drop-dead easy that I feel a little weird getting credit for accomplishing the task.