Silly Customer Stories!

MuppetFan · May 2013

rel1988 said:

I work in a male dominated industry so when non-regular customers come in they assume I don't know what I'm talking about because I'm a "girl" and will literally asked to be helped by a male for that reason. I love being able to prove them wrong and shut them up when I do know what I'm talking about.

On the flip side there are also huge creeps. I've had a handful of time where guys have literally sniffed my hair or right next to me and told me how nice I smell. Uh, thanks.

This is by far my favorite though. I was actually out making deliveries to a local farmer. He had a couple men out there working, one of them being an elderly man probably close to 70. He bluntly asked if he could take me in the back for 10 minutes for $25. I was so caught off guard I just laughed and didn't answer. He then came back with, "You want more then that? Well I only have $25 on me. Will you accept a personal check?". I didn't stick around long enough to find out if he was serious or not.

That's awful. Did you complain about this? I would have filed a complaint.

rel1988 · May 2013

@muppetfanno I thought it was kind of funny a 70 year old was attempting to solicit a 25 year old. I take kickboxing so I know I could've taken him on...just one of those things were you just shake your head and wonder what is wrong with people?!?

AllieBear725 · May 2013

@rel1988 I also work in a male dominant industry and deal with a lot of creeps.

Your story takes the cake. I would have flipped shit on the man though. That's ridiculous.

I have had a co-worker sniff my chair. At the current job I'm at. All the engineers are in a big open room because we work together, so offices would be a lot of un-unnecessary walking to talk, etc. I was out for the day and the guy who sniffed my chair is from purchasing. Well apparently he came in looking for a customer folder for a job I was working on. The engineer who sits next to me said he was looking all over my desk, and proceeded to bend down and sniff my chair! I don't know if this actually happened, but the dude continuously hits on me, almost weekly. I work at a really small company or I would complain to HR about it.

egeurts · May 2013

Ohhhh... retail customers... I worked at Target for 2 years awhile back. It was interesting. My favorite times were right before Christmas! I was the operator/fitting room attendant, so it was my job to deal with people trying to steal stuff by sneaking it in through trying on clothes. AND if people were unhappy with their customer service, I got to listen to it via phonecalls. Here were just a few of my favorites from December of 2010.

It's MN, it's cold. It's snowing. There's probably 8-10 inches on the ground. A group of 3-4 girls comes into the fitting room with a big cart full of clothes, and the bottom of their jeans are soaked wet... they aren't wearing shoes. Socks and FLIP FLOPS. GREEEAAAATTTT. I search their stuff before I let them go in to try to make sure that they don't steal anything, but after they left, I found wet, gross, wadded up socks in the rooms they were in. If you're going to steal new socks, why not steal shoes too?

A few weeks later, we had an ice storm. No snow, just solid ice. 1/2 inch of ice coating everything. I barely made it to work because public transport was 1/2 an hour late. The roads are salted, Target salted the sidewalks to the best of our ability, but its still COATED IN ICE. I get a phone call. There's a guy screaming at me, saying that he fell in our parking lot and twisted his knee. We need to salt the whole parking lot. Well, I'm sorry sir, but we're doing our best, and if you can't get out of your house, maybe you shouldn't have come to Target.

Then there's snowbank lady. We live in MN. It's December, a week before Christmas. We have snow. It's gotta go somewhere. We have large snowbanks on the edges of our parking lots. Calling me, and claiming that removing "one little snowbank" that is "obstructing traffic" is not going to clear congestion considering that we are the largest retail store in the twin cities. It's not going to happen.

And then there's just the constant stream of people who must have the latest and best hot item of the season for their spoiled bratty kids, but insist that they must have it on Dec 23. Dude? It's Target. You can't get Barbie's Dreamhouse, Tickle-me-Elmo, or whatnot, on Dec 23. It's gone. It's been gone. It's been gone since Thanksgiving. You missed the boat. Get over it. Your kid can go without it. Don't bitch to me over the phone. Not. my. problem.

harper0813 · May 2013

@wittykitty14, your hilarious stories remind me of a time when I was checking out at PetSmart and an elderly woman ahead of me in line paid for her $30 purchase entirely in pennies and nickels. No dimes, no quarters, not even a Sacajawea. I felt so bad for the cashier.

