I only have $70.00 on my card

[Antrogod80]

I had a customer today who annoys me to no end. This happens frequently. First they come to the register with a buggy full of food I'm eyeballing it thinking $100-$165.

They walk up unload it all. I ring it up nothing is said but I know its coming.

ME: You're total is $123.50"
SC: Uhhhh well I only have $70 on my EBT Card
ME: uhh Okay well do you want to put back some things?
SC: nah wait let seee.
"30 seconds of her looking at her food already bagged"

As this happens someone behind her is already unloading their stuff. This part is what bugs me most"

SC: How much did the (insert produce here) ring up?
Me:uhhh (ammount)
SC:No they said back their (totally unrealistic price)
Me: Oh okay well I'll have to get someone to verify
SC: Oh wait that might be right... Ummm just take this and this off.

Me" Now your total is $110.00
SC: nah take this and tis

Me: Your total is now $85.00"
SC: uhh sorry i don't want this

Finally we get to $70 or under it usually takes a good 5 - 7 minutes or more for this. It's about the 4th of 5th time she has done this. Its like some type of real life trolling.

[MoonCat]

I can remember years ago when we had some real money troubles, sometimes my mom would go shopping and wouldn't have enough cash to pay for the whole order. So she would pick out the most expensive thing(s) and ask the cashier to take that off. It was embarrassing but it wasn't that hard to do (at least for people who can do simple math in their head) and it didn't take forever. That lady with the EBT card should try buying a cheap calculator and keep a running tab as she's shopping. But she won't, because she's really hoping you'll let her get some stuff for free.

[Sapphire Silk]

ME: You're total is $123.50"
SC: Uhhhh well I only have $70 on my EBT Card
ME: uhh Okay well do you want to put back some things?
SC: nah wait let seee.
"30 seconds of her looking at her food already bagged"

As this happens someone behind her is already unloading their stuff. This part is what bugs me most"

Went to the Market of Freshness today (a specialty grocery store stocked with fresh and organic foods) with EE. It was my first time ever going there, and the place was PACKED! You could hardly move there were so many people.

We get to the cashiers; all registers were open, but there were no real lines. We get in line behind a lady with a bunch of stuff.

EE: This won't take long. These guys are quick here.
Me: Hmm. Well, given the prices and the kinds of things they sell here, I doubt they have to deal with very many people with WIC vouchers or food stamps slowing them down.
EE: Hmm. Good point!

We were outta there in no time flat. Polite customers: no EW's, everyone constantly saying "excuse me," or "please."

When EE was ringing up, she asked if they had discount cards like most groceries.

No, said the cashier. But we just went corporate, so I'm sure it's coming.

[I_Hate_SCs]

The woman could've just put the most important things on the belt first, and then stop the cashier when it hit $70. Of course, that'd be the most logical thing to do, so it is the most unlikely outcome.

[Teefies2]

I have to give props to a cashier I had last week. See, we are self-employed and money has been really really tight due to the economic downturn (we sell books, not a "necessity"). So I went to the grocery store with $30 in my wallet. My groceries rang up to $32.53. I said "Oh I'm sorry, I only have $30, I'll have to put something back". As I looked over my food to determine what I could put back, the cashier punched a bunch of buttons and with a HUGE grin on her face, said ... "Your total is $30!!!!". I went HUH? And she leans forward and says "Senior Discount" wink wink ... I'm old, but not old enough for the senior discount. Thank you lovely cashier!!!!!!

[JustaCashier]

Me: Your total is now $85.00"
SC: uhh sorry i don't want this

And then if removing that last item drops their total down to like, $65.00, 9 times out of 10, they'll probably start re-grabbing stuff, and saying "Can I get this, now?", And keep playing that game until they get back up as close to $70.00 without going over again.

Now, I've never worked at a grocery store, so haven't dealt with EBT/WIC, but have had similar situations at the hardware store, when the customer has only a set amount of cash on them, or on their card.

Mike

[jnd4rusty]

We have a small grocery store about 4 blocks from my apartment that is part of a chain but it is sort of the neighborhood store. This store is a little pricier than its sister stores in town but I go there for the convience. One day I was there and accidently went over what I had on me and the employee gave me his discount!! This particular employee has been there for almost 30 years and know everyone, I was flabbergasted but very thankful!

[Thatgirl71]

Here in Massachusetts your food stamps are issued in a form of a credit card type card, on the back of them there is a 1-800 number you can call to find out the balance left on your card. I don't understand why people don't do this.

