Your Retail Stories

[Eclipse Dragon]

Retail is an industry that brings out the best and worst of people and supplies some quirky moments.
Whether you're a worker or a shopper, this thread is dedicated to your experiences.

Also feel free to contribute if you have a customer service story, even if it's not in the retail industry.

----------------------------------------
I work in a shoe store.
For a couple months, we'd had problems with one particular shoplifter.
She always stole the ugliest women's shoes in size 8.
It got so bad, we called her "The Crazy Eight Lady".
None of us knew what she looked like because she was careful not to come in often on any one person's shift. One day one of the managers witnessed her stealing, it turned out she was a little 80 year old lady. When the manager moved in to confront her about it, the old lady bolted like some kind of ninja, jumped into her Lexus SUV and peeled out of the parking lot. I can't help but think she must have been some former professional
bank robber/ Olympic sprinter to be able to run like that...

In another story,
I once met a customer who had been in a catastrophic car accident;
the doctors told her she would never walk again.
She hobbled through the doors on her feet with a cane, she bought some new shoes to celebrate the fact she'd proved the doctors wrong.

 

[DarkSeraphim02]

I had a lovely little experience with a blockbuster employee way the hell back in the day.
I had come in, picked a game and went to pay for it. The employee told me there was a late charge on the account for a movie and was saying that until I payed the late charge I couldn't rent the game.

However there was a kink in the employees claim, neither myself or my mother, who's account I rented under, had rented said movie and I knew this for a fact and said as much to the employee, who proceeded to fold his arms across his chest, step back from the computer and tell me to "argue with the computer".
To which I responded "No I'll argue with the guy who puts the information into the computer".

After a few chuckles from the other employees and a brief pause I asked him to tell me the name of the account, turns out he had brought up the wrong account as there was another one on record with the same last name as my mom. He apologized, I said it happens then I payed for the game and went home.

 

[Vault101]

no interesting storys....

I really hate it when I have to "ask" when I want to buy somthing...as opoased to just grabbing it, taking it up to the counter, paying and getting the hell out of there (Ive seen portal 2 "cube" edition rather cheap in EB...but its too high on the shelf

 

[TehCookie]

I met the most bitter salesperson when I went shopping at Borders with a friend (back when it was still in business ;_. I checked out, no problems, my friend went to check out and she used my Borders card since I got the one with the 10% discount. We do this all the time no one ever cared, until that guy. He proceeded to flip out about sharing the card, and it wasn't because it was a policy or something he's saying she's going to steal all my Borders bucks and sharing is bad because it leaves you with the short end of the stick. We quickly finish up and I hand her my keys since I had the better car but she's the better winter driver and he just yells at us as we're leaving, "She's going to steal your car now too!"

I honestly thing he has some trauma happen to him in the past that makes him unable to tolerate sharing.

 

[Dags90]

I honestly thing he has some trauma happen to him in the past that makes him unable to tolerate sharing.

He was probably mauled by Barney, it happens.

I've never really worked an honest job, and most of my retail experiences have been alright. My mom is the worst person on customer service lines. It's bad. She was harassing this AT&T rep because her phone internet wasn't working, saying how "Yes, I checked through the options. I'm not stupid, and I'm not doing it again." Eventually she got rerouted to a manager and they were about to start talking about sending her a new phone that wasn't "broken". I ask her to hang up and let me look at it for a little bit, because I was literally wincing at the way she was talking to the poor person. I had it working in five minutes of checking phone settings. A few weeks later she returned the phone anyway because "the menu system is stupid."

 

[triggrhappy94]

I love these threads, so here a free bump.

I've never worked retail, but I know one of the managers at the local Home Depot. So I may soon have some stories of my own.

 

[ERROR989]

This was when I was trying to register for a Reward System at GAME. I gave him my information, (my name, address, phone number) but when I gave him my Email, it was already taken by someone. He spent ages trying to figure out who took my email, and eventually, I had to make a new Email address to register.