A kid probably got me fired tonight.
I'm a cashier an American grocery store.
Our registers are set up like so, one long belt and the register attached, a small gap, and then our small end cap with an extending belt. Tonight I was checking out a family with a small son who was wild, to say the least. He comes around and pokes his head in the gap, which is wide enough for one of our mini-carts. I smile, as one does when they want to acknowledge a child without engaging it. He grins and comes behind my line right as I open my drawer.
Can you smell the impending doom here?
What child doesn't like things that move and make noise and all that? Unfortunately not this one. Before I can stop him he reaches in my drawer and grabs a handful of money. Yes, he grabbed real American green currency and takes off.
Now, how did he manage this, you may ask, when registers have those little things that hold the money down? Yeah, I keep a messy drawer. I usually sort it out right before I retire for the night but as I still had a few minutes I hadn't yet taken the time.
So this grubby little former nipple-suckler has made off with at least one hundred dollars in twenties. I slam shut my drawer without giving the parents their change because let's face it, their spawn just took off with some of it.
I beg the parents to help me get it back and they immediately start blaming me for letting him back there, letting him in the drawer, letting him behind the line. Oh, I'm sorry, in addition to doing my job I'm now in charge of your brat? I called bullshit and demanded our money back.
Guess what junior's done while dear old mom and pop and I are arguing? Oh, you didn't guess? Yeah, he's shredded-SHREDDED- the money. Apparently he thinks it's okay to literally rip money right in halves. And then quarters. And then into bitses and pieces. A small pile of dead, shredded presidents on my floor.
I should mention that when I scolded the boy for doing it he ran full speed at me and drop kicked me in the knee. I'm a small female, this is a very solid six year old boy. Yeah, six year old. Should-freaking-know-better age.
I call for my supervisor because obviously now I'm freaking out-and my knee hurts-and I need help. She comes out and when I explain what happened she was a saint about it and told the parents they would be responsible for fixing this.
Mama and Poppa Dumfuc didn't like this. Did Not Like. On a monstrous scale. A big ole barrel of fuckin' nopes. Cat in the bath level.
This couple is probably mid-twenties. The kind of couple that dates in high school and probably got pregnant and gave it the old try and now they sort of semi-hate each other which already makes for a volatile combination and has manifested in their evil evil spawn. He is obviously acting out because his home life sucks and mom and dad are horrible.
You knew these people were never going to make this easy.
They start complaining that they can't pay us back because they just don't have the money. This is a couple who paid for their food items with EBT and then pulled out a stack of hundreds to pay for everything else. Mom was just bragging on her new Samsung about how they just booked a cruise over Thanksgiving to the Bahamas or whatever. Even off-season those things are expensive. Not to mention the three cartons of cigarettes they got and the three cases of beer and the six bottles of wine. I'm talking a three or four hundred dollar total that they paid for with cash. They weren't paying us back.
So my supervisor goes to call for a manager in her office, leaving me with two angry adults and an amused and mischievous child. The mother actually gets in my face and threatens me. I said I was calling the cops because as I said, I'm small and this lady is tall and wide.
That's when daddy throws sonny-jim in the full cart and grabs mama-sue and hightails it the eff outta there. Like Sonic with a lit firecracker up his ass. My supervisor runs out and I tell her what happened. Unfortunately we live in a budding metropolis with a packed parking lot that stays busy into the night and in the twenty or so seconds it took for me to call for her and for her to get to me they got away. I don't know how they did it. I can't imagine it was a quick job loading their stuff. Maybe they just threw it all in along with the cart and peeled off. Who knows?
So there I was sitting in front of our four managers trying to explain what happens and I'm definitely going to be speaking to the cops. In the mean time they are blaming me for this. Officially, on the record, in internal files. I'll probably be fired. I'll probably have to pay for the lost money. Might be accused of stealing. Who knows. Either way I'm about to have a hard time finding a new job.
This right here is why I'm never having kids. Why I don't like kids. Why looking at kids or hearing them actually causes me to cringe. Because kids these days have no discipline. No respect. No morals. They are held responsible for nothing. They are put on pedestals and treated as demi-gods. Their parents are lauded for simply procreating. They become self-righteous and entitled. I don't want to turn into that. I don't want to have a child that turns into that.
The world today makes me so sad.
****UPDATE**** So, things have moved fast, super fast. It's only been two days but we have action. I got good and bad news. The good news is thus: today at noon the mom, dad, and their son came back. They didn't come in to shop, they came in to make things right. They asked if I was there so my manager called me and asked me to come in. I brought my lawyer uncle just in case. We met in the coffee shop attached to the store. They bought everyone coffee and pastries for everyone. There's a story here. Now, they didn't run because the kid ripped up the money.
They ran because of a host of things. Number one being the EBT card they were using isn't there's. They explained they were using the wife's mother's card but her mother didn't know they had it. She only asked if they could after the fact. They also had weed in the car and both of them had been drinking-I didn't smell it though-and so they were afraid they would get arrested. It's almost unbelievable that that is why they ran and I even said so. They offered to replace the money their son destroyed but the manager had already gotten confirmation this morning from corporate that they would be covering the loss so my manager asked that they donate the money to a worthy cause. They agreed and very soon, our local animal shelter-a no-kill/adoption only-will be two hundred dollars richer! They were very sorry and even more sorry that the kid kicked me and made him apologize to me. We all separated on good terms, at least, they and I did.
Now for the bad news. I got fired. After they left my manager informed me that the board doesn't want me back. My uncle is considering suing but I may stop him. I'm just glad everything worked out as well as it did. I know it seems silly not to take action but considering this could have gone worse, I'll take what I can get. Thanks everyone for their wishes over the last two days!
