‘I would cry’: Drive-thru worker says customer paid him $14.56 in change
A fast food drive-thru employee posted a viral TikTok showing he wasn't exaggerating when he said some customers pay for their orders entirely in change.
While one could hardly be mad at someone who pays in coins for something that's a couple of dollars at most, Zay (@zaydamod) shows a pile of change he received in the drive-thru for a $14.56 order—and he didn't seem too happy about it in his clip.
@zaydamod ♬ original sound - Zay 🧸
Zay records himself at his place of work as cars slowly pass by outside through the drive-thru window. He points down to a large stack of various coins, stating, "Now this the sh*t I be talking about. B*tch just came to the window and gave me $14.56 in change."
One commenter didn't appear to sympathize with the fast food employee's plight, writing, "Stop complaining it's not hard to count."
Someone else said they don't even take the time to properly count the cash when they receive all change payouts like this, sharing, "I just put it in the register and go about my day."
However, Zay said that doing so is a surefire way to ensure that the balance of the register is off.
"That’s how your stuff be short," he replied.
Another TikTok user commented that they couldn't believe there were customers who did this.
"Ppl like that scare me no shame whatsoever," they said.
Other fast-food workers held a similar opinion as Zay's when it came to customers paying for their items with all change.
"Everytime people give me change as a way of payment, I die inside slowly but surely," a user wrote.
For many Americans, paying for items with cash may be their only option. According to a 2019 Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation survey, there are some 7.1 million US households that don't have a bank account. For some, it's because they don't have enough money to keep a sufficient enough balance so that they don't incur extra charges or overage fees.
But according to the Federal Reserve, there is no legal mandate that states a business must accept coins as a form of payment for its goods and services. Meaning that if a business chooses to do so, it could reject an all-coin or even cash payment from a customer.
Mashed penned a piece delineating some of the reasons why fast-food employees dread whenever customers pay for their orders in all change. One reason, it makes it difficult for them to reconcile their cash register balances. Others said they've suspected adult customers of purposefully doing this during busy periods in hopes the cashier won't realize that they're being shortchanged.
Overall though, paying in all change takes more time to process an order, which ultimately defeats the purpose of "fast food."
The Daily Dot has reached out to Zay via email for further comment.
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