Sometimes, you come across a person who seems to be annoyed by your very existence, for no reason.

So, what would you do if a customer pressed the assistance button, but when you arrived, they claimed they’d never touched it? Would you just acknowledge it and move on? Or would you argue with them over whether they pressed it or not?

In the following story, one self-checkout cashier finds herself in this predicament and gets a complaint after choosing the latter. Here’s her story.

If you don’t lie to the cashier, things go more smoothly.

I run the self-checkout at your friendly neighborhood retail store.

Yesterday was pretty busy, but it always dies down eventually, so I stood in front to see if I could attract customers to my area.

I’m watching as a woman (W) comes through, baby in her arms, 4 items in her cart, and proceeds to check out.

She scans some colored pencils twice, so she calls me over. I cancel the extra, put it in her bag, then go back to my post. Shortly afterwards, I hear the “beep” of a register that’s having some error of some sort.

At first, the woman ignored her.

I go back to her register, and on the screen it says “Help is on the way.” Well…here I am.

M: Hi, what did you need help with?

Silence.

M: Did you maybe press the Help button by accident?

The customer denied pressing the button.

W: No.

M: Okay…well, somehow you pressed the help button.

W: No, I didn’t.

M: …okay, well…somehow the Help button got pressed.

By this point, she was over the woman’s attitude.

W: No, I pressed it earlier when I needed you to take something off. Now it’s saying something about assistance needed.

Her attitude is starting to annoy me, and unfortunately, there’s not really anything I’m going to say that will make this situation any better, so I just remain silent at this point.

W: You know, they should really hire self-checkout people that (incoherent mumble).

When the lady walked off, she headed straight for the customer service desk.

M: I’m sorry?

And she leaves, right to the service desk. Not surprising. Here’s the thing: I’ve gotten compliments from my managers for handling customers better than they themselves would have handled customers.

Sure enough, a couple of minutes later, a manager comes by, and I already know what it’s for. The lady said I was being rude.

I told him what happened, and he basically said that because a customer complained, he had to come by and talk to me about it.

Frustrated, she pressed the button herself.

Afterwards, I had a hunch, so I decided to run a test. I pressed the Help button.

R: CALL FOR HELP?

Then of course there’s the big button to confirm that you do, indeed, want to call for help. I press it.

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R: ASSISTANCE NEEDED. bleep

Which had to have happened AFTER I canceled her extra item, NOT before.

Eek. It seems like the woman did it on purpose.

If you liked that post, check out this story about a customer who insists that their credit card works, and finds out that isn’t the case.

Let’s see what the fine folks over at Reddit think about all this.

This reader suggests just letting it go next time.

Here’s someone who’s had that happen to them at a register.

According to this comment, you should never argue with a customer.

Yet another person who’s dealt with the same error at a self-checkout.

She needs to be warned about her attitude.