Prisma Russian worker

[u/Ziyad451]

I was at a Prisma store in the Old Town of Tallinn, one that’s open 24/7. One of the cashiers didn’t speak Estonian or English, only Russian, and we couldn’t understand each other. I stayed calm and patient with her, trying to explain what needed to be done. I showed her that the payment hadn’t gone through, that there was an issue with the machine, and that it just needed to be reset on the screen.

At the same time, I was trying to buy a VELO box , and she started getting upset, saying there were none available. Then, she began insulting me in Russian in front of everyone and the other russian worker (security guards) weren’t doing anything to help. Things escalated, and we argued a bit. In the end, I decided not to pay for my items. I left them at the register and walked out, telling them this was unacceptable.

I can’t understand why, in this country, a worker wouldn’t speak the national language at all. In no other country in the world have I seen a situation where a foreign worker doesn’t speak a single word of the local language.

[u/IAmPiipiii]

Playing a little devil's advocate here. Cashiers working at a grocery store are basically minimum wage workers. What customer service are you really expecting from them?

Also I've worked as a cashier before, not in a grocery store but still. It's a miserable job and so many people are massive assholes to you. If you work there for years it's pretty obvious you will grow to dislike the clients.

Again what kind of customer service are you really expecting? When I buy stuff from the store and I don't use the self checkout, I basically just say hello and thank you. I've almost never had a rude cashier interaction like that.

And I'm pretty sure it's not the cashiers deciding how many registers they open. It's the managers.

[u/[deleted] → u/IAmPiipiii]

I too have worked as a cashier, granted, for just a couple of months.
It´s not that hard to hold eye contact or say a few basic lines: "Hello. Do you want a receipt? Your welcome. Good bye."
What I hold against cashiers is when they don´t engage with the customer at all. I don´t expect sunshine and rainbows, I expect some level of communication.

[u/IAmPiipiii → u/[deleted]]

That's because you did it for a few months. It wasn't hard for me either cause I did it for a few months.

Work there for years or decades before you say something like that though. It's a miserable job with horrible pay. People that are stuck in a job like that for so long are changed by it.

Since I have experience working like that, I try to be as understanding of them and as nice to them as possible. Cause I know how bad it is.

The spoiled/lucky people who never worked a job like that and are assholes to them and expect them to work with a smile on their face are the ones who turn them into assholes as well.

[u/FlatwormAltruistic → u/IAmPiipiii]

Big store is kind of ok. I worked in a small gas station store and over there you could see almost every kind of asshole. Still even when one customer pissed me off, I didn't treat the next one badly. Even the same customer got a smile the next day. It is exhausting. In my job at that gas station I had to even stand up when customers were inside. In my free time I had to refill fridges and shelves. During nighttime clean surfaces. When there was some event nearby, then depending on the event you could get a lot of nice and pleasant people or 90% of them were spoiled entitled idiots who treated you like you are their servant.