Wrong Price

A man is thirsty and stops at a convenience store to get a drink. He has a coffee mug which he keeps in his car to do refills because he knows that a cup of coffee is $1.29 if purchased with a cup, but only $1.09 if one brings and reuses his own cup. Twenty cents is twenty cents, after all. When he gets in the store he decides he also wants some potato chips. There are two sizes of chips, which are marked $1.49 and $1.89. He picks the $1.49 bag of chips and brings both items up to the counter. The cashier says, "$1.09 plus $1.49. That will be $2.58."

"Wrong!" declares the man. Why would the man say that this is wrong?

Answer:

This was an actual situation that I was in. I always keep my coffee mug in the car to get refills of coffee. However, you will note that the scenario described does not say that the man actually bought any coffee, and that was the situation that particular day. I was using the coffee mug to get a refill of soda, the price of which was not $1.09. The cashier made the assumption, as you likely did, that because it was a coffee mug (since that is its main purpose) that it was being used for coffee.

However, if you didn't get it right, and it gives you any consolation, the cashier did worse than you. In this particular store the coffee is self-serve, but the soda has to be dispensed by the cashier behind the counter. So she looked at an empty mug and assumed that it was filled with coffee!

(She's a good soul, though!)