The Customer Is Always Wrong

[TehCookie]

I'm at JoAnne's with my parents picking out curtains (yes forced along because someone had to carry bags) and while waiting near a unoccupied register a elderly person asked me where the kids crafts were. I stood there for a minuet waiting for her to at least attempt to look for it before responding "uhh right behind you" where their were 20 kids noisily doing crafts.
Five minuets later I had another woman ask me if she could check out. I just gave her the wtf stare so she repeated her question so I replied in a dry tone "I don't work here" I mean I thought I looked someone odd wearing my long black winter coat and sunglasses in a store (lost my regular glasses) not the dark green apron with JoAnne's embroidered on it.

 

[ffxfriek]

The Necroswanson: I am your new fan club. That is all.

YAY! Being the first you have been promoted to, "Minion Overwatch" status.

Do i get a whip? My last job i only got a small hammer and some encouraging stickers.

Actually you get two. Productivity comes with a whip for each hand.

BEST JOB EVER!!!

may i also join the fan club? i have a whole new respect for you

 

[paiged]

This thread definitely made me smile, I'm glad it reappeared on the front page.

I work at a Cumberland Farms (it's a convenience store with a gas station), and I had a woman come in last summer and right away ask "Do you guys carry soda?".

Even better, I just had a woman two weeks ago screaming at me about her Sunday paper. She came back after five minutes to return it, saying it didn't have half of the inserts. I gave her the money back and apologized, but she continued on, telling me I needed to alert my customers that I was ripping them off, and that we were sabotaging the newspaper by keeping the inserts for ourselves (I need 20 copies of the New York Times book review for sure), that she was going to report us to the company, and ended her argument by shouting THIS IS NOT EUROPE THIS IS AMERICA!

 

[bmf185]

This felt pretty good the other day so I thought I'd share.

There's this guy who is in one of my majors at university so he's in some of the same classes as I am. Anyway, he seems like a total douche and always asks douchey questions, so I have always been wary of his doucheyness without any real proof, and I try not to judge him (it's a new thing I'm trying). However, he came up to the information desk in the course books section of the bookstore where I work holding a brand new 2009 edition Biology book and asked this gem:

"So, like, theoretically, if I swiped a USED sticker off of one of these other books and put it onto this one could I just sell it back to you and make tons of money?"

At this point all five of us desk workers are absolutely relishing in the almost palpable stupidity involved in that statement, but the guy to my right got to him first, saying, "You would look dumb as hell. That's a brand new edition that doesn't have a barcode on it saying that it's used. The people upstairs know this and would call the cops."

The rest of us hadn't stopped laughing since the "dumb as hell" part, and he left red-faced mumbling under his breath.

It's good to know that if it walks like a douche and quacks like a douche...well it's probably a douche.

 

[ffxfriek]

The Necroswanson: I am your new fan club. That is all.

YAY! Being the first you have been promoted to, "Minion Overwatch" status.

Do i get a whip? My last job i only got a small hammer and some encouraging stickers.

Cato'ninetails is better than a whip in my opinion.

i liek your thinking

 

[Calax]

At gamestop I've had a lady threaten to toss her PS3 through our front door because she thought it ate her game (which her children had put back in the box... She didn't check the logical place obviously)

I've also had people beg to return crappy PC games when our return policy clearly states that PC games can only be returned if the thing is busted for the same item.

Meanwhile at McDonalds I got suspended for responding to a customer with "I'm sorry, we don't sell time here." as a joke. (My standard greeting was "what can I get for you?" and half the time people responded "Just a moment please")

 

[Cid Silverwing]

OP: You got that off of http://notalwaysright.com/ right?

I don't really have a story to tell but imagine this scenario - Video game store with a crapload of any 7th generation console + a pile of launch titles set next to it (that could only attract more attention if associated producer of the console had a booth there). Customer walks right up to the desk, ignoring all the fat advertising and everything that points to where said consoles and games are, and asks "Where's the [console]?"

