Give the check out assistant a medal and a promotion

Blast my iPad.

What a silly thing to say bluebottle

I give and expect politeness. We are role models to our chldren, so where else will they learn it? Politeness cuts acoss society and both staff and customers shoudn't have to be told not to be rude to one another.

Really? Only if you live in a Utopian PC world, bluebell...

Quite - it's an indefensible position

I've made my point. If others don't agree, that's fine.

I'm certainly not going to spend the rest of the evening/night defending my opinion.

Ana I understood from your posts that you felt the checkout person should shut up and put up.., she was paid to do a job so if people were discourteous she had not rights to challenge .

I am saying that unless people who are not naturally polite are told about it they will go on thinking it's OK to ignore daily good manners.

We train children in school to say hello/good morning/ please/thank you etc.
and many parents expect that and teach their kids that too... when do we stop expecting people to behave like that?

"my only aim (and the job for which I was paid) was to put the customer's items through, ask for the final total and conclude the transaction"

A robot could do that.

I bet people appreciated it if you gave them a smile as well, or exchanged a few words if they spoke to you.

I bet some of them even tried to make the job more pleasant for you by being pleasant themselves and not behaving as if you were just a robot.

And I maintain you were paid to be pleasant too, or at least a bit more than robotic.

It Wasn't intentional rudeness. It's a debatable point whether it was rudeness at all.

No one's saying it's wrong to expect courtesy....

It's probably unrealistic though.

shouldn't

i don't think it is wrong to expect courtesy and to bring discourtesy to the attention of the rude person. Does not matter if i am being paid to do a job or not! Rude is rude!

As a teacher / headteacher I was being paid but I would challenge rudeness from parents/staff etc. Why should a checkout assistant?

Personally I always make a point of looking the assistant in the eye and saying thank you. (just in case anyone's getting the wrong impression)

Of course, nanaej - my point exactly! Courtesy is desirable, but can never be made compulsory, so until we live in an ideal world retail assistants will have to take the good with the bad, or find another type of job.

Ana I have not suggested that good manners, being polite and courteous should be compulsory, just desirable.

There will always be some folk who think they are busier / more important/ plain selfish/ thoughtless/ rude etc and because of that will carry on as they always do!

It may be healthier, but is it compulsory? Should non-communication be forbidden?

The assistants in my local Boots are very helpful, Deeda. If there's no one at the makeup/electrical/etc. counter then the checkout assistants will find someone to help you. I admit it isn't a very large branch, but that's my experience.

I mean at a checkout.

I don't remember ever hearing a customer be rude to an assistant.

I think a small amount of social /human face to face positive interaction at the checkout is healthier that non-communication!

You're jolly lucky, Ana, if you have the impression that most customers are courteous!

Have you shopped in Boots lately Ana ? It's hard enough to find an assistant at all - one who could be bothered to talk to you, or had any knowledge of their merchandise would be little short of a miracle.

But surely it isn't usual? Most customers are courteous, and I would have thought the checkout assistant could have put it down to experience instead of causing a scene.

I have worked as a checkout operator myself in the past - my only aim (and the job for which I was paid) was to put the customer's items through, ask for the final total and conclude the transaction. That was before the advent of mobile phones, but I'm pretty sure it wouldn't have bothered me if a customer didn't exchange chit-chat with me.

Perhaps the assistant would be more comfortable working in Boots, where her customers would be happy to talk to her about their requirements...

I'd probably find her very funny. I would think "daft cow".

Anyway, I'm glad to see that the majority vote, by a large margin, is with the checkout woman, not just on GN, but throughout the land.

How would you like it, jings? Bet you wouldn't like being ignored as if you weren't even there, as if you were of no more account than an inanimate object, while you were trying to do your job – which includes being polite to customers and expecting them to be polite to you.

And, being a human being, a social animal, it probably makes a great deal of difference to the bearability of your job, which is hardly a thrilling one, if the people who stream past you during your shift have a smile for you and possibly even a friendly word or two.

Bluebell is right. Checkout assistants are not automata or slaves to be treated with disdain.