To ask retail staff your worst customer stories?

I suspect this was a dig at your phrasing - 'How was your meal?' rather than 'Did you enjoy your meal?' Probably one of those people who gets their knickers in a twist at perceived 'Americanisms' so responds as if to a literal British-English question.

My first job was in McDonald’s as a teenager, a drunk man came round the counter and started throwing burgers at us because he got angry about waiting for his order.

This was first thing in the morning.

The same McDonald’s made us clean the toilets with just spray and napkins, no gloves etc so it wasn’t just the customers that made it awful 😂

I was not loving it….

Not so much awful as downright weird. I was about 16 and working at Boots. An older woman came in and asked me about a product (antiseptic cream), then she started telling me that she had these 'little white lumps down below' but that she had 'never been with a man, so not sure if that's normal'. I directed her to the Pharmacist pretty sharpish.

I work in a charity shop, I had someone complain loudly and say they were going to complain to management (we have multiple stores) because .... we didn't have any black ties or white shorts in 16 inch collar! He's forgotten his funeral clothes and for some reason couldn't get the concept that we only had what was displayed and whilst we understood his predicament, we couldn't magic them. He then told me it was ridiculous we didn't have them and he was going to put in a formal complaint which he did, have head office a laugh I suppose

I also worked in a cafe where a lady ordered a cup of tea and some soup for lunch. When I asked how her meal was she replied with ‘it was a bit hot and very wet’ I nearly died laughing. Why did you order tea and a soup if you didn’t want it to be wet? So weird

I used to work as a receptionist at a dentists office. We opened until 8pm on a Wednesday to cater to people that couldn’t get to the dentist during the day.

I was booking a woman in for her next orthodontic appointment when she stated ‘it’s got to be in the evening as late as possible because I can’t get away from work before 6pm’

Not a problem, I replied that I understood how hard it was to find later appointments due to work and not being able to get away, she looked me dead in the face and replied ‘yeah but I have a proper job, so it’s harder for me’.

I don’t know whether it slipped her mind for a moment that I was there at 8pm because it was my job or what, but needless to say she didn’t get an appointment for any time soon.

Drunk woman running round knocking things over, tearing down signs and punching the manager in the face. Before someone blames lockdown stress or COL crisis, that was about 20 years ago.

I was a manager in retail and worked all through the covid shitshow

It was awful! Customers were vile. Always

Left after 11 years service, best thing I ever did was get out

Used to work in a call centre so lots of examples of truly horrible offensive, shouty, cruel customers but the ones that stick in my mind are the really stupid and therefore funny ones:

• complaining that her dining table hadn't been delivered, main reason she was unhappy was that she had delayed the induction of her baby to get the table delivered. I mean really, get your priorities straight!
• complaining that after letting her little sod of a child run around the shop like a crazy thing, he'd bumped into a shelf of novelty pumpkin Halloween mugs that made noise when tipped. She was angry that not only had her poor little darling been hit by a falling cup but the damn cup had laughed at him!
• wanting a refund for a 3 year old ironing board that had broken when her toddler jumped on it. Went absolutely barmy on the phone F'ing and blinding at the top of her lungs about shoddy craftsmanship.

I worked retail as a teenager. I refused a sale to someone. Got called a racist word back...lovely

I had a customer that turned into a stalker from 2003-2005.

That was the worst customer.