MuppetFan · May 2013

@egeurts I have trouble believing that someone who fell in the parking lot and injured himself wouldn't go back into the store immediately to deal with it. Normally they are looking for money. In many of those cases, the store doesn't own the property and a property manager is responsible for clearing the parking lots (so...really not your problem). At my supermarket, we had a responsibility to reasonably maintain the carts in the parking lot and the interior of the store...we got PLENTY of awesome customers complaining about that.

These are examples of VERY common practices:
1) Man goes to empty aisle, man spills water on ground/smashes a grape on the ground/puts a piece of paper down (you pick), lays beside the item and screams for help.

2) Woman knocks magazines down off the candy rack while frantically picking out dozens of candy bars. She steps OVER the magazines to get to the other side. On her way back to her original position, she forgets about the magazines that SHE knocked down....slips on them.. with her hospital slippers. Yes, she is wearing flimsy, disposable, hospital slippers to shop. When she lands, she says she is fine. I get her some water and ask if she's okay or needs help. She says she is good. We find her husband, he starts screaming at us and telling us to call 911. He's going to sue us and take all our jobs.

We have ALL of this on video. We *still* give him money in the $300- $3,000 range. It's called a "nuisance settlement". Basically we say that we know this is bogus, but it's not worth our time or legal resources. You agree not to sue us or waste our time.

HobokensFury · May 2013

My aunt works in the computer science and engineering department at a college. A student came in to enroll in an online class and asked her if a computer was required to take the class.

You really can't make shit like this up.

amaryann210 · May 2013

I worked retail at Old Navy while in college and while most of my time was spent folding fleeces, my favorite customer was an elderly man who came in one summer day. This was the late 90's and capri pants were just coming back into style. He asked me where he could find some "clambake pants".

FI works as customer service for a health insurance company. He doesn't share much about work (HIPPA and all), but did tell me someone called to complain about their claim being denied. He had to inform them that filing a claim for diabetes treatment as a result of a car accident didn't quite make sense to the company.

I think the best story I've heard is from my little sister, who worked at Target during graduate school. Two very large women got into a fight in one of the aisles and during the course of the fight, one sat on top of the other. The employees cannot get involved physically, so all they could do was call the police and wait for them to arrive. She got some amusement from listening to them, however- "Oh, no, I ain't gettin' up!" "I cain't breave! I cain't BREAVE!!"

NerdyLucy · May 2013

Do any of you visit NotAlwaysRight.com?

There's also NotAlwaysWorking and NotAlwaysLearning, amongst a few others located on the right side of the page.

LizM61409 · May 2013

We have a pager that patients can call after hours with emergencies. Now, I totally realize that sometimes you're not sure if it's really an emergency and that's fine, and when NORMAL people call at 1am with something they're not sure about, it's usually along the lines of "I'm really sorry to bother you, but I'm pregnant and my belly hurts and I'm not sure what to do". TOTALLY fine. It's what we're here for.

A couple months ago, I got a call on a Tuesday at 1am with "I have a yeast infection and I wanna know if it's okay to have sex". Apparently it couldn't wait to call the office in the morning.

I was too stunned in the moment to do this, but I really should have had some fun with it. Like, "I don't know, how well do you know this guy? Oh, he's just your friend? Do you have an IUD in? Will you be using a condom? No? Then no, you're not allowed to have sex"

WinstonsGirl · May 2013

I used to work retail, and could have given you ladies hundreds of stories a few years ago, but I've forgotten most of them.

One I do remember though was a woman who while paying, asked if we took personal cheques (Nope). She then said she refused to use debit cards, since she didn't want to aid us becoming a "cashless society". She finally paid with her Visa.

I also had customers mad at me because the publisher hadn't released a new book yet. More than once.

