Cashier Lesson – Counterfeit Bills

This entry is part 1 of 6 in the series Cashier Lessons

This is written as a satirical instructional article.  I wrote this a long time ago, don’t know exactly when.

When checking if a bill is counterfeit, please do the following:

1. Lick it.

If the ink on the paper appears to fade after each successive lick, it is most likely not fake. Ink on real money does not dry, as odd as it may seem.

2. Hold bill up to the light.

This sends a message to everyone around you that someone is paying with a big bill. You will not only put that customer’s life in danger because they are now, by default, given the status of being a high roller, but you will give the incantation that you know what you’re looking for.

It doesn’t matter if you know what you’re looking for either, just pretend like you do.

Protip: most people will not know what you are looking for — this method also prevents people from making jokes (as opposed to using a regular counterfeit pen) because they are (most likely) embarrassed to say something retarded like “its fake, i just printed it out this morning” because you’re including more people in the transaction than just you and the customer.

3. Loud Music at all times.

When possible, have music at a volume that will be hard for a customer to crack a joke about money being fake, because you’ll have to ask them to explain it again, and it’s very disconcerting to explain it over your music. The most effective music for this technique is hardcore or really fast music, such as Bane, Hatebreed, Throwdown, Fear Before the March of Flames, and for the emo touch, Hawthorne Heights, Silverstein, or From First to Last.  Heavy metal works as well, and this includes DragonForce or Metallica from the 1980s.

4. Pretend you don’t care – give them the cold shoulder.

This works wonders to avoid stupid counterfeit bill jokes. Just nod your head slightly to convey the message you understand their joke, as if you haven’t heard it a million times before, so they don’t try and explain it to you again. Under any circumstance, DO NOT LAUGH. It ISN’T funny. You’re bound to have heard every joke in the book at this point in your career as a cashier.

Cashier Lesson – Being a Receptionist Without a Chair

This entry is part 2 of 6 in the series Cashier Lessons

Everyone knows that when you’re a receptionist or manning a desk you either are standing up, sitting down, or leaning against whatever can hold you weight.  But what people don’t know is how to cope with being a receptionist in a situation where the desk is made for sitting but there is no chair!  It’s supposed to make you look more approachable when you’re standing around looking like you’re straining to do everything you’re trying to do rather than sitting in a chair using the desk that is made for sitting in the way it was designed to.

So you are forced to stand, but lo and behold, you’re not four feet tall, so 85% of the surface is out of reach and the other 10% is unusable due to line of sight issues.  That leaves approximately 2.5% of the desk you used to be able to use for use.  The other 2.5% is taken up by the normal useless junk that you’re required to keep on your desk, such as business cards and phones — you never had that to begin with anyway.

There are a number of solutions to tackle this problem.  Pick the most viable solution for your situation:

1. Bring the counter to you.

This solution requires you to engineer the desk or counter in such a fashion that it rises approximately three feet into the air.  You can use anti-gravity machinery or exquisitely stylish cherry-wood wedges to accomplish this.  It’d be like you’re sitting… but you’re standing!

2. Bring you to the counter.

This solution requires you to invent the marmalade that Alice drinks in Alice in Wonderland.  Just make sure you drink just enough to shrink to the size of the desk.  But I guess you can drink enough so that you can swim around in the tears of lazy receptionists who don’t like to stand up while being a receptionist.

3. Pretend like you’re sitting.

Who says you can’t sit without a chair?  You can crouch or sit on an imaginary chair, or develop a jet engine system to keep yourself comfortably levitated at the elevation of your counter.

4. Get a new counter/table.

The most sensible solution of all is to get a new counter.  But sensibility is more expensive than a new counter, so you’ll most likely have to forgo this solution nine times out of ten.

5. Bring the surface of the counter to you.

I suppose this is most sensible low-cost solution.  But this means you spend money on ancillary items when you could just solve your problem by using the chair you already bought instead of raised surfaces to solve a problem you didn’t need to create.  But, who cares, it’s just money, right?

Another challenge that is presented is your ability to be sneaky about things.  While in a chair, you would be able to sneak a snack or a peek at your cell phone just to holla at your homies.  There are only two presentable solutions available to tackle this problem:

1. Hide under the counter/desk.

Hiding under the counter/desk allows you to temporarily shirk any responsibilities you may have been forced to do.  You can hide from customers, managers, other employees — its like a safe haven for about five minutes while you sext that hottie you met at the bar last night.

2. Make the counter into a fort.

Nothing says “fuck you” to customers better than stacking up large amounts of random shit so high into the air so they can’t see you anymore.  Who says you need to help anyone but yourself?  You need some alone time randomly during the day after you’re creeping on the hot guy/girl trying on a shirt in front of the fixture instead of the fitting room?  Time to get some boxes and staple a handwritten “Do Not Disturb” sign so people can’t see you anymore, and don’t come-a-knocking.

