I just visited a nearby CVS pharmacy, and I left glumly reminded
how rampant ignorance is in the world around us.
My visit was prompted by a 30% off coupon I had received by
email. Seemed like a good opportunity to
stock up on stuff. List in hand, I
cruised the CVS aisles, grabbing dental floss, Alka Seltzer, and so on. As I dropped items into my cart, I kept a
rough running total in my head. When I
was done, my estimate came to $70. I
headed for the checkout counter, contemplating with gratification the amount of
money I would be saving.
At the computer/register, I waited a while as the young man
behind the counter apparently had some problem in the transaction with the somewhat
perturbed woman ahead of me. When he was
through with her, I handed the unsmiling fellow (hard to tell his age, but he
certainly was no more than a teenager) my CVS Extra Care card, and proceeded to
pile my selections on the counter. I
watched the mini-screen on the credit card apparatus as the kid scanned the items. Grand total before taxes: $70 and change. Score one for my mental acumen.
Now here’s where
things went wrong. The young man
pointed his handheld scanner at the coupon I had printed out. The scanner failed to read the barcode. Next, he keyed in the numbers printed below the
barcode. Apparently that didn’t work
either, because he picked up a small calculator, and began hitting
buttons. All this in absolute
silence.
On the mini-screen, I saw that my cost reduced to $65. I’m no mental Stephen Hawking, but $70 times
10% is $7 times three is $21. I told the
young man that the discount had to be near that amount, and not $5. He looked at me with barely concealed exasperation. He began re-scanning all my items to un-purchase
them back down to zero, at which point he repeated the scanning until we were
back at $70. No explanation, of
course. Again, the young man picked up
the calculator, and got to work.
I glanced around at the customer waiting behind me. He nodded solemnly. He was in my corner. Finally, on the mini-screen, the discount
showed up as $19 and change. Knowing
that sometimes certain items are exempt from discounts (and to avoid dragging
out the process), I quietly decided “close enough.” I swiped my credit card, and completed the
transaction.
It boggles the mind – my mind at least – that people are hired to handle cash and credit card business when they seem to be, to be kind, clueless. And, what irritated me, as I toted the overstuffed white plastic CVS shopping bag back to my car, was my belief that most people don’t pay attention when they shop. I’m willing to bet the farm that, had that young man been the customer, he’d have headed home carefree and unaware that he’d been gypped of something around $15.
