DictionaryAI

cashier

Sayka-SHEERUS/kæˈʃɪɹ/UK/kəˈʃɪə/

Pluralcashiers

Verbcashiers, cashiering, cashiered

6 meanings of cashier

Practice

  1. 1
    nouncountable
    A person who works at a till or receives payments from customers.

    The cashier counted out my change and handed me a receipt.

    She trained as a cashier before moving into a management role.

    Similarchecker, clerk

    Note

    The cashier of the supermarket express lane comes from French caisse, by way of Dutch cassier or French caissier. The title names whoever takes the money at the point of sale. The bank or business officer who is in charge of the money once it is in carries the same title, and context tells the two apart.

  2. 2
    nouncountable
    The person responsible for managing the cash and payments of a business or bank.

    The cashier reconciled the day's takings against the ledger before locking the vault.

    As the firm's chief cashier, he authorized every payment over a thousand dollars.

    Similartreasurer, bursar

  3. 3
    verbintransitive
    To work at a till taking payments from customers, as one's job.

    He cashiered through college, ringing up customers every evening.

    They cashier at the market during the busy summer season.

    Note

    The noun turned back into a verb, often met as cashiering. Linda Dyer's "A Customer's Rights" in The New York Times (1983) speaks of "cashiering skills," and Thomas Quealy's M + M (2007) plays on it with "the cashiers never cashiered before." It takes no object, which keeps it apart from the verb of dismissal: someone who cashiered worked a till; someone who was cashiered lost a post.

  4. 4
    verbtransitive
    To discard something or put it aside as no longer wanted.

    The committee chose to cashier the outdated proposal entirely.

    She cashiered her doubts and signed the contract.

    Similardiscard, scrap, abandon, jettison

    Note

    Here dismissal widens from people to things: a proposal or a doubt can be cashiered the way an officer once was. The older picture often stays in view. Tina Brown, writing in 2022, calls the man Diana dropped her "cashiered toy soldier," and the phrase works on both levels: he was discarded, and he was a soldier.

  5. 5
    verbtransitive
    To annul something, rendering it void or no longer in force.

    The court moved to cashier the earlier ruling.

    The assembly cashiered the old statute with a single vote.

    Similarannul, revoke, repeal, rescind, overturn

    Oppositeuphold

Less common meaning

  1. 6
    verbarchaictransitive
    To dismiss someone, especially a military officer, from service, often as a disciplinary punishment.

    The court-martial voted to cashier the lieutenant for cowardice.

    Inevitably his appeals for financial assistance were ignored and, though not cashiered from the army, he was pointedly cold-shouldered by his brother officers.
    2012, Jonathan Keates, “Mon Père, ce héros”
    Note

    A verb of disgrace, not mere dismissal. It came through Dutch casseren from Old French casser, "to break," and a ceremonial cashiering was often marked by literally breaking the officer's sword. It now sounds archaic and turns up mostly in historical writing, as when Colin Jones's The Great Nation (2002) notes that the Directory had not cashiered its police spies. The till-worker noun is a separate word, from French caisse.

Practice

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Origins

Meanings 4–6

From Dutch casseren or kasseren, which came from Old French casser ("to break up"). During the ceremonial cashiering of a ranking military officer, the breakup was often dramatically symbolized by literally breaking the officer's sword.

Meanings 1–3

Borrowed from Dutch cassier or French caissier, from the French word caisse.