Cashier Lesson – Ways to Torture Cashiers

This entry is part 3 of 6 in the series Cashier Lessons

Let’s say you are in a supervisory position over cashiers.  Typically supervising is a boring and monotonous exploit.  Babysitting other people to make sure they’re doing their job correctly can bring out the worst in people, especially when you do it day in and day out.

Why not put a little sadistic fun into your life by torturing the people you are supervising?  Here’s a few suggestions:

1. Funneling customers to one cashier’s register (or just away from you).

Nothing says “I’m lazy” more than rejecting any customer that comes your way.  But there’s a reasoning behind that.  It’s because you want that stupid cashier with the tacky blonde highlights or that other cashier with the excessively form-revealing biking shirt (can anyone say man boobs?) to have pleasure of taking another customer after the one they’re already ringing up.  Who says you need to endure the crappy money jokes customer’s always seem to think are funny when you can just deflect them to the next guy?

2. Musical registers.

Nothing wipes the hopeful look on a about-to-close-out cashier’s face than to make them close-out later by switching them to a register that closes later.  The best part about it, is that its all random and “pre-ordained to fate” because they chose a bad number.  To set up a game of musical registers, write the names of the registers on a piece of paper and cut them out.  Fold them up and then toss them into a small box or cup or something like that and have the cashiers draw a piece of paper.  These papers will tell them where to go for their registers, and if you’re lucky you’ll have a situation where a cashier who was happy they were about to close closes last and an overzealous cashier cheers that they get to close first instead of last.  Then you can revel in the pain of the cashier who just had the power play to being put into the penalty box.

3. Inventory.

Nothing is more sadistic than forcing people to count millions of Scantrons, pens, pencils, sweaters, or large amounts of random shit for hours on end.  If you get a chance, make sure they count the roundabout fixture full of dusty stickers that look alike.

4. Stare at them.

Nothing will make a cashier more uncomfortable than getting every move they make scrutinized upon by their superior.  When they mess up, you can stare at them even harder and make grunting noises and tell them they’re doing something wrong with little to no explanation.  You’re doing your job, after all.

5. Leave them with no change.

Oh, the cashier just called for pennies?  I think you should wait another twenty minutes and let them sweat a little.  Especially since they called for change five minutes ago and conveniently didn’t tell you they are about to run out of pennies.  Leave it to them to explain to customers why they don’t have three pennies to give back for change.

6. Mindless policies.

Making up policies that do not make any sense is a subtle way to make life hard for a cashier.  Nothing pains the soul more than to have needless red tape and hurdles to jump over to do even the simplest of things.  Need some more ones?  How about you fill out a cash request form which you will evaluate the reasoning for before getting the money?  How about requiring extraneous, useless information on checks to make the transaction take longer, and if they forget something, then you can punish them for doing so.

This requires some creativity, obviously.  Just think up the most ass backwards ways to frustrate your employees and execute.

7. Hidden supplies.

If a cashier is able to easily get the pens, pencils, staplers, or whatever they need easily, then you fail at torturing them.  You need to make sure that any of the office supplies they may require to finish transactions are in hard to reach or practically inaccessible areas.  Make sure these supplies are always a few steps away and limit the amount of efficiency they can possibly have by maximizing the annoyance factor.  Make sure the stapler is on the other side of the room from the pens and pencils.  Why would you ever want them to be in the same place?  It’s not like you want anything to be convenient for anyone.

Series NavigationCashier Lesson – Being a Receptionist Without a ChairCashier Lesson – Using the Computer

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