Strangest complaint you've ever received

I once had a customer request a refund for an item that was too small for her child. I asked to see receipt, all was fine so I waited for the item. And waited. Eventually I asked to see it. Her dd was wearing it. She couldn't understand why I couldn't exchange something that had been worn all day and was clearly covered in food stains. Struggled not to laugh that time.

Also had a customer ring and tell me that the shop next door played Spanish sounding "hold" music and she wanted it to be something more English. I asked her what she wanted me to do about it and she said she just wanted to make me aware and hung up on me! Bizarre.

I wish I could remember half the people I had the misfortune of having to deal with when I worked. One particularly nasty customer that springs to mind is one who demanded a particular type of car for a test drive and flew into a rage when we said it wasn't available, because we didn't have every variation of every model in stock. That would be hundreds of thousands of pounds of cars sitting around, devaluing with every second, in case someone one day wanted to drive one.

We managed to locate one at another site and my colleague offered to go and collect it and give it a quick rinse off when he got it back. Customer went apoplectic again because the car wasn't sparkling clean. Well he damn well knew it had just been driven over so wasn't going to be showroom condition!

He actually threw the keys on the floor! My colleague asked the mans wife very politely if she could pick them up as he had a bad back and she did!

And we had another one who demanded any loan car he liked when his was in for its service, and he'd have that one there thank you very much. Well, no, you won't actually, because that belongs to another customer.

I will try and think of some more. What is it with some people when they have to deal with staff? Why do they turn into utter cunts?

I too would happily have told a lot of these people they they were in fact morons. Has anyone tried this technique ?

This is why

This is I don't work with the public, I'd have decked someone by now!

These are great

ooooh, I had a great plagiary one.

Parent: 'I can't believe you're suggesting ds plagiarised his coursework. That's a very serious allegation. I think I should terminate this conversation & speak to the Head about your attitude.'
Me: 'That's fine, Mrs Fruitcake - I've already spoken to him, so he'll know what it's in connection with.'
Parent: 'Well, it's ridiculous. I work for a University you know. What plagiarism detecting software have you actually used, hmmm?'
Me: 'Google.'
Parent: 'GOOGLE!'
Me: 'Yes - it's by AA Gill. It was in the Sunday Times magazine. Your ds tells me he was so pleased with his work, he uploaded it to his blog & Gill obviously plagiarised him.'
Parent : '& can you prove that's not the case?'
Me: 'I'm reasonably confident that it isn't, unless your ds also does time travel...he'd have been seven when the article was originally published...'

IrisWild - I was a supervisor, I'd have been a pretty crap one to let staff (especially not fully trained ones) go ahead and make rather big, time consuming mistakes. especially when it was on days when I was in charge and any jobs not done were on my head

My mother used to work in a popular bakery known for their sausage rolls. They had a customer complaining about wasps. The manager explained that they do all they can but unfortunately it didn't help much. The customer demanded they put a notice up. The manager - tongue firmly in cheek - said he didn't think that would work because he wasn't sure if wasps could read...

My MIL was a librarian. She had someone complain about all the half blank pages in books being a waste of paper.

I had someone demand to know why I had swapped the green ride on tractor that was up on display on the back wall for a red one. She insisted it was red the week before and would not believe me when I said it had always been green. She actually said "well how would YOU know?" Erm... because it was me who put it up there, it's me that spends every bloody day here.

I'm so glad I only temp now...

I work in a pet shop.

The two most ridiculous things I can think of [at the moment] are:

1. There is a dog in the office. Yes. He's my dog. You didn't even realise he was there until I walked by with him so he could have a wee.

1. I wouldn't sell a customer a coupler (which is a lead extention to allow you to walk 2 dogs off one lead) for one dog. They complained because I suggested they just buy a lead if they were only ever walking one dog with it.

doublelife- maybe my ears have become desensitised to the noise

I would have seen her point if it was a guns and cars action movie but it wasn't it was 'my sisters keeper' haha

I work in an opticians and frequently get shouted at by patients who aren't entitled to NHS sight tests but think they should be. One particularly lovely lady shouted at me all the way through her son's eye test because he wasn't entitled to an NHS one (he was 17 and not in ft education). Apparently he's too young to claim other benefits so it should be covered by the NHS, I explained we don't make the rules, just follow them but she just kept on and on. I told her to write to her mp in the end I think.

One of my colleagues had a written complaint once; the patient had dropped her contact lens in the bin and my colleague wouldn't let her fish it out and put it in her eye!

working as a retail manager I was serving a customer at the till point. member of staff asked for help merchandising, I said just let me finish with customer i'll be right over. She stormed off the shop floor into my managers office and complained I wasn't giving her enough support

I've also had to deal with a customer who was furious I wouldn't refund an item of clothing that was too big for her baby as she had washed it. My suggestion of keeping it till he grew into it was ridiculous apparently, and every one knows clothes should be washed before you even show them to a baby. She stormed out of the shop saying she would NEVER shop with us again.

I love these! Anyone else feel a bit sorry for the poster who originally said people complained cos the films are too loud?!

