Tips for Customer Service Workers Part 42: My Till is Going Slow

One of my day jobs is in customer service. Sometimes I write about it.

Extract from The Customer Service Workers' Handbook 

Part 42:

My Till is Going Slow 

Potential Settings: Anywhere which uses a single line queuing system, such as fast food restaurants / ticket booths / coffee shops / supermarkets / banks / virtually any retail

Keywords: transaction, inconvenience, technology

Scenario

Your till is taking longer than it should to process a customer’s transaction. There is just you operating the tills, and you have a queue of people waiting to be served. This has happened before and you know it’ll just take a few minutes for the till to kick into life and catch up, so there’s no need to call a colleague or a manager for assistance. But you have in front of you a customer who is having to wait anything up to an extra three minutes for their transaction to be completed, not to mention the line of other customers who are also being affected by this three minute wait.

How can you best deal with this situation?

First things first: Apologise and explain to the person you are serving that the till is being slow. This is easily done by saying, ‘Sorry, the till is being slow’. Most people will accept this and wait patiently, but some may not. The most common customer response to your apology is: ‘It’s okay,’ but you will know by the tone and style of delivery whether or not it really is okay. The main thing to look out for is looseness or tightness.

Looseness: the customer smiles as they say ‘It’s okay’ and they are relaxed enough to lean on the counter with one arm and perhaps even engage you in conversation external to the business you are conducting.

Tightness: everything about the customer is tense, in particular their shoulders, neck and face so that when they say ‘It’s okay’ they do it without opening their jaw.

What to do if the person you are serving is visibly annoyed by having to wait 

Be careful here because the stony atmosphere they are generating might make you talk more and say ridiculous things. A common trap to fall into is to suggest the till is having a bad day. While it’s true that this approach would be welcomed by a friendly and easy going customer – one who might even take personifying the till a step further and say, for example if it’s a Friday: ‘It must be ready for the weekend!’ or if it’s a Monday: ‘It must have had a big weekend!’– a lot of people are just not susceptible to this kind of play acting and will look at you like you’re filth if you even try it.  

Saying ‘Sorry to keep you’: should you or shouldn’t you?

This is a good, although risky, way to phrase an apology. It’s risky because if the person is feeling ‘kept’ already, you will either highlight this feeling inside of them and make them more of an indignant prisoner, or – and this is the hope – they will see the idea that a human keeping another human just by a small delay in the transaction process is ridiculous and they will feel some shame at their behaviour towards you so far. If this happens, they will redden and say, ‘It’s okay’ again, but this time they’ll mean it and you will feel the self-worth shift back into your body.

Note: If your customer is friendly and finding the whole delay process a bit of an adventure, saying ‘Sorry to keep you’ might lead them to exclaim ‘It’s no problem!’ and laugh loudly. This will infuriate the people who are waiting.

Keep your focus on the till or the person you are serving.

Do not catch the eye of the customers waiting in the queue. Most of them will be wearing an expression, and doing things with their body language, chosen specifically to let you know how much you are inconveniencing them right now.

Examples: pursed lips, arms folded, eyes staring directly at you. They will be shifting their body weight from one foot to the other more than they need to because this lets the other people in the queue know how inconvenienced they are right now. There will be at least one person tapping their foot. In some cases, there will be some muttering, including the sound ‘fff’. However, there will be some people in the queue who are fine with waiting either because they are enlightened or they don’t have much on today.  

What to do if the person you are serving isn’t annoyed.

The friendly and relaxed customer will probably be chatting to you as they wait. Be aware that if you indulge in conversation with this person, the people in the queue will think you’re just pissing about. Be sure to interject your chat with serious stares at the till, and even if it’s not necessary consider looking around the back of the till as if you are solving a problem with the wiring.

At last! The till has caught up and completed the transaction.

How the customer exits this situation, and how you bid them goodbye, will depend on their behaviour during the last 3 minutes. If they maintained their annoyance it’s always nice to be extra nice to them in the hope that you will highlight their not-niceness. But don’t hold any hope for this.

You can use ‘Sorry to have kept you’ as you greet each of the customers who have just had to wait. Once again you’ll most likely elicit the ‘It’s okay’ response delivered with or without sincerity.

Your till is now operating as it should.

Congratulations, customer service worker, you can go back to working to full capacity  with maximum efficiency.   


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If you enjoyed that, why not try this previously published extract from The Customer Service Workers' Handbook:

He or she is just not that into you: the disengaged customer - rude on purpose or by accident?