Today I went to Vons Supermarket in Inglewood. I decided, after some deliberation, to buy a large pack of Decaf English Breakfast Tea and a bag of lemons. When the checkout guy rang me up, it showed $3.99, and I was certain that the price I saw was under $3.00. He returned my items, so that I could price-check the tea with a high school girl working there named Taylor.
When Taylor and I arrived at the tea, she was unable to locate a price tag for the tea I wanted to purchase. The only price tags present were for similar products of tea, and they all read $2.99. We both concluded that this was a store error, because Decaf English Breakfast was not mentioned on the price tags, only Decaf Green Tea, of which there was none. As we both walked back to the check out cashier, I remarked to her that this dollar I would be saving could feed a family in Africa.
Upon arriving at the checkout guy, his friendly demeanor had changed dramatically, and he was only willing to ring it up at $3.99. While I had the patience to get a price-check, I was becoming irritated at this point, and verbally announced my disapproval at the way the checkout guy was shoving me off. He told me to go over to Aisle 7, where I was greeted with a patient Vons worker, who seemed to be a Veteran of the store for several decades.
When she ringed up the item at $3.99, I explained what Taylor and I had concluded, and even showed her a picture on my phone that I took of the $2.99 signs. At that point, probably sensing that I was becoming irritated, she calmly did an override and dropped the price to $2.99. Feeling a victory of my $1.00 savings, I impulsively gave the extra dollar to Child Cancer Research, essentially throwing away my gain in an act of Bravado.
Next time I am faced with a challenge that tries my patience, I hope to be more steadfast in my demeanor throughout the entire transaction, and have a firmer grip on the saddle of my emotions.