 

[090907]

i had a customer today ask me if i could sell him two promoted "half price" items and invoice him for one at full price... i said no... He went on to argue with me over it, and demanded to see the manager, I called him out on the intercom, and before the boss came out he said that he was going to claim it from petty cash in his office, but they had only approved purchase of one... my reply was "Gaining advantage through deception. My last boss was fired and charged for it." he shut up and bought both items.

 

[astaldodhol]

I used to work at a post house driving parcels to people, it is a service that's here in Iceland.
Anyway, I used to get the question ''Do you work at the post house?'' a lot, when I was wearing the Post-Office jacket and delivering parcels. I always wanted to reply with ''No. I just enjoy delivering parcels to people''

 

[cheesecake123]

3 times things happened at a mcdonalds in cleethorpes all on seperate days but they are about the people working their(just to make it clear as it may be seen as a very crap restruant place building)

1) i went there with my mum and step dad. we go through the drive-through and as we go around the corner to the exit we see a car just parked in the middle of the lane we waited several mins hoping that the driver would notice us and kindly move. a few minutes now and my mum leans across and presses the horn on the car and beore we knew it an old man came out of the car storming towards us he explained that the the parking spaces you have if your order isnt ready were full so instead of parking in the normal spaces and go inside he decided too keep everyone waiting (what an idiot)

2) (i feel really bad about this as we probably appeared to be scammers or something resusulting in someone getting the sack) i was with my mum step dad and brother and we were all sat inside ready to enjoy a meal. we got our food sat at a table opening the boxes we realised that the food was cold we asked if we could have another burger(as we know nobody likes a cold burger). 5 burger latter yay warm food and then we were on our way.

3) another time we went and we went through the drive-through again (no idiots in cars this time woot). anyway we ordered our food and were instructed to park in the special spaces (i forgot their offical name ok i think their service bays or something like that) waited what felt like 20 mins (probablly wasnt) a worker comes out gives us our food and ALL of or money back because we waited so long (aww bless).

 

[Acid Armageddon]

I work at a convenience store in the small town of hemlock, new York. Now to understand my predictament you must know 4 things.

1. Hemlock is one of the most redneck, ghetto towns in all of New york.

2. I work the night shift, which is usually 5 PM to Midnight.

3. I usually am alone in the store during the evening shift.

4. The store is situated across from a bar.


Now this bar, it seems to be the ONLY thing people do with their lives in this town. Every Saturday night, it;s packed and you can hear the sound of the TERRIBLE karaoke that is occuring just behind the bars (thankfully) closed doors.

The bar, however, does not control customers. I have had 2 very drunk people come into my store, one left her shirt and money in the bathroom, while another one rolled around crying on the floor.

One night I had a gentleman come in, and after about ten minutes, he yells out "WHERE ARE THE FUCKING CONDOMS?" I tell him that we are out (which we were) and he reacts by shouting "Great! What the HELL am I going to do now?"

Thats just a few of my encounters on the job, which I havent even been at for one year yet.

I am truly saddened by people....

 

[Talendra]

I used to work in retail, though it is mostly a blur, tuning out was the best way to deal with it *nods*.
However I just back from a client having trouble with her internet, who also scheduled the electricians to install new power points at the same time, since laptops don't need power and all. Pitty modems still do.. Though I did change a few settings on the computer that looked wrong, and fingers crossed it works when the power comes back on or I have to make another trip over *sigh*.

 

[GrimRox]

I work at a convenience store in the small town of hemlock, new York. Now to understand my predictament you must know 4 things.

1. Hemlock is one of the most redneck, ghetto towns in all of New york.

2. I work the night shift, which is usually 5 PM to Midnight.

3. I usually am alone in the store during the evening shift.

4. The store is situated across from a bar.


Now this bar, it seems to be the ONLY thing people do with their lives in this town. Every Saturday night, it;s packed and you can hear the sound of the TERRIBLE karaoke that is occuring just behind the bars (thankfully) closed doors.

