Ah yes. The Supermarket Line PIN Amnesia Syndrome. A very real, very documented medical condition that strikes exclusively at checkout counters, never at home, never in the queue, only the moment the till lady says “Fifteen hundred and forty shillings” and stretches out her hand like she’s about to receive a Nobel Prize.
Here’s how it always plays out:
Minute 1: Person ahead of you pulls out phone with the confidence of someone who has done this a thousand times. Dials *334# like a concert pianist. You relax. This will be quick.
Minute 2: The menu loads. They stare at it like it’s the Kenyan constitution. “Send Money… no… Pay Bill… no wait…” Sir/Madam, you are not defending a thesis. Just pick one.
Minute 3: PIN time. And suddenly — SUDDENLY — this grown adult who has used this SIM card since 2014 cannot remember four digits. Four! Not their KRA PIN. Not pi to ten decimal places. Just four digits they typed six hours ago to buy airtime.
They try once. “Wrong PIN.” They try again, slower this time, like typing gently will jog the memory. “Wrong PIN.” By the third attempt, they’re basically praying over the keypad, eyes closed, lips moving. The queue behind them has now formed its own micro-economy: someone’s checking Instagram, someone’s mentally reorganizing their fridge, a toddler has started crying out of secondhand embarrassment.
Minute 5: New plot twist: “Ah, let me just move money from my bank app first.” Now we’re switching apps. Loading spinner. Fingerprint fails twice because their thumb is sweaty from the PIN trauma. They finally get in, initiate a transfer, and then, plot twist of plot twists, “It says processing.” Sir. Ma’am. We are not processing a mortgage. We are buying sukuma wiki and two Cokes.
Minute 7: The transfer finally lands. They go back to the till line, re-dial *334#, and start the PIN saga ALL OVER AGAIN like it’s their first rodeo.
By now the cashier has aged visibly. The ice cream you bought has become soup. Somewhere, a manager is being paged for “till 3 emergency,” and it is not an emergency; it is just Kevin who forgot his PIN.
And this, honestly, is why I want to gently — GENTLY — grab people by the shoulders and ask: why not just pay directly from your KCB Mobile app? One app. No bank-to-wallet Olympics. No *334# interpretive dance. No PIN spiritual crisis in front of eleven strangers and a toddler. Just open, scan or select till, confirm, done, while the rest of us are still queuing, aging gracefully, questioning our life choices.
Save common cents. Save the queue’s sanity. Save Kevin from becoming a supermarket legend for all the wrong reasons.
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