(whilst thinking yes some films are indeed played too loud)

Cafe, have had complaints on the same day that the cappuccino was either 'all froth and no coffee' or 'not a proper cappuccino because there was too much coffee and not enough froth.' The second from the boss who was something of a wanker a coffee aficionado and obviously didn't believe that the customer knew best.

In a bar, 'There's cabbage in my salad.' It was from a pre-bagged salad mix (controversial) and was a bit of chunk red lettuce .

Working in a cardiology department I took a phone call, apparently any fool could see the appointment we had sent out was for the day after his birthday.

I started a new teaching job, the previous teacher had been ill for some time so I had to do her marking. I pointed out one assignment was plagarised and put the web page it had been cut and pasted from. Apparently this was me being racist. I had never met the student. The student's name was something like John Smith so not typical of any particular ethnic group and anyway, they had cheated.

Had a complaint because we weren't open. At 3am.

Because drilling holes into the walls was making a mess. - Errrr...yeah.

Because the plaster was still wet when he touched it - the wall wasn't even finished.

Because the lights weren't working...well no. You can't rewire a house when it's LIVE and they weren't even living in it.

Because the drill was too noisy - not a lot we can do about that.

Because another electrician 15 years before hand had put in a dodgy socket...we'd been in business 6 months at that point.

Because we didn't use the existing wires that were already in the walls - the job was a rewire...because the wiring hadn't been touched in 40 years.

Because we called when we were going to be 1/2 hour late to a job thanks to a puncture.

I used to work in a call centre for a mobile network, once in a heavy storm one of our base stations had been damaged, when I told one customer this he demanded the engineer be sent up to fix it immediately. When I explained it was considered too dangerous for the engineer to climb a mast in high winds, he said the engineer knew he'd have to face danger and risk his life when he took the job so should still be sent up! He told me he had a urgent call to make, when I pointed out he could make the urgent call from the phone he was using to speak to me he swore and slammed the phone down.

I work in a complaints department and have had loads of bonkers stuff over the years.

We had a customer complain we had changed the registration of his car to our name. Why he thinks we would do this I don't know. Despite us and the dvla confirming this never happened he won't believe us and thinks we are in cahoots with them.

A customer once told me my mother was a cunt because I couldn't put him through to someone who had gone home for the day.

Recently had someone complain that a member of my team was unprofessional because they wouldn't transfer his call to someone who was on the phone. When i asked how he expected to be transferred to someone who was already on another call he said he understood that but shouldn't have been told no. He then wanted to speak to a director so he could make them feel how he felt.

Also, this is third hand but I assure you it happened: someone made a formal complaint to a nursery when they collected their child and found a piece of dry penne pasta clutched in their hand. They said the nursery was being reckless allowing children to do craft activities with dangerously sharp pasta shapes.

I once had someone write in and complain that I'd hung up on them during an awkward work conversation about regulatory stuff where I was delivering a message they really didn't want to hear.

They'd got pissed off and hung up on me.

Our IT department were complained about en masse because they said they were unable to fix a kettle. The strange thing is, the IT bod in question had been a little sarcastic.

IT: We can't fix your kettle
User: But it's electric. That's what you do, right?
IT: So is Bob's pacemaker but if anything went wrong with it, we'd sooner he saw a heart surgeon than come down to IT

The complaint was still that all IT refuse to do their jobs, rather than the sarcasm.

If you work in a shop/pub/call centre i think you just get used to idiots.
I had a woman want a refund on a cardigan because of the "shockingly poor quality" the problem? a button had come off, oh and the cardigan was 9 years old!

How do people who work in customer service roles manage to keep a straight face when receiving such ridiculous complains? The one about the woman complaining about Thomas the tank engine video being too violent would have had me in hysterics I'm afraid.

The woman who's house backed onto my parents, who they'd never even met before, complained about the large tree in my parents garden. Not because it was blocking light from their house but because the tweeting from the birds sitting in it in the mornings used to wake her up early.

My mum just pacified her by saying she'd see what she could do about it .I mean how the hell can you stop birds from singing?! Silly bitch! I've since found out that said neighbour has managed to fall out with most people on her street because she complains about everything, obviously has nothing else going on in her life.

A customer called me over to complain that he had overheard two members of my team talking about another customer and that it was unprofessional. I had heard part of the conversation taking place so replied honestly that it wasn't about a customer, they were describing a Manager that they both knew (in terms of clothing he wore-big quiff/funky dress sense) He then complained about me that I was obviously lying as I had responded with a denial too quickly. Bit my lip so hard that day, I'm surprised it didn't draw blood!!

Their are some proper Idiots about

I volunteer in a charity shop and a couple once came in and brought a Bob The Builder hard hat to the till, and the lady told me to take it off sale because it was unsafe for children to wear as a hard hat. Apparently it would offer no defence against falling items and that I would be liable if a child received a head injury as a result of wearing this hat (presumably on a construction site?!). The gentleman with her tried to persuade her that it was a toy and not meant as safety wear. She then asked me if I could have the manager reduce the price for her! I told her that I was the acting manager at the time, and I thought 50p was a perfectly reasonable price already. So then she said she'd have to make an official complaint to Trading Standards as I was selling a dangerous item! I was trying not to laugh and offered to take it off sale to placate her!
Definitely the weirdest complaint I've ever received.