I’ll make this one short and sweet. My girlfriend and I went into Cici’s just planning on getting 2 of the normal $5-some-odd buffet orders. When it came time to pay, I handed the guy behind the counter my debit card, but he pointed me to a swiper device in front of the register, so I assumed this was just one of those things where the customer does all the swiping & PIN entry or what have you, and the cashier would take care of the rest.
Not so.

I swiped my card, and the machine asked me to choose “Withdraw,” “Transfer,” or some other option. Come to find out, the sign sticking up from the back of the machine says that this thing is an ATM, and that whoever provides it charges a $.99 operating fee over and above the amount of each transaction placed with it.
Still a bit confused, I assumed that “Withdraw” was what I wanted, so I pressed that and then I get options of 5, 10, 15, 20, and “More”. Since my total was just over $5, I pressed “More” and “Other” (which showed up on the next screen) which allowed me to enter the exact amount. Oddly enough, the machine rejected the entire transaction when I did this. I asked the cashier about it, and he said I had to pick one of the $5-increment amounts. Grr.

So, grudgingly, I chose “$10″, entered my PIN, and waited for the receipt to print. When it did, the paper started coming out at an angle and then stopped, while the machine started to make a growling sound as it tried to print on jammed paper. I then tried to help it along by pulling on the little bit of paper sticking out, and then it started printing again — but by now, the crucial part of the receipt was mangled beyond recognition. This would have been the part the cashier would have looked at to see how much I had paid, since the ATM receipt acted like a cash voucher. Thankfully, I was able to just tell the guy behind the counter how much I had paid, and he proceeded to process the transaction and give me my change. Whew — close one.

That has got to be the WORST transaction I have EVER had to deal with. I mean seriously, why can’t they accept cards the way normal places do?!

Couple that with the fact that the spigot on the soda fountain that dispensed water had something wrong with it, such that if my cup didn’t completely surround the outlet, it would spray all over the place.

I was ANNOYED, to say the least.
I did fill out one of their comment cards though, so MAYBE the manager will take the appropriate heed to what I had to say.

Oops, sorry, that wasn’t short and sweet like I said it would be. I kinda started getting into it. lol

This entry was posted on Monday, March 30th, 2009 at 15:12 and is filed under Design and Usability, Fails. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.