Village Tesco cashiers beg to be allowed to stop asking customers how they are

If your partner can’t be arsed to listen to you, why should she?

Cashiers at the Harold branch of Tesco Express are begging their manager to put an end to the practise that sees them forced to ask every single customer how they are.

“It’s horrible,” said one shell-shocked worker who asked to remain anonymous. “Everyone knows that when someone behind a till asks you that question you either ignore it or grunt out a one-word answer but not here. I don’t know what’s wrong with everyone, except I do, and in the most harrowing detail.”

“I deliberately say ‘Hi, how are you’ with less energy and interest than a dead hedgehog but it makes no difference,” said another employee who also refused to be named. “The floodgates open and the most dreadful tales of misfortune and sexual dysfunction come tumbling out. Sometimes I pretend I can’t scan something just to press the buzzer and get a ten second break from it while I talk to my supervisor about the price of waffles.”

Manager of Harold Tesco Express Paul Watts went on the record to deny that there was a problem.

“I’m very encouraged that villagers want to chat to us after all we are a local store and not some faceless monolith that barged into the community and deliberately undercut all the independent shops until Tesco reigned supreme. We’re not like that at all. Ha ha ha!”

When his slightly manic laughter had subsided the Evening Harold asked why his staff were afraid to be publicly named as critics of store policy and whether there was any truth to the rumour of ‘Tesco Police’ a heavily-armed paramilitary wing of the corporation who roam the country putting in planning applications on any piece of land larger than a shoebox and crushing workplace dissent.

“That’s ridiculous!” exclaimed Watts. “Just because one of every four pounds in the UK is spent at Tescos and we have unstoppably expanded both physically and in areas like banking and video-on-demand does not mean we’re taking over. There is nothing to fear from Tesco – it’s double-plus good.”