And numerous customers who asked me if we carried the book that was in the local paper a month or two ago. It might have had a blue cover. No other information was available to help with which book it might be

MuppetFan · May 2013

@1covejack wait, the guy thought it was like being at a restaurant and he thinks you'll postpone saving a guy's life bc he ordered his OJ first?

#nerdylucy, never heard of it but It sounds like a new timesuck for me like damnyouautocorrect or something.

NerdyLucy · May 2013

MuppetFan said:

#nerdylucy, never heard of it but It sounds like a new timesuck for me like damnyouautocorrect or something.

It totally is a timesuck. I check those sites every day for new stories.

vanityink · May 2013

NerdyLucy said:

Do any of you visit NotAlwaysRight.com?
There's also NotAlwaysWorking and NotAlwaysLearning, amongst a few others located on the right side of the page.

Exactly what I was thinking of. I read Not Always Right religiously.

I don't have any good customer stories, but DH has had some fun. He works at the DC Tourism Bureau and they do have some...interesting people call in. One Monday, DH came in and found a voicemail from a man who stated that he had done some research and was 1) certain that a catastrophe was going to hit the world in the next few months and 2) thought perhaps he might be the "chosen one" to stop it (just perhaps, no delusion of grandeur there, obviously). Since this was the case, he wanted them to connect him to President Obama. Or Michelle. Michelle would do as well. They didn't call him back, but DH just came home saying how sorry he feels for the switchboard operators in the White House (why they called tourism rather than the White House in the first place is still anyone's guess).

MuppetFan · May 2013

I had never even considered the switchboard operators at the WH. Wow.

I just giggled when I wrote "switchboard". We call our receptionist that, but really, it's just a telephone that she's got now with a list of extensions.

ranzzo · May 2013

I worked a lot of retail and have a few stories.

In high school, I worked a large department store. We were right off the highway close to a bad part of time. As a cashier we would have to call in a manager when someone would attempt to purshcase large quantities of baby formula. Apparently it was used to cut cocaine. We would have people flip out.

During the Christmas rush I had a very large lady pay in wadded up, sweaty cash that she carried in a Crown Royal bag that she just happened to hide in her bra. She pretty much flashed everyone while getting it out.

I also worked at a hardware store. You get hit on a lot while working at a hardware store. I worked in the commercial area so mostly I sold large orders for contractors. We would still get regular purchases though. I had one guy that kept coming in and just pick up things around the counter like razor blades and every time he came through, he would ask me out. He creeped me out, so I would always politely decline. He brought me flowers on valentine's day. He told me he worked for the Department of Homeland security. Some of the guys that worked in the department would hang out around my station when they saw him come in because of how creepy he was. At the time I was in college and living at home. One morning before class, my younger brother's school called and asked for someone to pick him up because he was ill. I went to go get him myself. On the way there, I was pulled over. The cop asked me why I thought he pulled me over and I said I didn't know because I wasn't speeding. He asked for my driver's license and then said "I wanted to rent some tools." I then realized it was the creepy customer. I didn't recognize him with his hat and glasses on. I was like a deer in headlights. He asked where I was going and I told him I was picking up my sick brother. He asked me if I needed a police escort to get me there faster. I politely declined, gave me my license back and said "I guess now I know where you live." I called the police department and reported him and never saw him again.

MuppetFan · May 2013

@retreadbride

What the heck is up with people's sense of entitlement over groceries? My first supermarket job at 15 or 16, I had a woman freaking out over the price of a specific bag of chips. She didn't believe the register, so she demanded I follow her to the product. I pointed out that the sale tag was for the product beside it. She said that was misleading. I asked how we could've done it so that it wasn't misleading. She said we should've separated it better. She kept screaming at me. Shift supervisor comes over, she tells him that "The customer is always right". He said, "Well, that's not our motto. Ours is More for your Dollar". She complained about him and he got suspended.

He also got suspended for not giving a customer his carriage (that was full of product) because the customer didn't want to go get one...but I assert that he should've gotten the dude a carriage.

