To hate supermarket tillers commenting on my groceries

[rightothatsmethen]

I know they are being kind but I always seem to have them pick up stuff Im buying, look ate me with a raised eyebrow and question how much it costs.

This morning I was buying a bag of cherries and the lady picked them up and halted proceedings with a "These are five pounds" "Are you sure you want them?"

Cue me feeling like I was in some onscure game show, while two of them gathered with shocked faces afore me and in back of me in the queue while, against the clock, I had to decide.

"Will I? , Wont I?. Oh my god, is £5 a lot for cherries? Will I look cheap if I say no? Will I look frivolous if i through caution to the wind and buy these gold plated cherries?"

Really its too much. Anyway I bought the cherries.

SocialButterfly I'm and at the teenage boy on the till chatting merrily away to you about your choice of lube.

YANBU. I dislike the running commentary too. In our local Morrisons we usually have the choice between:

Cashier A) A man in his late 50's (probably), who clearly hates his job & moans continuously. If an item should need replacing (like my damaged melon last week) he makes it very clear just how much you are inconveniencing him & holding up his queue.

Cashier B) A jolly young man in his early 20's (I imagine) who is very friendly but will comment on EVERY item you buy. Questions I have had from him include "what do you do with ironing water?", "why is this packet of pasta soft (fresh) and this packet hard (dried)?" and "are these peaches?" (when buying plums). He means no harm I know but when you only have 15 mins to pay for your shopping, pack it, load it into the car & then get to school for pick up time you don't always feel in the mood for 20 questions.

Cashier C) A lovely lady who is incredibly proud of her 4 grown up daughters. So much so that she manages to tell you where each one lives & works and how many children they've got each time you go through the till. I have tried to say politely "oh, yes, I remember you telling me about her last week" - it has no effect whatsoever, she will still recap .

I don't mind a bit of friendly chit chat but some things are obviously out of bounds ("ooh heavy flow this month love" or "expecting some action this weekend then" obv not on).
When we were early 20s, DH had to buy a pregnancy test to bring to me (was living in a foreign country and my command of the language only allowed me to order food & drink). Lady asked him if we were hoping for a yes or no, he just said a no and got out of the shop ASAP.

I don't mind a bit of chat, and if the questions are a bit much i just tell fibs - eg buying a huge amount of alcohol, cashier asks "oh having a party" (we were but i was in an odd mood) "no, just for this weeks drinking at home" cashier didn't know what to reply to that.
Had an odd one this week - bought 10kg of basmati rice (on offer, it stores well, we are a family of 6 plus numerous extra teenagers to be fed) and cashier went on and on about the size of the bag of rice, and wasn't it a big one and whatever would we do with all that rice, and on, and on

I think it's a bit intrusive. Also, when I'm in a hurry to get shopping done, is it my job to explain what various exotic fruits are, and how you eat/cook them?

OTH I feel my attitude should be more Buddha-like; I might learn something, who knows. Like patience, tolerance, etc.

I remember once going through the checkout where a youngish lad was working. He held up my avocado and said "do you know what this is?" Thinking he was asking if I knew the price, I said no, so he asked the woman on the next checkout who told him it was an avocado, he punched in the avocado code into his till and gave me a funny look. I can only imagine he was wondering why the hell someone would buy expensive food items without even knowing what they were .

I was buying minced chicken in Asda last week. The woman working on the till said 'this is Halal meat, you know'. I was gobsmacked! But I just smiled politely and told her I was making chicken bolognese! Does it really matter if I use Halal meat?! It was the only kind of minced chicken in the shop!!

YANBU! But I do like a chatty, friendly cashier - it makes a world of difference. (and I hate when they're talking past you to colleagues)

I once got told by a cashier that she had never seen anyone place their shopping on the conveyor belt so well-organised (heavy on first, goes bottom of the bag - light at the back, goes on the top of the bag - frozen stuff together, stuff in cardboard separated from frozen stuff so the boxes don't go soggy, etc etc - common sense, right??). Anyway, I found this rather humorous as I'm the world's messiest, most disorganised person outside of the supermarket :o

I was once in the supermarket buying a pg test, she scanned it through she said 'what are you hoping for? positive or negative?'

