Obnoxious customers one deals with working retail [View All]

[skygazer]

Say what you will about retail workers - at least when you're shopping, you're there by choice. Also, if someone tees you off, you can be snippy without getting fired. We, on the other hand, are stuck there and have to put up with an incredible amount of crap, all with a smile plastered on our minimum wage earning faces.

There are the people like the lady I ran into today. I was with a customer, helping her find a particular liquor she was looking for, we were talking and this lady (and I use the term loosely) walks up and says, "ExCUSE me, where are your chips?" - this stated aggressively and accompanied by an aggravated expression as if to say, "how dare you not be fawning at my feet - can't you see I want to ask you something?"

Then there was the guy who wanted slivered green beans or some such thing - "I'm sorry, sir, we don't carry them." "Well, why not?" he demands belligerently. "I don't know," I shrug. "Perhaps you can find them at _____ (the other store)" "Well, I don't want to go there. I'm here. Why in the world don't you carry them?!" I want to reply, "Wait right here, sir, and I'll pull some out of my ass" but I can't do that.

We have customers who will snap their fingers for assistance (those get ignored, I'm afraid) and those who blah, blah, blah on their cell phone while I'm ringing them up, ignoring me when I tell them what they owe me, holding up the line, glaring because I've dared to interrupt them.

Then there are the people who ask you where everything on their (long) list is. Take them to one item and they ask you another. Take them to that one and they ask for the next. Essentially, they want you to do their shopping for them.

I've had people walk up to the express lane and dump $400 worth of groceries on the belt and tell me, "You WILL ring this up - I'm in a hurry!" (If you're in such a fucking hurry, why are you buying so much and why didn't you start earlier?) When that happened one day, I simply signed off the checkstand, said "no, I'm not" and walked away. Luckily my boss got a kick out of it).