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.

Cashier Lesson – Using the Computer

This entry is part 4 of 6 in the series Cashier Lessons

The computer is a resource that is used in everyday operation as a customer service representative.  We say it is to help customers and to manage day-to-day operations of the cashier department, however we know that is only 25% of its use.  Keeping up to date on fashion trends and celebrity gossip is tantamount to doing any actual “work” on the vestige known as the computer at the customer service desk.

How to Avoid Helping Customers

Furiously typing away at a computer makes it seem like you are very very very busy when in fact you’re not.  Just don’t make eye contact and they’ll probably move on to the next register.

How to Avoid Helping Underlings

There are several folders on the desktop at your disposal to get those pesky cashiers off your back.  It’s not your fault that they used the last copy of the availability form that had a big “ORIGINAL” written across it — oh no.  But it certainly becomes your problem when cashiers are biting at your ankles and looking at you with dumb stares with their hand half-way inside of an empty folder wondering how to get what they need.

Just tell them “I’ll get it later.”  Then never get it.  That way someone else can do it and you don’t have to worry about shit.  If it is important enough they’ll figure out a way to get it.

How to Deflect E-mail

If you feel so inclined to check the E-mail inbox, there are a number of things you could do.  You could help each customer, but why would you do that when you could have someone else do it for you?  Simply forward it all to the applicable managers and they can sort it out.  Or why even do that?  Forward it all to your supervisor and have him deal with it.  You don’t get paid enough to deal with stupid bull shit.

Hell, just delete it all while you’re at it.  No one needs the stupid bullshit customers spout in their stupid e-mails, after all.

How to Hide What You Are Doing

Sometimes it may not be inconspicuous when one of those assholes from the corporation come by and walk through the store and wonder why there are people in line at a register or why a cashier is standing around doing nothing (there’s never a happy medium with these guys).  Always keep a blank, open tab and switch to it whenever you see someone that may get you into trouble walk by.

The Cashier Quiz

This entry is part 5 of 6 in the series Cashier Lessons

The Cashier Quiz is the quiz that contains all the Cashiering questions created.  Test your know-how of how to be a cashier by answering these questions.  Any new questions created will be added here.

How do you know when to apply the breakfast discount?

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If someone who doesn't work at the store comes to you and asks you to give them pens to use because there is an event and they keep losing pens because people take them... What do you do?

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What do you do when a customer has an old gift card?

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The White Board tells you how to do something new, so you...

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What do you do with the register slips in your drawer during the day?

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There's a frantic bird in the store and no one can seem to catch it. What do you do?

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A customer comes to your register and would like to rent out one rental textbook. So you...

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A customer would like to return a t-shirt, however they do not have a receipt with them. So you...

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There are 10 minutes left and you run out of dimes. The next transaction requires dimes as change. So you...

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When an elephant wants to buy a scantron for 35 cents with an ATM card, what do you do?

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Cashier Lesson – A Lesson In Sound Physics

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

A college convenience store is a magical place.  So magical, in fact, that proper physics do not take place!  Hence the word, “Magical.”  It is magical in ways that you can only experience as it happens.  Not through traditional scientific method, rather through make believe.  One of the major dictators of physics within your convenience store is the old lady who complains about noise coming from your convenience store.  For the sake of this article, we will call her Pamela.  Ms. Pamela runs the building your convenience store is located in, and within this building is the little world she has created.  Your convenience store is part of this creation, as your employer has rented a space from this lady and put you to work behind the counter.

One aspect of this magical building is the bending of physics of sound.

Ms. Pamela’s intentions are questionable.  Whether she is truly a human within a rotting sack of flesh or an alien in an unconvincing human costume.  Anyway, that’s for later.  The point of this lesson is about Sound.  And boy does it ever make no sense.

If you ever have the radio/music on while in your convenience store while Ms. Pamela is in the building, she will always come and tell you to turn it down — no matter what volume it is.  She claims that the sound waves from “the radio,” which is pointing toward the trash can, is actually bouncing up into the air ducts, through the elevator shaft and into the study room (that is about 30-40 feet away from your convenience store) in enough amplitude that it is possible to hear it!  Not only is this clearly bullshit, but simply impossible.  On many occasions, the radio is nowhere near as loud as the refrigerators and slushy machines that are inside the convenience store!

Because she rules the building with an iron fist and we rent the place from her, she wants to always feel like she’s in control of everything that is going on.  That imperialistic, alien, sound adept masterbitch.