How are you paying today?

[ItsTricky]

It drives me bonkers. If I am making my purchase today, I'm not going to pay for it tomorrow, am I?

I remove myself from the email list asap after, then you qualify for a discount when you join again.

I remove myself from the email list asap after, then you qualify for a discount when you join again.

We're made to say these things, we don't like it anymore than you do.

If it's such a rigmarole for (most) customers and staff hate doing it, why is it happening? Madness

I know that staff ate made to say these things.

But what are staff advised to do if the response to 'What are you doing with rest of your day?' is something really sad or personal?

There have been times when the actual truthful reply to that from me would have been, 'Going to hospital.' Are the staff then meant to ask what for, or just slip into silence?

Taxi drivers do this to me - ask what I'm going to the hospital for - gynaecological tests if you must know - and it makes me feel so awkward.

It's not so much the question, it's that the person framing the question hasn't thought through what the answer might be.

Or is the customer meant to immediately think up some jolly fib, like baking cakes and de-fleaing the cat? What is the bloody point?

I want to buy my shopping, not take part in a stressful evasion game on a day that's shitty enough to be going on with.

Try carrying out a 45 minute manicure with your manager stood behind you listening on to every word to make sure you're trying to sell whilst conducting fake small talk. You could tell the customers just wanted to relax as I would as a paying customer but we would get a bollocking for not talking. I'm so glad I don't have to face customers anymore What I can't stand though is when you're stood with your card waiting for the cashier to finish her conversation with the cashier behind them and they turn to request payment again forgetting they need to select card on the till

I agree, I do dislike unnecessary chit chat.

I don't understand the problem.

'how are you paying today' means 'cash? credit card? vouchers? debit card? magic beans?'

I don't think I've ever been troubled for my email address, nor press ganged into a store card.

I must look very undesirable and poor.

I take payments from customers (not a shop but have a till)

I ask "how are you paying today" if I can't see whether it's card or cash because I have to press a button if they're paying by card. It also prompts some people to actually get their purse or wallet out.

It's asked to make the transaction quicker - seems a strange thing to be annoyed by!

Oh people here are so mardy sometimes. I used to have to ask this all the time. Our managers instructed us to spend a lot of time with customers to get a high average spend (and yes, we were able to tell when the was or was not appropriate) and we'd still be nattering away by the time all items were scanned.

Is it really that irritating?

Retail workers can't do right for doing wrong.

I am now reminded of having versions of the following conversations several times - I'm looking at YOU, Sainsbury's:

me: Hello shop assistant, can you tell me where to find the crossbows and scuba gear, please?
sa: crossbows are on aisle 745 next to the machine guns, and the scuba gear is on aisle 948484 opposite the live snakes
me: thank you very much shop assistant
sa: IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE I CAN HELP YOU WITH?
me: (in my mind) yes, tell management this customer thinks that's a dumbass question because I've just asked what I wanted and you've been delightfully helpful, and being asked if there's anything else is a waste of all of our time and also annoying, so please, management, tell the shop floor staff to stop asking, ta.
me: (out loud) no thank you

Please note: my local sainsbury's does not sell crossbows or scuba gear. Details were changed for anonymity. I don't want you all to know I buy Pot Noodles and Nesquik.

I do feel bad for shop staff made by management to come forth with this bollocks. What's going to happen when one day someone says 'can I help you with anything else?' and the customer says 'yes - here, amuse my feral brood while I go shop, thanksbye' ??

I have now turned into a grumpy ranting lunatic and am going off to find

a) coffee
b) cake
c) a cuddle
d) a crossbow

Oh FGS. People get so het up about such trivial nothings. They are asking what method you are paying by. I ask it where I work because I can't release the product until a cheque has cleared, some people use money off cards which means I alter their invoice accordingly, some people have prepaid and have a receipt to show me, some people (rarely) pay cash which means I have to pop and get change from the safe. It's also polite instead of just holding out your hand and waiting for payment in silence. I agree, you can't ever do the right thing for everyone in retail.

I have never understood Dunelm's 'Did you find everything you were looking for?' when paying. I always laugh and say 'yes and some stuff I wasn't looking for'. But I wouldn't be paying if I hadn't found everything, and I would ask someone on the shop floor if I couldn't find something.

It would be a massive PITA for the cashier and the queue if I then answered 'Well actually I couldn't find the duvet set with a pug on it now you ask'.

YABU. It's one word. It's not intrusive, they're just doing their job.

How are you paying today sounds a bit more friendly and conversational than how are you paying. That's all. not a big deal. Cut the poor employee some slack. It's not offensive.

Just for clarification, as there seems to be some confusion. In the question 'How are you paying today?', the word today is unnecessary. The question does not annoy me, the unnecessary word does.

linerunner You raise some very valid points. How about if a customer is asked 'Is it your day off?' (possibly with the unnecessary today ) and that customer has just lost their job or is trying to find work?

If shop assistants have to chat to customers then sticking to chatting about the products being bought (What a lovely dress etc) or the weather would be less annoying.

Should add, I don't mind a chat at all. Would be better if it's organic, rather than automated, that's all. If I didn't wish to speak to anyone at all I'd use self service.

It's often used to close a sale. Customer unsure whether to purchase, salesperson asks how you are paying. It's a persuasion thing. (I'd like to add it's also one of the reasons I'm no longer in retail. A tremendous amount of retail is morally a bit iffy.)
The staff have to do it because if they get caught out by a mystery shopper and they don't do it they could be up for disciplinary.

I don't mind chat, either. I can crap on about the weather like a good 'un.

I just don't think the script that staff are given has been thought through properly.

I remember taking my dad out to a supermarket after my step mother died and he was still in an agony of grief. The thought of him being asked, 'And what are you doing with rest of your day?' when the answer would have been 'Wishng I were dead, too' does my nut in.

Unfair on everybody, especially the staff.

iitstricky
But even the lovely dress chat wouldn't work, what about if the dress was for a funeral.

Not quite retail, but I once went into a pub after a funeral, all of us all in black, with red rimmed eyes, and the bar man says in a jolly voice "Don't be do miserable, not as if anyone died is it?!" To which I was able to issue the immortal reply "Actually yes, my father" Poor man did have the grace to look thoroughly ashamed and we didn't pay for drinks for the next two rounds!

I get very angry on behalf of retail workers sometimes, the management just don't think these things through and don't give them enough discretion to not converse if the customer clearly doesn't want to.

See, when I make conversation with a customer, I do it to put them at ease, and if I ask if there's anything else I can do to help, I quite often get a customer say "oh, hang on, I meant to get... " We do all this to hit our targets, do as we're asked and yes, to be helpful. I am quite touchy at the moment as I'm trying to do everything I can to get the fuck out of retail. With us, the email thing is so you have a hard copy of your receipt, you know, so you don't become one of those really annoying customers who shout at us as we won't refund something without the receipt that they have lost.