AIBU to ask why customers are still doing this disgusting habit?

[Blopi]

Why do people think it’s acceptable to hold money, lottery tickets etc in their mouths before handing them to the shop workers?

It’s a disgusting habit. Yesterday in a shop, I saw a woman holding a lottery playing slip and £10 in her mouth. The shop worker I saw rightfully refused to take the money. The customer became very angry and wanted a manager.

Manager rightly backed the shop worker. Saying it’s a habit that should have gone away.

How would customers react if staff held their change, tickets etc by their mouths before handing to the customers. Similar to the reaction that the customer did on when the shop worker refused their money.

Stop doing this habit along with boob money

There is a sign up in the Poundland near me stating money will not be accepted if it’s held in your mouth. No joke. Made me feel sick at the thought, money is absolutely filthy.

It’s a bit silly to get worked up about it as a shop worker- money is disgustingly dirty, spit you’ve seen applied isn’t making it worse than the germs it has picked up from pockets/hands/wallets - wear gloves if you’re unhappy about germs and need to handle it. Wash your hands at the end of your shift. I think the shop was unreasonable here.

People do it with their passports at airports too. Then hand them to the poor border patrol person to look at.

Banknotes are even more disgusting though.

I never understand why people put parking tickets and keys in their mouths. They're not dogs. It's easy enough to hold them. If my hands are really full, I just hang the keyring off my little finger. If never put it in my mouth.

Surely the person most at risk of (what exactly, germs?) is the customer, as it’s in THEIR mouth? I suppose they then pass these Mouth Germs to the worker when they hand over the money or whatever, but the worker could just hold the other end and use hand sanitiser a lot. As a PP has said, money is ‘absolutely filthy’ anyway, prior to being held momentarily in someone’s mouth.

I work in a food shop and it’s shocking the places people will pull cash from. It’s disgusting. Had a regular who used to keep her bank cards and cash in her bra. 🤮 Not seen her in a while.

I work in a jewellers, and we have a selection of steel rings to measure a customer’s ring size. At least once a month someone will stick their finger in their mouth to get a tight ring off. (Despite me saying that we have hand cream if the need it). I always ask them to place the ring in a separate tray so I can clean it, and they always seem surprised that I won’t take it from them!

Some of the general public are just gross. If I started refusing to take money from customers who I see do unhygienic things, I'd be turning away a lot of business. Yesterday I had a kid walk around the shop carrying a fistful of change, by the time he handed it over to me to pay it was wet with sweat. I just used hand sanitiser and went to wash my hands when I got a free couple of minutes.

Have you posted this before? I'm sure I've read this before almost word for word.

I saw someone getting off the bus one day recently with his bus pass in his mouth. And I thought at the time how disgusting that was. But I didn't realise it was common for people to put money and other things in their mouths.

I shouldn't be surprised though because I feel I'm witnessing so many horrible dirty and unhygienic habits on a daily basis. People coughing and sneezing in shops and on public transport without covering their mouths. And in the ladies toilets in supermarkets quite a few not washing their hands - including those with children. And yesterday a man getting out of his car and blowing his nose withhis fingers and walking into the gym. No wonder illness spreads.

It's more inexplicable because I thought one of the few positives of COVID was what it taught people about thd necessity of clean personal habits and the spreading of germs and viruses.

Oops, i put my bus card in my mouth the other day as i ran out of hand space. I will wipe it clean and resist the urge to do it another time.

Perhaps if other shops did the same, it would happen less often. Also reassuring to hear of shop workers being supported.

People who were reminded of clean personal habits and germ spreading during 2020 and 2021 soon have forgotten in many cases.

I work i retail and mouths are the least disgusting

I've had notes pulled out of bras,shoes/boots/socks and on one occasion,her knickers (just after covid)

I refused that one (and thank god my manager backed me up-the latest manager wouldn't have done)

I thought I'd seen it all but that was a new low

Absolutely disgusting. The shop staff were quite right. And storing things in a bra is just about as low rent as you can go.

Oh wow, I had no idea people do this. If I'm honest, I'm not a clean freak and some of my hygiene practices are questionable for some people here, but I wouldn't dream of putting cash in my mouth because it's filthy, rather than because I'd be contaminating it further.

On that basis I don't think I'd be worried about taking cash I'd seen go in someone else's mouth because I know it's completely germ laden anyway.

Gosh, I'm low rent. 🤣

Why is a bra so bad? I've been l known to put a card in my bra on a night out, to avoid taking a bag. Surely my hands, which presumably are allowed to come into contact with the card, are much more germy than my breasts?

What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. Can’t say that I hold things in my mouth and I haven’t noticed others doing it either.

How do we know the cashier wasn't picking their nose or arse without washing their hands before handing us our change? Where does this slippery slope end?

i regulary use a shop where the lad stands there picking his nose and eating the bogies while talking to me....i can't look at him lol

Oh dear no wonder we have so many allergies. Your body is designed to routinely deal with minuscule amounts of someone else's saliva (not that the saliva even gets onto the note since holding a note in your lips is a pretty dry affair). We have immune systems for a reason and being so squeamish makes us less protected, not more.

I don't accept that they have forgotten, certainly about the hand washing given the way it was drummed into every one ad naseum and all of the fuss about hand sanitiser. I think they know fine well they should be washing their hands but they are too damn lazy or think they are in too much of a hurry

I honestly see people's disgusting hygiene habits as part of the utterly selfish attitude a lot of people have to others now. They frankly just care about anyone else but themselves. It's all just part of the breakdown in manners and politeness .

I'm actually so gross and disgusting that this wouldn't bother me. In fact if people knew exactly how gross I am they wouldn't even want to pass me the cash.
On the plus side I'm never sick when there are bugs doing the rounds.

Same! Saying that, a mate used to stick her phone down her bra-really common for riders-and she had breast cancer and was convinced it started exactly where her phone was. I always used an arm phone holder.