Evil customers

[0588kid]

Some customers stand out even 15+ years after my store closed.

My store never did get updated with UPC scanners... we were the only store in town that had to type in SKU numbers. Customers really hated it because SKU errors slowed everything down. I could never figure out why we had to enter the SKU AND the price. Even as fast as I could type the SKUs was no match for the convenience everyone knew at the grocery store and over at K-Mart. Anyway, one day a customer remarked as I was entering SKUs, with surprising venom: "I can't wait until Wal Mart comes to town and runs you out of business!" I'm a 19 year old college kid for heaven's sakes! People are funny. But you know, typing in SKU numbers was truly idiotic and the customer had a point. Wait 5+ years after the competition upgraded to even START to upgrade did in fact represent contempt for the customer and very bad business sense.

But here's the best evil customer story ever. I'm stocking Prestone to the top shelves in automotive... up on those cool rolling ladders. Anyway, from up there I can see the whole store. Just a few feet away from me I see a strange scene... an adult trying to drag a screaming brat INTO the toy dept. Not out of. Into!

"Let's look at the toys!" she said sweetly, begging the little boy. "Come on, let's see toys! Come on!" Nope, the kid is squealing and trying to get away.

Then the nice act disappears. The woman looks all around and then her face changes almost demonically. She pounds the kid several times and screams, "I'm TRYING TO BE NICE TO YOU, G-D IT!!"

She never knew anyone saw it. To this day I like to use her phrase when I'm trying to help someone who doesn't want to be helped.

[d_fife]

Originally posted by 0588kid
Some customers stand out even 15+ years after my store closed.

My store never did get updated with UPC scanners... we were the only store in town that had to type in SKU numbers. Customers really hated it because SKU errors slowed everything down. I could never figure out why we had to enter the SKU AND the price. Even as fast as I could type the SKUs was no match for the convenience everyone knew at the grocery store and over at K-Mart. Anyway, one day a customer remarked as I was entering SKUs, with surprising venom: "I can't wait until Wal Mart comes to town and runs you out of business!" I'm a 19 year old college kid for heaven's sakes! People are funny. But you know, typing in SKU numbers was truly idiotic and the customer had a point. Wait 5+ years after the competition upgraded to even START to upgrade did in fact represent contempt for the customer and very bad business sense.

But here's the best evil customer story ever. I'm stocking Prestone to the top shelves in automotive... up on those cool rolling ladders. Anyway, from up there I can see the whole store. Just a few feet away from me I see a strange scene... an adult trying to drag a screaming brat INTO the toy dept. Not out of. Into!

"Let's look at the toys!" she said sweetly, begging the little boy. "Come on, let's see toys! Come on!" Nope, the kid is squealing and trying to get away.

Then the nice act disappears. The woman looks all around and then her face changes almost demonically. She pounds the kid several times and screams, "I'm TRYING TO BE NICE TO YOU, G-D IT!!"

She never knew anyone saw it. To this day I like to use her phrase when I'm trying to help someone who doesn't want to be helped.

when I worked at ames in plymouth I had a few rude customers, one thought I accidently rang the same items twice and he was swearing at me and threatening to beat me up and had me ring everything over again, I did not make a mistake but he thought I did and when I rang everythign over again he and his girlfriend where critizing and swearing at me making me make more mistakes so I had to get another cashier to do it.

[0588kid]

I had a customer demand that I be fired on the spot. He was raving like a lunatic, saying that he was "inconvenienced." He was the VP of a local bank. His face was red and he was out for blood. Who knows why. He said he would never be back in the store. Of course, this was untrue because, like pretty much anyone who said that, they couldn't resist our bargains by the bagfull!

What was he upset about? This was during the first Gulf War and I was wearing a tasteful peace button--which I had permission to wear. His wife had come through my line and was offended by the button although she didn't say anything about it (was actually very sweet). About 30 minutes later he comes through my line, his face already red, and SLAMS down an armful of gulf-war related videos and t-shirts. As I was ringing them up he said, "What do you think about the war, boy? What do you think about the war?!?" [I didn't know they had meth in Ohio in those days!!] "What's that button supposed to mean? Does that mean that Ames doesn't support the war?" I calmly told him that the button only reflected my personal religious preference for peace. He started to scream, "Manager! Manager! Manager! Manager! Manager!" Then he demanded I be dismissed immediately.

Was he inconvenienced? Nope. Because he CAME IN to the store to do all that! His wife told him I had a peace button on and he probably decided right in the parking lot that he would go in and try to get me fired.

Now, today I'm no longer a commie peacenik (heh-heh). I was very proud of my visciously pro-war manager who handled the situation very tactfully and NEVER held it against me. There are people who "get" America and people who don't!

[d_fife]

Originally posted by 0588kid
I had a customer demand that I be fired on the spot. He was raving like a lunatic, saying that he was "inconvenienced." He was the VP of a local bank. His face was red and he was out for blood. Who knows why. He said he would never be back in the store. Of course, this was untrue because, like pretty much anyone who said that, they couldn't resist our bargains by the bagfull!

What was he upset about? This was during the first Gulf War and I was wearing a tasteful peace button--which I had permission to wear. His wife had come through my line and was offended by the button although she didn't say anything about it (was actually very sweet). About 30 minutes later he comes through my line, his face already red, and SLAMS down an armful of gulf-war related videos and t-shirts. As I was ringing them up he said, "What do you think about the war, boy? What do you think about the war?!?" [I didn't know they had meth in Ohio in those days!!] "What's that button supposed to mean? Does that mean that Ames doesn't support the war?" I calmly told him that the button only reflected my personal religious preference for peace. He started to scream, "Manager! Manager! Manager! Manager! Manager!" Then he demanded I be dismissed immediately.

Was he inconvenienced? Nope. Because he CAME IN to the store to do all that! His wife told him I had a peace button on and he probably decided right in the parking lot that he would go in and try to get me fired.

Now, today I'm no longer a commie peacenik (heh-heh). I was very proud of my visciously pro-war manager who handled the situation very tactfully and NEVER held it against me. There are people who "get" America and people who don't!

that is rude of a customer to say get fired on the spot

at least at my job I never delt with shaddy people. The ames i worked at was in a college town (I just graduated from this college) called plymouth nh

[Ames303]

The store I worked at had only four checkout lines before the big remodel. We would get busy where four checkouts weren't enough, so they put an additional register on the end of the checkstand (where the bags usually were). So we would bring two customers through at a time, if the customer at the first (real) register had a large order, we'd end up just standing at the makeshift register waiting for that sale to finish so two customers could come through.

I was standing at one of these end registers as I had just finished the sale but the cashier at the other register in the line was wicked slow so it was taking a little while. An impatient woman in line shrieked at the top of her lungs "that guy is just standing there doing nothing! He's not doing anything! No wonder people are leaving in droves."

I don't know who was leaving the store but nonetheless I couldn't ring anyone out because they couldn't get to this register plopped onto the end of the checkstand.

Another thing that was slowing down the checkouts (besides entering the SKU and the price, though the register was smart enough to tell you if the price was too low or too high, it just didn't know what the actual price was), was that it was decided that the cashiers spent too much time looking at the keys when entering the SKUs so they covered up the numbers with rubber caps. Being a geek I could handle this but many of the newer cashiers struggled with it.