2+2=3

[captpackrat]

Doesn't anyone know how to do simple math anymore?

I went to the fabric store to pick up 3 yards of material ($7.99 a yard) and a package of buttons ($1.75). The material was on sale, 30% off.

So the girl starts ringing me up. They didn't have a cash register, just a calculator and a "cheat sheet" with all the sale prices.

Mistake #1: She looks up the 20% discount instead of 30%. Naturally, I point this out.

Mistake #2: She looks up the 30% discount for $6.99 instead of $7.99. I'm a fairly honest guy, so I point this out as well.

Mistake #3: I'm not sure how she did it, but she ended up with the store paying me $2.something to buy the material. So she has to ask a coworker how to add things up.

Mistake #4: Instead of doing 5.59x3, she types 5.59+3 on the calculator. OK, now this is getting ridiculous. I wanted to get out of there, so I didn't say anything. She's already been corrected 3 times, twice by the customer. If the store was stupid enough to hire someone so incompetent, then they deserve to lose money.

Interestingly, she actually got the tax correct.

So I ended up getting nearly $28 worth of stuff for $11. Yay me!

Comments

[altivo.livejournal.com]

This is why fast food restaurants have cash registers with pictures of the food items on them. Yes, innumeracy is a growing problem in our society. They don't know how to make change either unless the cash register tells them how much to give you.

It is not entirely a new development, however. I remember my grandmother crowing about incidents not unlike yours, way back in the 60s. Once she went to Montgomery Ward to buy a $29.95 item that was on a 10% off sale. The teen-aged sales clerk said "Let's see, $29.95 with ten percent off. That's $29.95 less ten dollars, so it will be $19.95 plus tax." She also kept quiet and just accepted her good fortune. :)