LuckyAloha · May 2013

AddieL73 said:

I think I shared this before awhile back, but my husband used to work for Best Buy's Geek Squad, and once this guy came in and asked to have what was obviously government spyware removed. Seems he was convinced they were watching him because when he would go to Google something, sometimes Google would say "Did you mean.....?" They were watching, always watching!!!!!

Haha, I work at a dentist's office, and today I heard a patient yelling at the doctor because he thought they were CIA, and were installing chips in his tooth (or teeth?)

LuckyAloha · May 2013

Oh, and I used to work at a restaurant, and people are so crazy with food! I had a couple order a bottle of wine at 11 am when we opened and were laughing and having a great time. When I asked what the occasion was, they said they were walking next door to file for divorce.

I had a mother and daughter send spaghetti and meatballs back because "it wasn't what they were expecting." WTF? How can spaghetti and meatballs be "different than you were expecting?"

This is a very popular italian chain restaurant. At about 6 on a Friday night we had a fight break out in one of our rooms. A girl was trying to give an hj at one of the tables (keep in mind, very lit family restaurant with no tablecloths), the dad at another table saw it and got mad, and after some harsh words a full on fight broke out.

Anastasia517 · May 2013

I worked at Tim Horton's for a while, as did my FI. We both found that the most entitled, obnoxious people and the people who freaked out the most were people old enough to be our parents. People under 25 tended to be the nicest and most understanding.

The one recurring example was that at one point the manager was on a month long vacation and the person who took his place always ordered too little chocolate milk. I had a bunch of 6-year-olds who got over it really quickly, but the adults were crazy. I had multiple minute long conversations that went something like this.

Me: I'm sorry, we're all out of chocolate milk. Can I get you something else?
Customer: What?
Me: The truck should be in later today, but we currently don't have any chocolate milk. Would you like something else?
C: How can you be out of chocolate milk?
M: Like I said, the truck should be in later today and we sold the last of what we had this morning.

C: But how can you not have any chocolate milk?
etc, etc. Over and over again. There were at least half a dozen fully grown adults who couldn't grasp the concept of selling out of a product.

I also spent a solid 4-5 minutes one time trying to convince a guy that what he ordered didn't have raisins. He seemed to think we had a giant conspiracy to get him to eat raisins because he wouldn't believe any of the people who told him that.

When the debit machines were being fixed, they closed off drive through for an hour or so. They put cones down to show that it was closed and somebody kept the headset on to talk to people who drove up to it anyway. More than one person physically moved the cones, drove up, and complained about not getting service.

WinstonsGirl · May 2013

I liked your post, just cos it was about Tim Hortons.

kerbohl · May 2013

I've also got some Tim Hortons stories! The closed drive-thru is pretty common. The store owner would move his truck in front of it so cars couldn't get past, and people would come inside, and helpfully inform us that a truck was blocking the drive-thru and we should get it removed. Yeah . . .

The one that made me the angriest was actually a young woman, in her early 20s. She was ordering for a friend who was allergic to tomatoes. It hadn't shown up as "no tomatoes" on the soup and sandwich screen, so my fellow employee there (who is adorable and wouldn't hurt a fly) made it normally. This girl was understandably upset. So, my co-worker changed her gloves and remade it. Well, somehow this wasn't good enough. The girl started throwing a major tantrum which escalated to her threatening to kill my co-worker with the very bagel that she had made if she didn't fix it. She wanted to kill her OVER A BAGEL! What a horrible person! There is a way to complain, and it doesn't include death threats.

I also had the unwanted male attention there. One was this middle-aged Portuguese fellow that asked out every girl between 16-25. He asked out one of my friends with this printed off love-note. A few months later, he asked me out with the same love-note. By this point, he had asked me out three times and had been annoying me to the point that I had gotten one of my male co-workers to be my fake boyfriend to come over every-time this guy walked into the store. So I complained to a supervisor and got him banned from the store. I get annoyed when guys don't take no as an answer . . .

