After the tears
A post at the beginning of the week dealt with my momentary loss of composure. I needed time to consider what had happended before doing the necessary follow up, but circumstances didn't afford me that luxury.
The day after the exertion of power that so upset me we had the flip side of that power on show and the consequences could take weeks or months to work their way out of the system.
As a retail business the most oppressive obligation on our frontline staff and management is that they as individuals (and we as a business) not sell merchandise to persons who are not legally entitled to purchase them. People don't walk around with signs about their neck saying something along the lines of "I'm not old enough to purchase alcohol/cigarettes/butane/lottery tickets/knives/a 12 rated DVD". Far from it.
So whether someone is underage or not becomes a matter of judgement and all the training we undergo urges us in the direction of erring on the side of caution; which is to say if there is in any doubt whatsoever ask to see ID. Our policy is that once ID has been requested if compelling ID is not provided then the sale cannot proceed.
On Tuesday one of my staff asked a rough looking but still quite young looking bloke to provide ID before she sold him the (locally brewed and therefore chemical rich) Fosters he'd brought to her checkout. He had no driving licence, no nothing. No Sale. I happened to be passing and backed her to the hilt. He became abusive. He produce a letter that was a court summons and then claimed to have been born on a particular date. He insisted that the court document was addressed to him although the birthdate of the person being summonsed conflicted with the date he claimed for himself.
Eventually even this particular moron realised he wasn't going to pursuade me to change my position on the sale so he flung the lot (beer, sausage roll and some tins of baked beans) in my general direction and left the store, sadly before I could tell him to take a hike and not show his face again. I thought little more of it after recording the incident in the log book in which we're required to note any such IDings and refusal and abuse.
Imagine my surprise then when not more than ten minutes later I catch the same customer in conversation with my non-friend Blondie, notionally more senior than me. She's listening with sympathy to his tale of woe, of how he's travelled miles to purchase alcohol and a sausage roll from us (as though there are no booze outlets between us and the place he claims to have started out from).
Blondie looked at the letter he was offering her and then asked him if he had anything to connect him to the letter. He produced his electricity card (the electronic card used to top up an electricity meter for those who aren't credit worthy enough to have a contract with the electricity supplier). The card has a surname and initials. It has no photo. There was no absolute proof that the person named on the letter and the person on the card were one and the same. There was no absolute proof that the individual showing her these two documents was the person named.
In other words nothing had materially changed since I'd backed up the operator in refusing the sale. She sent him into the shop to buy his beer with her best wishes.
Needless to say the operator and I have queried this and we're both grateful that we've been backed up by the GM who has confirmed that we were "100% in the right" and Blondie was "100% in the wrong". She's now not talking to me, which in itself is no bad thing. Since the GM has already been made aware of the fact that Blondie's picking on 'Enyo', I'm a little bit fire-proof though the next few weeks could be very, very interesting.
The tears have dried up, though it remains to be seen whether she's capable of being vindictive enough to cause me to spring another leak.
The day after the exertion of power that so upset me we had the flip side of that power on show and the consequences could take weeks or months to work their way out of the system.
As a retail business the most oppressive obligation on our frontline staff and management is that they as individuals (and we as a business) not sell merchandise to persons who are not legally entitled to purchase them. People don't walk around with signs about their neck saying something along the lines of "I'm not old enough to purchase alcohol/cigarettes/butane/lottery tickets/knives/a 12 rated DVD". Far from it.
So whether someone is underage or not becomes a matter of judgement and all the training we undergo urges us in the direction of erring on the side of caution; which is to say if there is in any doubt whatsoever ask to see ID. Our policy is that once ID has been requested if compelling ID is not provided then the sale cannot proceed.
On Tuesday one of my staff asked a rough looking but still quite young looking bloke to provide ID before she sold him the (locally brewed and therefore chemical rich) Fosters he'd brought to her checkout. He had no driving licence, no nothing. No Sale. I happened to be passing and backed her to the hilt. He became abusive. He produce a letter that was a court summons and then claimed to have been born on a particular date. He insisted that the court document was addressed to him although the birthdate of the person being summonsed conflicted with the date he claimed for himself.
Eventually even this particular moron realised he wasn't going to pursuade me to change my position on the sale so he flung the lot (beer, sausage roll and some tins of baked beans) in my general direction and left the store, sadly before I could tell him to take a hike and not show his face again. I thought little more of it after recording the incident in the log book in which we're required to note any such IDings and refusal and abuse.
Imagine my surprise then when not more than ten minutes later I catch the same customer in conversation with my non-friend Blondie, notionally more senior than me. She's listening with sympathy to his tale of woe, of how he's travelled miles to purchase alcohol and a sausage roll from us (as though there are no booze outlets between us and the place he claims to have started out from).
Blondie looked at the letter he was offering her and then asked him if he had anything to connect him to the letter. He produced his electricity card (the electronic card used to top up an electricity meter for those who aren't credit worthy enough to have a contract with the electricity supplier). The card has a surname and initials. It has no photo. There was no absolute proof that the person named on the letter and the person on the card were one and the same. There was no absolute proof that the individual showing her these two documents was the person named.
In other words nothing had materially changed since I'd backed up the operator in refusing the sale. She sent him into the shop to buy his beer with her best wishes.
Needless to say the operator and I have queried this and we're both grateful that we've been backed up by the GM who has confirmed that we were "100% in the right" and Blondie was "100% in the wrong". She's now not talking to me, which in itself is no bad thing. Since the GM has already been made aware of the fact that Blondie's picking on 'Enyo', I'm a little bit fire-proof though the next few weeks could be very, very interesting.
The tears have dried up, though it remains to be seen whether she's capable of being vindictive enough to cause me to spring another leak.
posted by Enyo @ 12:08 am
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