I will teach my child arithmetic.

20Jul08

This gifted child could replace an army of baristas.

This child is a future barista of the month.

The teenager at Starbucks just rang up my order. I pulled out a twenty dollar bill before realizing I also had a ten. “Oh, actually,” I said casually, and tried to hand her the ten to do the switch.

“Sorry, I already rang you up,” she said, with the cash register still open – and handed me back a ten, some singles and some change.

Filed under: Tips | 7 Comments
Tags: fatherhood, life skills, starbucks

7 Responses to “I will teach my child arithmetic.”

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1 mtaterskt738 on July 21, 2008 said:

This is one of my pet peeves as well. There is no reason that kids should not be able to figure this out. I was taught at a young age how to give change and to figure money. I was running my parents fruit stand by 10 years old while they stocked the carts and carried things around. I mean I know occasionally you can get confused and it may be a problem but there’s no excuse for what happened to you.
2 jhoetzl on July 21, 2008 said:

I love handing people change after the sale is rung up! I especially like it when they refuse and tell me the register won’t let them change the amount after it is rung up. And the ever confusing “you gave me more money then the total” comment I got just this past weekend…
3 bloggingmom67 on July 21, 2008 said:

That has happened to me before. It’s bad enough the kid doesn’t know how to do math without the cash register doing it for him or her, but the fact that he or she would find it OK to tell a customer “already rung it up” says something else.
4 jaredhoylman on July 21, 2008 said:

I know that once I got into high school it was required to have a calculator in math class. I’m betting these days even junior high and elementary kids are reqired to have calulators. Hell, they all have cellphones (a totally different post)…with calculators on them.
5 iamsamiam on July 22, 2008 said:

I’m so with you on that – can’t people think for themselves anymore?! Think of the register as a guide, people!

Did you ask her how much the register added magically for a tip?
6 gardenqueen on July 22, 2008 said:

Not that the kid couldn’t be mathematically challenged, but they’re required to enter the amount you give them into the cash register. He would have been required to cancel out the sale and re-enter it. Working retail is a pretty thankless job. Maybe cut the kid a little slack.
7 Invisible Flan on July 22, 2008 said:

I’m a teenager who works at a coffee shop and I have to say while I wouldn’t have been confused by you, I am very often confused by those who give me something like sixty-three cents extra in change after I’ve already rang them up for $8.95 and they’ve handed me a ten. Often, customers can be ridiculous as well as employees. Time to pull out the calculator (especially when there’s five impatient customers in line). I think the idea behind the cash register change-ness is efficiency. Sadly, doing arithmetic in one’s head takes time, especially when one works at a large chain like Starbucks.