The worst complaint you have ever received

[planetclom]

I’ll start.
Someone complained they when they arrived early for an appointment I saw them early, they did not want to be seen early ...
Someone complained that I was only interested in box ticking and in the next sentence complained I spend to long trying to sort out their issue...

Work in the NHS if that is relevant, I suspect it is.

Haven't rtft so this may have been mentioned. I'm a teacher and regularly get Parent- "He's lost 3 jumpers"
Me- "Ok, I'll have a look, have they got his name in?"
Parent- "No, but they're ones with a school badge, 5-6 yr old" i.e. exactly like every other child's in my class!

I also had a parent ring after school to complain that I hadn't changed her child's reading books, her child had been off all week and had only come back on the Friday when we didn't tend to change them. I said she was welcome to pop back to school and I would change them for her. She didn't want to do that, just wanted to make me aware.

StrandedStarfish

That's wonderful
I was bitten on the thumb by an ostrich in a zoo. It was over 20 years ago but I might complain that I'm still traumatised by the event and that it ruined my hitchhiking career.

I was working in a stationery shop and we arrived one morning to a cascading waterfall coming through the ceiling from the flat upstairs, and the electricity had shorted out. We were all standing there in semi darkness, ankle deep in water, which was still gushing down from the ceiling as nobody was home in the upstairs flat. We opened the doors to allow some of the water to escape into the drain outside and a customer stuck his head in and asked if he could buy a pencil. He could clearly see the situation, but didn't comment on it at all, then was furious when we said that we couldn't help him at that time. He was so angry, that I said he could give us the money and I would write him a receipt and put it into the till later. He then was even more angry because he didn't have any cash on him! He went away and then came back with a £10 note. I apologised and said that as there was no power I couldn't open the till to get him any change and then he got even more angry. The water was still at this point pouring through the ceiling and running out of the front door like a river. He then stomped over to the shop across the street, bought something, then came back with the correct money for the pencil. Then complained that it shouldn't be this difficult to buy something as simple as a pencil, and that it was taking me too long to write him a receipt. What made it even more bizarre was that the shop he went into to get change was a massive branch of WH Smith, who as far as I'm aware most definitely sell pencils!!

A colleague had to waste NHS time and resources dealing with a formal complaint from a man complaining his large combat knife was removed when he was admitted to a MH unit.

Another colleague had to waste NHS time and resources dealing with a complaint that MH crisis services had said they couldn't help after a call from someone expressing concern about their daughter who lives in another Country.

Not a complaint as such but a MNetter once launched a personal attack on me and said 'people like me are the reason 2 women are murdered a week' because I criticised the Lundy Bancroft book.

I once had a customer complain that my name was too difficult to pronounce. It's English, and one syllable long.

Izzy I'm sorry but I'd have complained about that too. Aside from the invasion of privacy, pets could get out, there could be children around, anything could be in the way of the other side of the door and get damaged (we have a tiny porch rather than a hallway, the front door touches the bottom step when it's open) so there are often things at the bottomof the stairs waiting to be taken up when I next go. That being said, I keep my doors locked because it's a feck awful area and people regularly try doors and pinch anything they can grab quickly

I once had a customer comlain about me when I worked in a shoe shop. She wanted a women's size 10, and we had nothing in stock (VERY small branch, but of a big chain). I got the catalogues out, and advised which lines came in that size, and offered to waive the fee we usually charged to order in, so she could order as many pairs as she wanted to try on, for no charge. All good so far, she chose what she wanted to try, I took her deails, and said somebody would call her when they arrived in store. She came back later that day, and threw an almighty tantrum that they weren't there yet. Apparenly my customer service was terrible, and I was being awkward in refusing to get the shoes in for her

My first employers after university complained that I had cooperated with the police Fraud Squad during a raid on the business when they asked to see where we kept the files. I only took the lever arch folder off the shelf behind them!

Clearsomespace: the first ‘no problem’ is definitely irritating. The second is better replaced with ‘you’re welcome ‘ IMO.

