The pettiest, jobsworth bollocks you’ve encountered? Probably won’t top this.

[ermwhatypu]

I was in Morrison’s today. The woman at the till was handing out vouchers on a strip as an offer with 3 pounds off. There were three on each strip that you had to tear off. I had a screaming baby with me and was trying to find my phone to pay. As she handed me the strip one of the 3 pound vouchers fell off the strip onto the till… right in front of the woman. I said I will use that one please, as I wrestle dd back into the trolley. She looks directly at me and says I must hand her the voucher for it to be valid. She handed me the voucher back and I gave it back to her. She then scanned it.

Why are people like this!

Not really, someone ended up with my medication because the address on the label wasn’t checked properly ( similar though not identical first name and common surname). Easy to pickup two adjacent bags and misread the name on one. checking the address is a quick and efficient double check.

Indeed. Like Sainsburys making you scan your receipt if you've paid at a self-service till, I just don't go there anymore (fortunately there are other convenient options where I live). We (DH) still do(es) our main shop at Sainsburys but the bigger shop doesn't have that rule, and DH always pays at a staffed till anyway.

OP, i found it quite funny but people are being very serious about it. Calm down everyone, I think this was supposed to be a light hearted thread.

I've had a few incidences with train tickets. Both times I was admittedly in the wrong but I know they have a certain amount of discretion. First time I had a season ticket but hadn't noted the date and travelled 1 stop (fare was approx £3) the day after it had expired. Got a fine. Fair enough. A few weeks later, on a train, ticket inspectors came round, a young pretty girl didn't have a ticket at all because "it must be in her other bag" and got away with it.
Another time I had a ticket and wasn't travelling within the conditions it was valid for. I wasn't told the ts and Cs when it was sold to me and the train company website was very vague, it was a genuine mistake. The ticket inspector said he was going to fine me so I showed him the website that was deliberately vague where it was not clear how the ticket worked. He scoffed and told me I was lucky he was not giving me a court summons! A friend did the same thing because the Ts and Cs are not made clear and she got away with a warning.

You are wrong in this case.

This lady was just following protocol. Staff can and will get in trouble if they don't do things right when it comes to money/discounts.

It might be inconvenient for you but her job is more important.

Blame thieving staff who caused the need for the surveillance culture!!

She was doing as instructed. Wasn’t a problem, was it 🤷‍♀️

I suppose you've never had to work in retail.

How about a bit of compassion for people having to deal with customers like you every day?

First I have heard about Aldi checking empty shopping bags. Why would they check if there's nothing in it? Never happened to me. Ever. And I shop in Aldi twice a week, and go into 3 different ones over the weeks/months.

Any excuse to bash Aldi though eh? People love doing that on here. I suspect it's very likely someone who works for Morrisons, Tesco, or Sainsburys!

My DD said she noticed the Aldi cashier checking our bags the last time we went. To be honest I didn't notice

I used to work in a bakery when a pregnant lady came in and asked to use the toilets. We only had a staff toilet and I told her I was sorry but only the staff could use the toilet due to insurance issues. I told her where the nearest public toilet was (in a Mcdonalds around 5 minutes down the road).

She made a huge scene and was screaming obscenities at me and calling me names for not letting her use the toilet.

The security from the shop across the road (who knew me because they would always come in on their lunch breaks) even came over to check what was going on!

To an extent, but also a patriarchal*, controlling culture.

*used in the "fatherly" sense - ie treating employees like naughty schoolchildren

Because everything they do is filmed and they are scared of making a mistake and loosing their job

Ignoring shop polices for a moment, I've never once said Be Kind but I think this situation call for it.

She was doing her job. Not every job requires initiative and efficiency.

Supermarkets have inclusive recruitment policies and as long as she can do the job, does it really matter if she cant do it to the best of YOUR ability, as long as she does the task to the best of HERS and gets the right end result.

Kindly, you are shopping in a supermarket, where you can expect the job done right rather than a personalised, 5* experience.

When it comes to cash out of the till, sure. When it's about enforcing some silly policy about handing over some discount coupons, I don't think so. Employees shouldn't be scared about doing things to help customers.

Fucking hell 😵‍💫

@greensleevez not sure what I did wrong other than say could I please use the voucher.

Snowdogsmitten Right back at you!

OP, you moaning here about the 'vacant' shop assistant doing her job does nothing for people's general attitude towards retail staff.

Working in retail is horrible: poorly paid, unsociable hours, weekends, nights, rude, entitled people who can complain about you and get you intro trouble for absolutely anything. You're completely disposable and vulnerable. And English may not be many workers' first language which can be a further challenge.

There is a long path that runs from my street into a park, and there are bushes either side of the path that often got overgrown and covered the path in nettles etc. The park itself is maintained by the park trust and (most of) the path is maintained by the council. The problem is that the trust and the council seem to disagree on exactly where the boundary is, so that there was a patch about a metre long that never got trimmed.

It went on for years; it was absolutely ridiculous that neither side would just take the hedge trimmers that they were using anyway and just cut a bit further. I caught a bloke (council) once while he was trimming it and asked him if he could go a bit further, and he said no. I asked if I could borrow the trimmers and do it myself, and he said no (that bit I do understand to be fair). I asked if I could get my own trimmers and do it myself, and he said no, that would be vandalism.

Now there's a rumour that someone who may or may not look like my husband regularly sneaks out in the early mornings to trim it, but I couldn't possibly confirm or deny. I do find it amusing though that each party must just assume that the other has caved, and think they've won the standoff. 😂

Having to walk through an airport style security scanner in the middle of the desert is the one that sticks in my mind. No fences, buildings or anything, just this scanner sat all by itself in the middle of nowhere.

We complied as the site security guard had a big gun but it was hard to keep a straight face. There was no electricity supply for miles and we could see the cable and plug just lying on the sand!

Staff are being watched on camera by other staff according to a Tesco worker in my family. Probably that.

My daughter was literally 2cm too short for the dodgems ride. After disputing for a while that it was just 2cm I jokingly said I’ll go and put a thicker pair of shoes on her then. he said that would be fine and she would be allowed on. I didn’t have other shoes but did have spare socks that I rolled up and put under her heel. We re queued and he allowed us on!

I tried to buy a cutlery set once (standard forks, knives and spoons set from home bargains), I was 8 months pregnant and had my wedding rings on. I'm also 30 and I was told she couldn't sell them to me because I had no ID on me.

Pre-pregnancy I'd pop into the Waitrose opposite the offices I worked in to grab a redbull and was ID'd every single time by the same woman. I was 25-29.

She probably wasn't starting vacantly at you. She was probably saying something in her head that she could not say aloud.