Depends if his supervisor was around to swap out drawers and if he made request earlier and also it was the holiday season they could have been busier. But the press shouldn’t be whining about it in the first place.
It depends on the store. While I've never been to one of these stores, every convenience store (and some small grocery stores) have individual "money drops" where the cashier simply puts cash in an envelope, writes up a receipt for the till, and drops it in. No management involvement at all.
Mark