Oh, and we also had the pedophile (yes, we knew he was, we weren't just spreading rumours - he had been in jail for it and we were told to be careful around him) who would go up to the younger girls working there and get really close to their faces, stare at them, and ask them "what colour are your eyes"? And he really liked me because when he had just gotten out of jail, I still remembered his coffee order. Stupid good memory!

Anastasia517 · May 2013

That bagel story is insane. The worst bagel related one other than raisin-conspiracy-guy was this one set of parents FI served. They complained that he'd cut their bagel in half after putting butter on it, because their daughter wouldn't eat it if it was in 4 pieces. They were serious.

I think this thread is proof that the customer is not always right. The fact that there are people who don't understand that cashiers have no power to change prices and that hurricanes close things make me sad.

Amyliz1215 · May 2013

I work as a public health nurse, so sometimes people will call after hours to request a copy of their medical record. I had this one person who called me and left a voicemail, but did not leave a name or a phone number. This person then proceeded to call me several times over the next week, angrier each time because I had not called this person back but never left a name or phone number. Our phones don't really have caller ID so I couldn't even use hat to figure out who this person was. The calls eventually stopped but the person never got their record. Did they expect me to somehow know who they were!!? Haha

MuppetFan · May 2013

I've never heard of Tim Horton's! Looks like the closest ones are NY. Maybe I will try one on my way to Charlotte next week if we pass one (going to a wedding).

I worked at a Chick Fil A in college and I had a woman threaten to sue us because I didn't tell her that the food was cooked in peanut oil and her kid was allergic to peanuts. First, If your kid was deathly allergic to peanuts, wouldn't you be verifying the food has no peanuts product in it? Second, how is it our responsibility to rattle off all ingredients for each item for each order? Third, it's highlighted on the menu board in big huge letters, it's written on every.single.package, it's printed on the menu ads, it's actually on a sign at the registers, all employees are knowledgeable and can tell if asked, and the nutrition labels with ingredients are right at the register.

Old people def have a sense of entitlement. We didn't serve breakfast and the mall didn't open till 10 and we weren't supposed to put coffee on until 9:55 or something like that so that we minimize waste. We would give free beverages to seniors and as soon as someone walked in to open the store, old mall walkers would be asking for coffee. We'd tell them to come back when we open and they'd get really mad.

@amyliz1215 I've had that. I had a guy leave a message for me with someone saying to call Andy back. He said I have his number so she didn't take it. So....I assumed it was my boyfriend. I called him, no he didn't call me. Like 2 days later a guy starts talking to me like he knew me bc I talked to him a few months earlier and was concerned that I didnt call him back bc I'm normally so responsive.

Ajuliana · May 2013

@ranzzo You are so right about hardware stores. Besides the old guys bringing us birthday presents and telling us about all their assets and how they could take care of us, there was this one memory that stands out.

Creepy banker from next door came over after work, asking us cashiers if we knew where the stud finders were. We said no. He got this look on his face and said, "Oh, I just figured you girls would know how to find a stud." He wandered off and came back a few minutes later with the stud finder in hand, and proceeded to rub it all over himself and make "beep beep beep" noises. Then he said "See? It works!"

Awkkkkkward.

MuppetFan · May 2013

blech!

WinstonsGirl · May 2013

@MuppetFan - Tim Hortons is a coffee/donut shop up in Canada, though they've recently started moving into the US. Most people here are crazy for their coffee, though I prefer the hot chocolate. It's super rich and creamy. Apparently during the World Junior Hockey Championships in 2011 (held in NY state), all the Canadians found and took over the 1 Tim's in the host city. None of the Americans understood why it was so packed but we all had a good laugh over it up here

MuppetFan · May 2013

@kje_ ohhhh... that explains why I've never heard of it. It must be like Dunkin Donuts here. There's an amazing quantity of them here and everyone is addicted. I bet I would be too if I liked coffee.

WinstonsGirl · May 2013

@MuppetFan - Yup, pretty much the Canadian version. It was started by a former hockey player too, so now it's just a giant part of Canadiana I suppose

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