I work in retail, specifically a German retailer with plenty of stores in the UK. There are a few pet peeves, or irritations that customers do that rile me up, in fact 2 of them unbelievably so. If you do any of these, take a long hard look at yourself in the mirror and shame yourself.
Going Through a Manned Till With Only a Basket (or Carrying a Few Items)
When working in said German supermarket, we have protocols for opening and closing tills. If the first till is open, and someone comes along and can’t unload onto it, then we have to open another till. Meaning we are taking someone off the shop floor elsewhere to man a till, this is normally fine and accounted for in the hours. If Dennis hadn’t decided to go through the till with his basket, rather than walking the 15 metres to the self checkouts, there might of been room on the end of his belt for that other customer to unload, meaning the other till wouldn’t of had to of been open.
Unloading on an Empty Belt, at the End of the Belt
Say I am on till 1 and I am completely empty. Dennis this time comes along with a trolley and starts unloading, but rather than unloading at the end closest to me, he decides to unload at the other end. Yes, I could move my belt whilst he’s unloading, but then his shopping is spread across the whole belt, meaning if someone else comes along, they can’t unload straight away, and I have to open till 2.
Whilst he is unloading at the far end of the till, another customer has turned up, and Dennis, bless him, he is nearly 90, and quite slow. I have a dilemma, do I wait, knowing that the first half of my belt is empty and allow the customer to queue behind. Or do I open till 2? If I wait, then perhaps 2 other customers come down with big trollies, and now I have to open till 2 and 3 at the same time…poor till management. Ya’ll think it’s easy, but we got to manage the till flows efficiently, not just for customers sake, but for the hours we have on hand during the day.
“Does That Mean It’s Free Then?”
If I’m having a problem scanning an item, please don’t say this. I’ve worked in retail for 12 years, how many times do you think I have heard that before? I dare not to count.
Thanks for reading my tirade of things that irk me in the land of retail, I’m sure if you work in retail you may understand these too. On Saturday this week we have the return of Food Fight, where we have an international battle between Elbphilharmonie Café in Hamburg against Santagloria in Seville. Stay tuned to see who is victorious!
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The Taste Trekker 
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