Showerthought: That time the self-checkout ate my $20 bill and I just stood there like an idiot.

I was at the Target on 42nd Street last Tuesday, tried to pay with cash, the machine sucked in my twenty and then froze with a red screen, and after two minutes of staring at it an employee came over and popped it open and handed me five crumpled ones with a shrug.

3 comments

3 Comments

ward.kim29d agoMost Upvoted

Honestly, this happened to me at a gas station once, but the machine kept the money and gave me nothing back. The clerk just shrugged and said "system glitch" like that was supposed to make me feel better. Tbh I don't even use cash anymore unless I have to.

drewr1529d ago

lol yeah that feeling when you just stare at the machine like it betrayed you. @morgan_king36's tip about snapping a photo is actually smart though, I never thought of that. next time this happens I'm definitely grabbing my phone first before calling anyone over.

morgan_king3629d ago

Yo I feel that pain so hard. What finally worked for me was just calmly asking for a manager right away instead of waiting for the regular employee to shrug it off. At my local grocery store the machines have a little receipt that prints with a code when they mess up, so now I always grab that paper before the employee touches anything. Then I take a photo of the machine screen with my phone too, just in case they try to say it was my fault. The manager came out, typed some override code into the register, and handed me my full $20 back in like two minutes. I still use cash sometimes but I watch that machine like a hawk now, ready to snap a photo the second anything looks weird.