GORDON LIGHTFOOT | Local
YES OR NO
Chloe Jamieson, a 21 year old checkout operator at New World Botany, was left physically and emotionally drained this morning, after what should have been a very brief interaction with Prime Minister Christopher Luxon.
The part time employee says she was somewhat nervous about serving the prime minister (who was buying an 18 box of Coke Zero) but did not expect the question “would you like your receipt today?” to be such a hard one.
“It isn’t everyday you get to serve the prime minister. I just wanted to keep the whole transaction as normal as possible, you know? Play it cool,” she explained. “The usual stuff like ‘how’s your day been’, ‘it’s been really busy today’, blah blah blah.
“But when I asked him if he wanted his receipt, it was like I’d just asked a bombshell question about some major scandal. He didn’t know what to say. He was trying to dance around the subject, like he didn’t want to somehow put a foot wrong,” said Ms. Jamieson, reliving the ordeal.
“When I’d asked him two or three times if he wanted his receipt, he said something like ‘Look, here’s the situation: you have a receipt for me, but at the end of the day it’s a decision I have to make whether I take it or not’. Like… what!?”
Ms. Jamieson says that after about three minutes of interrogation, she eventually had to cut the conversation with the Prime Minister short, citing the growing queue of annoyed customers forming behind him.
“In the end I just printed the receipt and slipped it into his bag while he wasn’t looking. I did it quickly when he stopped to look at a text message,” said the confused staff member who should be getting paid time and a half for this.
The Prime Minister’s office issued a statement, saying that the checkout operator did the right thing by putting the receipt in his bag, and added that “in the hypothetical situation where she did not give Mr Luxon the receipt, then the proper steps would be taken to come to a resolution that would be acceptable to the people of New Zealand”.
More to come.
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