I was totally taken aback, I muttered 'positive' and she said good luck but went on to say how her daughter was desperate to get pregnant and it was so, so sad because she had been trying for 6 months and 'can you even imagine how hard that must be?'

I burst into tears because at that point we had been trying for years. I can't tell you why but it really upset me and I was doing that type of loud sobbing that just won't stop.

In the end the manager came over to see what was going on. I had a nice cuppa in the managers office and the cashier was told to keep her mouth shut!!

DrKoothrappali

Did you get the result you wanted? (Sorry if too nosy . . . see I'm just as bad as the cashier!)

I was behind a lady at the checkout once with a young lad on the till. He was having a full on "health and safety gorn mad" rant. I could see the lady getting crosser and crosser until she snapped at him and told him she was a health and safety inspector

I don't mind if they make the odd "ooh that looks nice" comment. Nothing wrong with that, but seeing as there are often quite private items there I'd rather not feel they were judging me on my purchases!

WhoseGotMyEyebrows No, not that time but I do have two DDs now, so I am extremely lucky

being on the other side of the till, I had a customer come in, with the loveliest bunch of flowers I had seen in a while. I commented, ooh, they're nice, to be told, they are for my brothers funeral. OOps

When I was one, in my yoof, we called ourselves "till tarts" .

I don't mind it really but I do think it would be more professional of them to pretend they don't even notice what they're scanning. Otherwise you get the awkward silence when after chit-chat/comments on every item, they then come to the wet-look underwear, lube and athletes foot cream.

I've been the other side of the till too Niccia, but I managed to not make anyone cry so think I did better than the silly sod who served me!

DrKoothrappali Oh yay!!!!! So pleased for you!

Not to be an arse, but for some people who live alone especially the elderly this is sometimes the most communciation they get all day...agreed inappropriate questions about lube and whatnot are not on but as with the 'party/funeral' references you never know what is going to be personal. Better for them to sit there and shut up all day? Not necessarily.

I've worked in a shop so know how you can forget yourself at times without meaning to be rude!

However, I was once buying a pregnancy test and the girl serving me picked it up, had a good look at it and then in a not so hushed voice said "Oooh, do you think you are then?" I didn't quite know what to say but she just sat there holding the test smiling at me, like I wasn't allowed to buy it until I answered!

WineandPizza When I worked on the tills the elderly people who came through were quite chatty but they would usually say something about the weather and I took my queue from them.

I would be eternally grateful to the checkout assistant for stopping me from spending five pounds on cherries! Are they made of gold?

Richard Herring did a funny stand up show i saw about it called 'someone likes yoghurt'. From when he went to a supermarket and stocked up on yoghurts and the check out person said it to him as if it was a really odd thing to buy.

I was buying a dress from a shop that was closing down and the cashier ladies behind the tills, must have been in their early 60's, were all chatting away completely unaware of the huge queue forming. When I finally went to pay for my dress, the lady decided to give me the ins and outs of "how lovely the dress looked on" and that it was "beautiful" and had a "gorgeous print". Yes that's why I'm bloody buying it! I stood listening to her ramble for about 5 minutes before she finally asked for my money .

OP was this in asda, the exact same thing happened to the woman in front of me in the queue the other day, the cashier pointing out with a horrified look that the punnet of cherries was five pounds.

The woman looked horrified too and then another staff member who was passing joined in and the three of them stood tutting at the punnet of cherries for a couple of minutes . She didn't buy them, I'm not sure asda head office would be too happy to learn that their cashiers are encouraging customers to put stuff back on the shelves.

moominliz And did you answer? (or punch her?!)