Some people love playing pranks on others or purposely acting in a way that makes things a bit difficult for the folks around them. They get a laugh out of their actions and often believe that they’ll never have to face the consequences of what they’ve done.
Fortunately, sometimes they meet their match who treats them the same way. This is what happened when a driver tried to make a tollbooth worker’s shift harder by paying a big toll in coins, only to be severely delayed by the amused employee.
More info: Reddit
People who try to inconvenience others may often find themselves on the receiving end of the same treatment
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The poster had been working at a tollbooth in the days before people used e-z passes, so people had to pay the toll in cash, and one driver brought $5 in pennies and nickels
Image credits: Norma Mortenson / Pexels (not the actual photo)
The driver clearly wanted to waste the tollbooth employee’s time by forcing them to count many coins, but the worker told the guy to wait, or else state troopers would be called
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The poster gave the driver a taste of his own medicine by fumbling with the coins and taking their own sweet time to count everything before handing over the excess change
Every service worker knows that sometimes they’ll meet kind people who understand the demanding nature of their job, and sometimes they’ll encounter difficult folks. The OP clearly knew that the driver only wanted to cause trouble, especially after the man handed $5 in nickels and pennies, thinking it would be funny.
In certain places, people are banned from handing over a certain amount of money in small change. To protect the interests of workers and to save their time, organizations should be clear about whether they are okay with accepting coin payments or require large sums to be paid in notes only.
One of the reasons why the driver probably thought his prank would be funny was because forcing the tollbooth worker to count out coins might have held up the cars behind. Luckily, such stunts have been greatly reduced because of the e-z pass, which is a convenient electronic toll collection method that helps save time.
The other man’s mean practical joke was stopped in its tracks due to the worker’s quick thinking. The OP warned the guy that if he drove off without waiting for the coins to be counted, then the state troopers would be called on him. The employee wasn’t making an empty threat and had told commenters that they had previously called the police on errant drivers.
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The driver couldn’t believe that his plan backfired on him, and he was annoyed the entire time that he was made to wait. The OP also made sure to delay things by knocking over the stacks of coins and starting over a few times. In the end, they justified it, saying that the guy had paid 20 cents extra, so he was lucky he waited.
Although this man may have paid in coins to frustrate the tollbooth worker, this method of payment has actually been used as a form of protest before. A man called Joe Schmidtlein paid his property taxes in coins because he was frustrated at how high the amount kept on rising. It was his way of ‘sticking it to the man.’
The poster also assured people that their act of petty revenge toward the driver did not delay any other folks. Since it was a slow day, it was completely fine to hold up the man’s car and make him face the consequences of his silly prank.
The job of toll collectors is steadily on the decline due to faster electronic payment and processing options. Despite that, this story really shows how important it is to respect the time and effort of any and all service workers and not to make their jobs harder through our actions.
Do you agree with the tollbooth employee’s actions, or do you think there would have been a better way to handle this interaction? Do share your thoughts down below.
People were extremely satisfied by the toll worker’s petty revenge and felt that the driver deserved it
Image credits: roman_babakin / Freepik (not the actual photo)