Our registers are set up like so, one long belt and the register attached, a small gap, and then our small end cap with an extending belt. Tonight I was checking out a family with a small son who was wild, to say the least. He comes around and pokes his head in the gap, which is wide enough for one of our mini-carts. I smile, as one does when they want to acknowledge a child without engaging it. He grins and comes behind my line right as I open my drawer.
Can you smell the impending doom here?
What child doesn't like things that move and make noise and all that? Unfortunately not this one. Before I can stop him he reaches in my drawer and grabs a handful of money. Yes, he grabbed real American green currency and takes off.
Now, how did he manage this, you may ask, when registers have those little things that hold the money down? Yeah, I keep a messy drawer. I usually sort it out right before I retire for the night but as I still had a few minutes I hadn't yet taken the time.
So this grubby little former nipple-suckler has made off with at least one hundred dollars in twenties. I slam shut my drawer without giving the parents their change because let's face it, their spawn just took off with some of it.
I beg the parents to help me get it back and they immediately start blaming me for letting him back there, letting him in the drawer, letting him behind the line. Oh, I'm sorry, in addition to doing my job I'm now in charge of your brat? I called bullshit and demanded our money back.
Guess what junior's done while dear old mom and pop and I are arguing? Oh, you didn't guess? Yeah, he's shredded-SHREDDED- the money. Apparently he thinks it's okay to literally rip money right in halves. And then quarters. And then into bitses and pieces. A small pile of dead, shredded presidents on my floor.
I should mention that when I scolded the boy for doing it he ran full speed at me and drop kicked me in the knee. I'm a small female, this is a very solid six year old boy. Yeah, six year old. Should-freaking-know-better age.
I call for my supervisor because obviously now I'm freaking out-and my knee hurts-and I need help. She comes out and when I explain what happened she was a saint about it and told the parents they would be responsible for fixing this.
Mama and Poppa Dumfuc didn't like this. Did Not Like. On a monstrous scale. A big ole barrel of fuckin' nopes. Cat in the bath level.
This couple is probably mid-twenties. The kind of couple that dates in high school and probably got pregnant and gave it the old try and now they sort of semi-hate each other which already makes for a volatile combination and has manifested in their evil evil spawn. He is obviously acting out because his home life sucks and mom and dad are horrible.
You knew these people were never going to make this easy.
They start complaining that they can't pay us back because they just don't have the money. This is a couple who paid for their food items with EBT and then pulled out a stack of hundreds to pay for everything else. Mom was just bragging on her new Samsung about how they just booked a cruise over Thanksgiving to the Bahamas or whatever. Even off-season those things are expensive. Not to mention the three cartons of cigarettes they got and the three cases of beer and the six bottles of wine. I'm talking a three or four hundred dollar total that they paid for with cash. They weren't paying us back.
So my supervisor goes to call for a manager in her office, leaving me with two angry adults and an amused and mischievous child. The mother actually gets in my face and threatens me. I said I was calling the cops because as I said, I'm small and this lady is tall and wide.
That's when daddy throws sonny-jim in the full cart and grabs mama-sue and hightails it the eff outta there. Like Sonic with a lit firecracker up his ass. My supervisor runs out and I tell her what happened. Unfortunately we live in a budding metropolis with a packed parking lot that stays busy into the night and in the twenty or so seconds it took for me to call for her and for her to get to me they got away. I don't know how they did it. I can't imagine it was a quick job loading their stuff. Maybe they just threw it all in along with the cart and peeled off. Who knows?
So there I was sitting in front of our four managers trying to explain what happens and I'm definitely going to be speaking to the cops. In the mean time they are blaming me for this. Officially, on the record, in internal files. I'll probably be fired. I'll probably have to pay for the lost money. Might be accused of stealing. Who knows. Either way I'm about to have a hard time finding a new job.
This right here is why I'm never having kids. Why I don't like kids. Why looking at kids or hearing them actually causes me to cringe. Because kids these days have no discipline. No respect. No morals. They are held responsible for nothing. They are put on pedestals and treated as demi-gods. Their parents are lauded for simply procreating. They become self-righteous and entitled. I don't want to turn into that. I don't want to have a child that turns into that.
The world today makes me so sad.
****UPDATE**** So, things have moved fast, super fast. It's only been two days but we have action. I got good and bad news. The good news is thus: today at noon the mom, dad, and their son came back. They didn't come in to shop, they came in to make things right. They asked if I was there so my manager called me and asked me to come in. I brought my lawyer uncle just in case. We met in the coffee shop attached to the store. They bought everyone coffee and pastries for everyone. There's a story here. Now, they didn't run because the kid ripped up the money.
They ran because of a host of things. Number one being the EBT card they were using isn't there's. They explained they were using the wife's mother's card but her mother didn't know they had it. She only asked if they could after the fact. They also had weed in the car and both of them had been drinking-I didn't smell it though-and so they were afraid they would get arrested. It's almost unbelievable that that is why they ran and I even said so. They offered to replace the money their son destroyed but the manager had already gotten confirmation this morning from corporate that they would be covering the loss so my manager asked that they donate the money to a worthy cause. They agreed and very soon, our local animal shelter-a no-kill/adoption only-will be two hundred dollars richer! They were very sorry and even more sorry that the kid kicked me and made him apologize to me. We all separated on good terms, at least, they and I did.
Now for the bad news. I got fired. After they left my manager informed me that the board doesn't want me back. My uncle is considering suing but I may stop him. I'm just glad everything worked out as well as it did. I know it seems silly not to take action but considering this could have gone worse, I'll take what I can get. Thanks everyone for their wishes over the last two days!