Extreme couponers are not trying to be assholes to you.
I mean, trying not to be an asshole doesn't mean you're not actually being an asshole. I'm pretty sure the majority of the people who walk into a restaurant ten minutes before close aren't meaning to be an inconvenience. They're just hungry and want to patronize the place. That still doesn't mean the staff have no right to be angry that the customers couldn't take one second to think "Man, I'm probably inconveniencing someone else more than necessary."
And to address everyone asking about this-- Yes, I have talked to management and ranted about it.
It is a corporate problem and a machine problem, neither of which can be fixed in a reasonable amount of time. Complaints about workflow and what we will and won't allow go up the chain of command past my bosses, and something like "I don't want to see the fucking face of an extreme couponer ever again" needs time to test and implement because each location still has to function roughly the same way for brand unity and to mitigate confusion on part of customers and employees. Can't have one store saying "Fuck you" to extreme couponers and every other store still allowing them. The most that my particular store has done to curb this is a four-item-per-deal limit, which basically does nothing. If you've got four
instances of twenty different
items, and a coupon for each, then fucking congratulations, you're still within the bounds of the rules and now I have to deal with you for an hour managing the coupons of up to 80 items.
As for the machines, I mean, what the hell can I do about that? Corporations are cheap. That's their point of their existence. They're not going to just dole out fresh equipment that works at the speed of an MIT computer, assuming such equipment exists (apparently our machines are considered top notch by the Rite Aid employees we absorbed. Jesus H. Fucking Christ). We've had to
fight for working printers before, mainly because equipment issues are addressed by IT and warehouse folks on a case by case basis. "So one printer in photo went down? Okay, but we have 1000 other stores right now that have been struck with significant register failures. Get to the back of the line, Charlie."
But that's not even the problem. Our registers
work. They just work extremely slowly, especially since they're having to scour people's member accounts for digital coupons. If it finds any, it has to check each and every one of them to see if any apply. If none do, it says "No digital coupons applied." If it does, it has to then calculate the price difference. This process
can take forever if you have a bunch of digital coupons on your app just hanging there, which most customers do, because who thinks to check for something like that and delete them from their account? Even if you don't put in an account or have digital coupons, if you have a bunch of items, by item # 20 I guarantee you that process is slowing the fuck down. I can't scan as fast because the register is literally stuck in the process of adding the item to your cart, which I have to wait on to get to scanning the next item. I can mitigate this to an extent by simply scanning one item and upping the quantity, but sometimes that can be an inconvenience because the system is slow for whatever reason. Maybe it just got hit with a power surge. Maybe it needs to be rebooted. Maybe it doesn't feel like working right now, big whoop, wanna fight about it?
Even if I get through all of this bullshit of scanning items and coupons, and I hit the payment button on the machine to tell it "Okay, now take that lump sum and wait for the customer to exchange money for it," guess what? An extreme couponer might have fucking forgotten the one offer to apply to the random-ass item I scanned in the beginning of this whole stupid-ass song and dance, which requires me going back to the scanning process to call for a manager. BECAUSE ONCE I'M IN THE PAYMENT PROCESS, I CANNOT GO BACK TO THE SCANNING PROCESS. A coupon counts as "partial payment," meaning the machine thinks you're raring to go. To void this shit out and go back requires management approval, which is another OS process I simply can't complain about to management to make disappear. So now I have to call for management. And we have to void it out. And I have to open the register up to retrieve the physical coupons you originally used (we have to mail in coupons for a rebate, requiring that we put them in the register after using them for nightly processing). Then I have to close the register so I can reset the machine. THEN I HAVE TO RING UP EVERYTHING AGAIN.
Oh look, five customers have walked out pissed off. Oh well, so long as you can get a fucking deal on useless shit, right?
And hell, sometimes the fucking thing crashes-- there is a national issue going on right now of "an illegal call has been made to the scanner," whatever the fuck that means, and it necessitates rebooting that register, which can take upwards of twenty minutes. If that happens during a checkout, we have to relocate and start everything over, which takes time. Or, sometimes there's inadvertent miscommunication, or I don't see all the items in your cart because I'm short AF and can't look over the counter and into your cart. There's plenty of reasons why the process of ringing up items can be slowed tremendously.
Extreme couponing does nothing but exacerbate the issues.
So I'm stuck with what I got in this instance of my work career. There's nothing to complain about in regards to work flow and machine. These things are not going to get fixed in the time I plan on being here. You know what could be easily fixed? If people weren't cheap, or at least weren't
inconsiderate with their cheapness. Come at slow times and days, do your transaction in batches versus everything at once, allow the floor persons time to get some other shit done- since lord knows you're too cheap to pay my student loans- and most importantly of all, don't act like you know this system better than me. If a coupon doesn't work, or if I have to call a manager to fix your fuck-up, don't roll your eyes and insist we're incompetent. Take your coupons and shove them up your ass on that one.
Retail sucks, and it sounds like you have problems with that.
Retail actually wouldn't suck as much if people weren't assholes. Most of my customers are actually
really nice and accommodating to me, because A.) I'm pretty crackerjack at retail and know how to give a good experience, and B.) They realize I'm a human being and not an obstacle in the way of acquiring their tacky shit.
But there's a few assholes,
and I have the fucking right to rant about them. If anything I've said bothers you, I mean,
oh well. Not like you really give a damn anyway since you know there's nothing retail workers can do about it.
