Weird stuff at Lowes

[EightFingers]

Went to Lowes today and at the register paid using a gift card and the remainder would be put on my Visa. For some reason unknown to me, they couldn't run my card. At first they said it was expired (it expires this December), then they said the amount was too small (8.20), to put on a charge card. After several other attempts, I finally just paid with cash since the line was getting long. So after handing the cashier the cash, she asked me for my phone number...I asked why and they got defensive.
Oh, and my card is a chip card which we tried swiping and inserting.