When Cashiers in supermarkets comment on your shopping when it goes through the till?

[crypes]

The other day at one of the biggee Supermarkets i had a running commentary on the items i had bought. I was in no mood to talk and i was starting to cringe a bit about 'that loaf looks nice and healthy' and 'your going to be doing alot of gardening this week'. Sometimes i have even had a cashier read the front of my paper and i thought 'gods sake havent you got a tea break coming up?' I just read in another thread sometimes you may want your shopping items to be private and stay private.

YABU, they're just being polite and making small talk. It probably makes their shift go quicker. I'm not always in the mood to make small talk with strangers, but if people talk to me I'm always polite back.

Do you think they actually give a shit? They're either doing it of boredom because they've been sat stuck at work for hours just scanning the shopping of mardy bints or they've been told to do it because the manager thinks it's customer service.

Stints in retail should be mandatory like how some countries do military service for youths.

Sounds like a character from the fast show.

Not sure about unreasonable but you do sound incredibly uptight.

I used to work on the tills in a supermarket many years ago. We used to get mystery shoppers and we would get bollocked for not having a conversation with the customer, it is part of our job to engage you in conversation

Believe me, after 6 hours sat on a checkout the last thing I wanted was to strike up a conversation about your bloody bread.

Yanbu, I really don't like this either, or when you buy from a cafe or somewhere like subway and they comment on how much/little food you get.

It depends what you have got, doesn't it? I don't mind a bit of "ooh, that's nice, I had that for my tea yesterday" but I would draw the line at "ooh, Tampax, time of the month is it?" or "Gosh, condoms, not looking to extend the family then eh?"

YABVU. I wouldn't like to be pinging stuff through the till for 8 hours a day.
Stand too far away from her so that she can't talk to you or wear some headphones.
Realistically, unless you do a three month shop, you'd be through in three minutes max.

I was a little taken back buying a pregnancy testing kit in Tesco years ago when the cashier asked me if I was hoping for a yes or a no.

All well and good as I was hoping for (and got) a yes but I would have squirmed had I have been desperately hoping I wasn't pregnant.

Some items shouldn't be commented on. Sanitary protection also comes under that category.

I honestly can't remember a single time any cashier anywhere has ever made any comment on any of my shopping at all. Where do all these nosy people live? Is it the same place all the wound up about nothing people live?

They're made to do it.

*I used to work on the tills in a supermarket many years ago. We used to get mystery shoppers and we would get bollocked for not having a conversation with the customer, it is part of our job to engage you in conversation

Believe me, after 6 hours sat on a checkout the last thing I wanted was to strike up a conversation about your bloody bread.*

This

stellanova I want a checkout job so I can say exactly that to someone!!!! But yabu...having worked in retail I agree with vodkajelly about mystery shoppers... I hated having to approach every customer in the store cuz clearly some people knew exactly what they were looking for and didn't want to be hassled, but unforunatley it was part of the job to make smalltalk. If you don't want to be bothered go through the self service!

She is probably actually hating the sight of u and your shopping and would quite like to ram your healthy loaf up your arius but she's been told to be polite and chatty.

Get over yourself.

I used to work in Asda when I was a student and christ it's dull, any conversation you can strike up passes the hours, I used to get the hint if the person wasn't in the mood though.

Start the conversation yourself and then you can direct it away from your shopping.

I've had nice chats with the people as I pack my shopping, I enjoy it. As I think about it the nicest check out staff I've met are in Asda followed by Morrisons.

Try reading The Checkout Girl. Very interesting account of behind the scenes at Tesco. The staff are MADE to engage with customers. I would imagine for most it must be hard to strike up conversation with strangers all the time - hence inane comments about shopping contents...

As vodkajelly said, we have to do it. It's considered good customer service by the powers that be to make a few positive/affirming comments about your product choices. Most people seem to like it, some people don't but it doesn't seem to generally piss them off that much if it's just one or two comments-Sounds like this person was a tad OTT though.
There are express tills and self serves for those in a rush or who don't like the human interaction part. I get the impression certain customers think you should be seen and not heard and are beneath talking to. Personally it annoys me more to be served by a rude silent ignorant type who bashes my stuff through whilst huffing and puffing.

amieis The lady behind the till (it wasn't a big enough shop to be a checkout) did say to me once: "That kind of beer is great if you have your period. Loads of iron. I always drink it."

I used to really hate customers who threw credit/debit cards or money at me (days before chip & pin) like I was diseased or something. Really ignorant. But then I had some lovely sweet regular customers who queued especially to see me which was nice. Even the fella who always told me all about his piles it was nice to know it made a difference to them to have someone listen and converse with.

This was in Sainsbury's.

I went into sainsbury's with my three kids (youngest about three months at the time) to buy a car-less (yes no car not careless) friend a pg test and gave the cashier a 'don't even think about it' look............ :D

I have heard complaints on here about

cashiers talking to other cashiers throughout the whole transacation and not once speaking to the customer

cashiers not saying a word, complete silence

cashiers helping with the packing

cashiers talking to them whilst they are packing

It does seem a cashier is always getting it wrong, perhaps all these complainents would liek to go through the self service tills and leave the cashiers to tend to the people that do appriciate them

ds2 works for a well-known chain of supermarkets. Staff have checkout targets to meet - so many items through the till in a defined time - so while they are expected to be courteous and helpful to customers, they simply don't have time for rambling and inappropriate conversations about their shopping.

Don't like it either. Also when M&S cashiers greet me with "Thanks for waiting".

I sympathise with them. Obviously it's not their fault they have just been issued with a standard spiel to stick to.