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The original was posted on /r/talesfromretail by /u/Gorguf62 on 2023-09-03 16:12:36.

I’m working the service desk at a grocery store. At my store, we do Western Union money services at the desk where someone can send or receive money to/from somewhere else.

I’m in the middle of doing one WU transaction when the guy for this story comes in and gets in line. Before I even start helping him, the guy threw a tantrum over the fact that another customer was waiting by the lottery machine instead of waiting behind him (the guy by lottery said he knew the WU guy was first) so I’m thinking to myself “this is gonna be a fun one.”

I finish the transaction I’m in the middle of and the guy comes up to the desk. He’s says he’s here to pick up WU and hands me a piece of paper with the money transfer number (the number used to look up WU transactions, and the amount he’s picking up.

He’s picking up $7500.00

I turn to my front end manager who’s also standing behind the desk and ask him if I’m even allowed to do that kind of a transaction since I’ve never had one that big before. He texts our bookkeeper to find out and also opens the register where we keep the bulk of the money and starts counting to see if there’s enough in there (I had already done a number of big WU transactions earlier in the day). I take the paper with the transfer number and type it into the computer.

There are no transactions under that number.

I look at the paper and ask for clarity on a couple of the numbers since the handwriting wasn’t that great. I try again, and once again, no transactions come up. As I’m doing that, my manager says there’s not enough in the drawer.

The guy starts arguing with both of us, saying to me the number he was given came from WU and he’s had it for three days and saying to my manager that WU told him he could pick up the money here. I tell him if the number is not in the system, there is nothing I can do about it and he has to call WU. My manager tells him that while we do WU services, that doesn’t mean we’re going to have big amounts of cash just lying around. The guy eventually gave up and left.