Oh wait..I forgot, we're talking about sucky customers here, lol.

[bainsidhe]

SC: Uh, put this back
OP: Total is now $122
SC: How about this back
OP: Total is now $120

Seriously, people have terrible math skills. I'd often have people with $150 worth of groceries and only $50 to spend. Friends/family don't believe some of these stories.

Worse still, our store had to toss perishables due to liability reasons. Can't have someone get sick from chicken that may have been in a temperature "danger zone" while someone was shopping two hours. Doesn't matter if it was still frozen solid, policy dictated we tossed it. Not only does this have a great impact on selling prices (someone has to pay for it), but wanna guess what got put back? Always the cuts of meat or other expensive perishables. Rarely the candy, potato chips or soda.

[EvilEmpryss]

And she leans forward and says "Senior Discount" wink wink ... I'm old, but not old enough for the senior discount. Thank you lovely cashier!!!!!!

Panacea had this happen to her. She was waaay under 65, but we haven't let her forget the day she got her first senior discount.

Being a few dollars short is one thing, making the cashier check twice the amount of food that you can afford to pay for is just flat out rude.

[Sapphire Silk]

Panacea had this happen to her. She was waaay under 65, but we haven't let her forget the day she got her first senior discount.

Being a few dollars short is one thing, making the cashier check twice the amount of food that you can afford to pay for is just flat out rude.

I knew you were going to bring that up . . . .

[blas]

When I worked at Pick'n'Boogers, I could even tell the customer how much money they had left on their card, for next time. I was almost always ignored. That or I'd stand there just bug-eyed when they'd go way over their limit and put away better foods in order to keep soda and chips and icecream and other junk.

[hinakiba777]

My very last customer on my very last day at the Grocery Store a few years back did this. She had the wrong card so she couldn't afford her 300 dollar order and needed to bring it down to about 150 or 100.

All the items she grabbed to return were 1.00 or 2.00 items. And she was only willing to go one item at a time before checking the balance. It took forever. This was at close as well.

[Teskeria]

Worse still, our store had to toss perishables due to liability reasons. Can't have someone get sick from chicken that may have been in a temperature "danger zone" while someone was shopping two hours. Doesn't matter if it was still frozen solid, policy dictated we tossed it. Not only does this have a great impact on selling prices (someone has to pay for it), but wanna guess what got put back? Always the cuts of meat or other expensive perishables. Rarely the candy, potato chips or soda.

And this is why, when I had just done a huge shopping (for me) almost $400.00 and my CC was declined with $1000 avail (damn company was apparently having issues and declining most of their cardmembers according to my 20 minute call with them with order suspended so cashier could take other customers per my request), when I found I couldn't get it working right then, I figured how much I had on my other 2 cards and in cash, and asked the poor cashier to remove just about all the canned goods and boxed goods until we had just enough to cover the perishables. Damned If I was gonna cause a store to lose a couple hundred in meats. The sad thing was it did take a while as I had a lot of cans and boxes cause they were on a good sale.

And the cashier was very polite and sweet the whole time. Got her when we went back for the canned goods 2 days later, and reassured her we had verified the cc companies system was working now. She was still sweet. We called the manager and complimented her.

[Elandora]

I work nights at a grocery store as the only cashier, while I don't often have long lines or massive hordes of customers, this does happen from time to time. When a person with EBT underestimates the total of their three-cart order and has to put half of it back, that seems to be when everyone else wants to go shopping and check out. (luckily we have several grocery stock people who hate ringing people up to cover for me c: they're good sports about it)

One situation in particular stands out in my mind, a woman and her mother come through the line with three shopping carts filled to overflowing. Most of the items in the cart are steaks, shrimp, bags of potato chips, two-liters of soda, and frozen pizzas.

I rang the order through, and it ended up being around $800, the woman had $500 on her card. Instead of deciding that she couldn't afford to eat shrimp after all, or maybe she could make do with less, she instead started picking through her purchases and handing stuff back to me to void out. She started with the 59 cent gravy packets, 25 cent koolaid packets, 50 cent cans of green beans.... eventually she moved up to the more expensive items, but she didn't cancel anything that cost more than $3. Altogether her transaction took 40 minutes of my time (and the time of the grocery manager who had come up to help while I was doing this, plus the time it took him to put away the perishable items she decided not to get). And then she needed help bagging.

For the most part I take things like this in stride, more reasons why my job isn't boring.