The bar, however, does not control customers. I have had 2 very drunk people come into my store, one left her shirt and money in the bathroom, while another one rolled around crying on the floor.

One night I had a gentleman come in, and after about ten minutes, he yells out "WHERE ARE THE FUCKING CONDOMS?" I tell him that we are out (which we were) and he reacts by shouting "Great! What the HELL am I going to do now?"

Thats just a few of my encounters on the job, which I havent even been at for one year yet.

I am truly saddened by people....

You should have told him to whack one out...

 

[Aedwynn]

I have a couple of stories. One of which is truly foul, and so I won't post it without a request.

...

Sod it, I'm gonna post it anyways, apologies in advance to any squickable people out there!

I used to work the night shift in a Travelodge (Chain of cheapish hotels) and I was no stranger to weird, obnoxious, rude or just irritating people that anyone who works in any public-serving role gets every day;
Like the customer who demanded use of our private staff office as she was due to be on a radio show that evening.
Also, the people who accuse you of stealing or short-changing them and DEMAND the police to be called - when the police arrive these people are usually discovered to have drugs on them and are promptly arrested. (You would not BELIEVE how often this happens!)

But, my story;

We booked in two young lads one night. They left their bags in their room and went out clubbing (I presume). Nothing wrong there. Business as usual.

Later that night (Well, about 4 a.m. - I worked 10pm to 7am) I find one of these lads trapped in the fire escape, a one-way door; you can exit via them - but you can't get back in without a pass. Again, this does happen depressingly often, no matter how many big red signs you have on the damn doors!
So, I open the dorr to let him out, when I see a puddle of water on a lower flight of steps. That's odd, maybe a leak somewhere. I push past the lad to have a look. The kid didn't respond - he looked out of his mind and his pupils were dilated.
Shutting the door behind me (I don't want that guy going anywhere the state he's in) I descend a flight of steps... and find a *mountain* of faeces. I have no idea how a man can produce that amount of waste! Shocked (and realising what the large puddle of liquid must have been...) I run past the lad, who is just beginning to notice my presence, and lock him in, while screaming on the radio for my buddy to come up and take a look at this!

Once the kid had sobered up (we still had him trapped) he started banging on the doors to be let out.
"Fair enough," we said (probably not those exact words), "But you gotta clean up that mess you made first."
"That wasn't me, was it?"
"Well no-one else has been in here!!"

We frogmarched him down the steps and made him look at it. Then told him he either cleans it up (we'd give him the means) or we ring the police. The smell was starting to get pretty bad.

He cleaned most of it up, and I lost the coin-toss to clean the rest. Then I took an empty room and got a long, long shower.
He kept apologising, to be fair. Between asking if he really did do it. (He MUST have... no-one else had been in and it *certainly* wasn't there an hour before we found him.)

We went easy on him. By rights we should have kicked him out and called the police, (he was almost certainly carrying a crapload of illegal drugs - no pun intended) but we just frogmarched him back to his room and told him to forget it. He started offering us money and crying after a while. I kinda felt sorry for him.

Anyways, that's my story of customer hell! Hope you enjoyed it as much as I didn't when it was happening.

 

[Locker420]

Good or bad I am one of those people who can't stand to see wait staff, clerks and other service people being abused by idiots. Additionally I'm a pretty big guy, 6' (1.8 meters) and about 230 lbs (16.4 stones) and hyper, so I anger quicky and don't think sometimes when I get going.

Two quick stories from the past come to mind:

1. I'm working in Tulsa, Oklahoma (yea yea I know) and I'm done with my week's assignment and ready to fly back home. I get in an excruciatingly long line at the American Airlines ticket counter to check in, tag my bag and get on the plane. The queue is tremendous, over 100 people and fills up an entire airport wing.

