Karma in action.

… This woman was having trouble with her card out at the pumps, and came in with an attitude.  Before I could even say “HI”, she says to me “What’s the problem out there at your pumps?”  Instead of saying that 9 times out of 10 it’s the proverbial ID-10-T error, I blamed it on the  weather, and cheerfully offered to run it pre-pay at my register.  Attitude still intact, (apparently I was suppose to mystically fix the problem at the pump), she agreed and we ran her card.

… “Credit Card Declined”.  In this case, the most beautiful words I’d seen all day.  Usually I don’t like to see those words.  It makes the customer unhappy, makes me uncomfortable and I hate explaining that I have no idea why the card was denied and, no, I can’t change it.  But I have to admit, making an arrogant person eat crow feels good.  Especially when you can do it in a customer-service appropriate way.