Death By Supermarket
12Apr2006
Do you ever have that situation where you don’t have enough cash to buy lunch, but feel embarrassed paying for a $5 sandwich with a credit or debit card? I experienced that today.
I hate paying small sums by debit card. Why?
- It really annoys me when other shoppers in front of me pull out a credit card, so if I did it I would probably annoy the people behind me
- It generally holds up the entire queue whilst the card transaction is being processed. The stares you get for pulling the card in the first place are intensified when the checkout assistant cannot key the numbers fast enough, or the transaction takes an eon to be approved
- It’s just not very efficient. You should always carry enough cash to cover your lunchtime purchases
- Don’t even talk to me about people who write cheques…
So to avoid the issue of holding up the express queue, or walking the 5 minutes down the road to the ATM machine, I thought it would be better to ‘justify’ the use of the debit card by doing some general grocery shopping as well as buying lunch. Big mistake. I mean massive. Almost as big a mistake as believing Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.
Doing general grocery shopping at lunch is pure 100% mayhem. Everyone around you is operating according to one of their three mission objectives:
- Select the lunch target
- Acquire the lunch target
- Exit the situation with the lunch target in hand with minimal collateral damage
Add in the variable that Friday here is a holiday and the shops are closed means that the drive to complete the mission is intensified five-fold.
So wandering around the supermarket browsing the aisles whilst carrying a basket or pushing a trolley is the equivalent of driving a 1-800-RV Rental Winnebago around the streets of Baghdad in the days just before Saddam surrendered – you are likely to get insulted, shot and/or killed within 5 minutes.
And fifty minutes after entering the supermarket, I managed to extricate myself almost unscathed with two bags, vowing never again to do any ‘normal’ shopping at lunchtime. Until the next time I don’t have enough cash in my pocket for my lunchtime sandwich…
I have never been to bramuda, but paying with a card here is so quick it usually is faster than cash. The US gov and the corperations can’t get your money fast enough. And you just said that peole that use their cards buy more, so the process is getting faster.
I despise debit cards and everything they stand for. The reason may be because my bank doesn’t shut the card off when account balance is low or zero. No no, they love to wait until you have $150 in overdraft fees. I currently am $350 in the hole and considering cutting up my debit card. If only it wasn’t so damn convienient.
Instead of holding up a queue with a card during lunch rush hour, I held the line by counting change for an iced coffee. It’s too bad I’m addicted to the sweet sweet cup of caffine, the whole situation could have been avoided.
So don’t be too frustrated with card users, you know your in trouble when there’s a change counter in front of you. Or worse yet, you are the change counter.
i hear ya…try buying a latte with a debit card. i did it once and all of a sudden was overwhelmed with the fear that secret police would take me away for being a remarkable combination of unprepared and lazy.
Wow. I use the credit card for everything, and I mean that literally. I buy a $1.80 tea with the credit card. Why? Frequent flier miles, easy accounting, no need to keep going to the ATM, …
I hardly ever carry cash… which lead me to purchase a 2 dollar Protein Bar at a gas station by Debit Card. One thing I hate is when places have a “miniumum limit”… they really can’t do that by their Merchant Agreement with Credit Card companies. VISA and MASTERCARD require that , in order to take their cards, you as a merchant cannot set a “minimum limit”. I’m always annoyed but I never do anything about it.
have you tried to have your sandwitch “on your account”? meaning you come back one day to pay for it, or you might one day add a big positive balance there that you deduct little by little.
France seems to operate in 17th century “Trust” and “Credibility”, I actually have accounts in several neighbourhood bars and grocery shops.
After working retail for quite some time, I can tell you that TONS of people use their credit and debit cards for amounts less than $5. Even less than $1, which I think is weird, but whatever. And maybe it is faster in the States, I don’t know. I’ll admit, I do it. But I would rather have the cash to spend – it’s much better. But if you use your debit card, you can usually get money back if you want, and that boosts your amount up AND gives you cash so it won’t happen later that day. Maybe you can’t get cash back in Bermuda?
Now I feel like a cheapskate for only leaving a few words here.. but must be humourous photo of the day award.
Classic! Welcome to the holiday madness that is the “Good Thursday” grocery shop. The great codfish riots of 2006! I actually saw someone once buy a newspaper on their debit card. Wow.
I had some remorse when I used a credit card for a 9Euro bill at the supermarket… And I thought that cackles from two ladies behind me had something to do with that..
But, shadows of remorse went away when I reminded myself that
it was not my credit card! I still got to keep my change;)
Besides, after the change of national currency to euro (we too joined the EEU)things cost too much for the change in the pockets and less than a “decent” amount for a credit card. And I try to keep myself from creating decent bills because they do not respond to equal purchases anymore – it’s sad to see three numbers before the decimals.. Credit cards seem convenient to me too but here it is usually slow as well.
ATMs with 50E for a cup of coffee aren’t a good idea either…
i understand your pain of the frenzied pre-public holiday shop. i used to work in a grocery store and people would go absolutely nuts the day before the holiday. seriously, we are shut for one day guys. you are NOT going to starve. now, you’d think that because i work in an electrical goods store, i wouldnt have to deal with that. right? wrong! today (being saturday here in aus) my store was an absolute orgy of chaos! omg! we were shut for one day. one whole day. OMG YOUR ELECTRICAL APPLIANCES WILL NOT DIE PEOPLE!!! GAH!
hmm. i think im done. sorry to hijack.
ana: Wow… I’m jealous. I thought that the days of honest to goodness credit were over.
thumbtack: Orgy of Chaos? Ha! I love that description!
Tom: I know your pain… anytime I’m at the grocery store just to pick up a couple of things and it ends up not amounting to much (and I know I’m going to pay with plastic) I end up buying more than I wanted to, just to I won’t be “that guy” that you’ve been talking about.
)
(Sorry for cramping your style by responding to some of these posts.
Still… I hear you have two bags with ya
Paul
Here (Can) everyone uses credit..noone cares the amount. Least of all the people behind you in line. It is the people (mostly little old ladies counting out change) that throws people into fits of tongue smacking, foot tapping,and eye rolling. It actually costs more money to take out of a bank machine most times. See…You are always politically correct somewhere.
Thanks for all the comments – here are some answers:
- frequent flier miles/bonus points – I wish.
- cash faster than a card – not when the checkout lady is too short to reach the numbers on the card swipe machine
- minimum limits on ATM card purchases – I hear you! That is always such a pain…
- accounts – the only place you can really have a tab here is in a bar, and when you see your monthly statement/invoice it’s enough to stop drinking…almost
- cash back – not very common/available here
- codfish riots – they are coming!
as a general rule i try not to make credit card transactions on small purchases, but sometimes i don’t have cash on hand and have to use my card anyway…. and really it’s no big deal, to be honest.