After being in line for a few minutes I start to hear some sort of rukus from the front of the line. As people begin to pay attention the noise gets louder and louder. I take a look and see a middle eastern type gentlemen with a few others in tow. He's got a gigantic pile of suit cases, trunks and the like piled in front of the counter and he is literally screaming at the top of his lungs at the poor girl at the ticket counter.

At this point no one is really doing anything but the guy isn't stopping, just getting worse. At this point he starts cursing (badly) at this girl calling her a whore and a ***** and the like, this is where I've had just about enough. From the very back of the queue across all those people I yell at the guy:

"Hey! You! Leave her alone!"

Now not only the guy turns towards me, mouth hanging open but every single person in the queue turns around as well to look at me. The exchange follows

ME Guy (yelling): "You shut up! I'm not talking to you!"

Me (yelling): "Well I'm talking to you and this is United States. You can't treat people like that now you leave her alone!"

ME Guy (yelling): "You shut up! I will kill you!"

Now it's on. My backpack gets slammed down, my suitcase goes flying and I'm coming at this guy at a very quick walk RIGHT through the queue. The cool thing is for the first several rows of queue I had to duck under the stretchy tape they use to form the line. By the third row I had other passengers holding the tape up for me all the way to the front.

Two seconds later I'm standing right in front of this guy and I'm about 2mm from his nose. The funny part to me is that I have to bend over to get face to face. The guy is about 5'4 and fairly wide.

Me (talking but pissed): "Leave. Right now or there is going to be some serious trouble."

The guy's traveling companions are already pulling the bags away and seeing as I might drive him into the ground with one shot the guy backs off, red faced and leaves the area. I go back to the end of the queue, retrieve my bags all to a serious applause from the other folks around me.

When I get to the front of the line I end up with the same girl who was initially being abused. Come to find out the guy's problem was the fact that the entire section of the airport, including the queue was for American Airlines and the guy and his companions were booked on US Air (completely different airline). The woman explained this to him but this buckethead insisted that they check him in anyway and wouldn't leave.

She must have thanked me for the entire time it took to process my ticket.

2. Similar story but different circumstances. A buddy and I are in Safeway (grocery store) one day to purchase some beer. Now bear in mind this guy is even bigger than I am. Ex UC Davis football lineman who stand about 6'6'' and tops 300lbs easy.

We find the cooler, grab our selection and make our way to the express (10 items or less) line. In front of us is a scruffy looking guy and his girlfriend with a shopping cart containing about 24 individual 40oz bottles of Colt 45 malt liquor. The whole time we are in line this guy is grabbing on his girlfriend roughly and bitching at her for griefing him about the beer.

They get up to the check out girl who immediately tells the guy "I'm sorry sir but this is the 10 items or less line you'll have to move to another line". Of course the guy goes off his rocker about how it's all beer and should be a single item even though it's 24 individual bottles. The woman apologizes but asks the guy to move for the second time. Now he's really mad and say something similar to:

"Look here you fucking ****. Ring up my forties right now or I'm going knock your fucking teeth out"

Well that was it. I looked at my mate, he looked at me and we went after this guy. He got one arm and I got the other, we jerked that fool right off his feet and escorted him towards the door. Unfortunately for him we were moving too fast and the automatic door opener was slightly delayed causing his forehead to bounce violently off the glass as we slammed him into it once, to send the point.

Once we got him out side we sent him flying into the parking lot, all while his girlfriend follow us laughing at him and talking shit the whole time. Going back in the manager of the store tried to give us our beer for free after helping out his cashier.

It was a good day.

 

[Haliwali]

Snip

Well, look at that. Decent people. Never thought I'd see the day...

Also, I nominate that this thread be stickied.

 

[Spleenbag]

As soon as I start working retail somewhere around here in a couple years (14 years old at the moment, in Southern California) I am sure to have something to contribute to this thread if it's still around. I hope everyone with a shitty story here found something equally pleasant soon after whatever ordeal they went through. I salute you, brave clerks and cashiers!