‘No problem’ is an American import. And kind of translates as ‘you’re welcome ‘ but it means ‘it has been no problem for me to solve this / it hasn’t put me out’ or whatever.

Most times when ‘no problem ‘ is parroted out in its meaningless way you think ‘why would it be a problem, this is what you are here to do, and if it was a problem, I am paying you to solve it’.

If re-assuring a client or customer and wanting to be meaningful I would say ‘that should be straightforward, I’ll let you know when I have heard back “ or similiar.

“Two cokes and a cappuccino, please”
“No problem “
Aaaaagh, WHY THE HELL WOULD THERE BE A PROBLEM! (Unless I am in a hardware store or getting in a bus).

I hope you've taken a good, long look at yourself and sent President Putin a letter apologising for your attitude.

I'm ashamed to say I haven't done either . The same student also got angry with me in class when I said that one of the (many) reasons Boris Yeltsin's approval ratings had collapsed in the 1990s was because Russian voters were unimpressed by his international reputation as a drunk: he said that Russian voters admire a man who drinks very heavily because it makes him a real man and Yeltsin's drinking made him very popular (it didn't). Perhaps not surprisingly, the student in question was a Russian man.

Most times when ‘no problem ‘ is parroted out in its meaningless way you think ‘why would it be a problem, this is what you are here to do, and if it was a problem, I am paying you to solve it’.

No, I don't think that at all. Assuming they're dealing with my query/complaint/request in a satisfactory manner, saying 'no problem' to me is, well....no problem. I never think about it at all.

I've never heard of people objecting to the phrase 'no problem' before. I always assumed everyone took it to mean 'there will be no problem in resolving this for you', not 'there is no existing problem to solve'.

I'm sensitive to phrases like 'child porn' or 'childless' and so on, but this one.....really fails to upset me. If it gets you that worked up, I'd think the existing issue couldn't be that important.

Also, Maccy D milkshakes really are too thick. I don't mind ice cream, but I can't be expected to drink it through a straw ffs. Although obviously that's not the fault of staff, they serve it as it is intended to be.

I was once told if I wasn't so fat, I wouldn't take so long photocopying.
Yes I was obviously so fat I could only mash the keypad with my fat hand

I worked at a leisure centre in my youth.. it was fairly gritty so a lot of the complaints were reasonable although at the time it was frustrating because as staff we were doing our absolute best.

I was also spat at by a customer for not returning a discount card that he was no longer entitled to (too old).

The junkies used to complain when we asked them to leave because taking heroin in changing cubicles is largely frowned upon.

A man was incredibly aggressive and demanded to see a manager because I realised he didn’t actually have a membership and wouldn’t let him in for free. (The previous weekend receptionists had thought he was a member but never swiped a card for him for some reason).

Not a formal complaint but a patient once moaned to the modern matron that I hadn't gone to the store room to get her cans of coke because I was in the staff room having a medic examine my (later found to be fratured) finger and I'd politely asked her to find another member of staff to do it as I was injured (and crying) after being assaulted.

Which she knew. As she'd witnessed it.

Work in Endoscopy. Patient booked for a colonoscopy (camera in the bowel) and sent the laxative to prepare for the procedure.

Patient arrived and complained that the preparation had given them 'awful diarrhoea' so took an Imodium to sort that out. Needless to say they were (literally) full of shit and the procedure had to be abandoned.

That reminds me return an ED sister once complained at me yelling across the department at me that I was obstructing my daughter's care when the ED staff had messed her around for 8.5 hours breaking every rule regarding the MH Code of Conduct and failing to follow one of their own pathways.

Boy was that a complaint later on.

What's a modern matron

Raindrops - I have no idea why my post reminded you of that.

Because return it isn't always the patients who complain inappropriately in healthcare settings which is what you seemed to be implying

Regarding "no problem". I don't answer "no problem" but say "you're welcome" or something else appropriate. If it's something I'm helping with I want it acknowledged, even if just by myself!

Russian voters admire a man who drinks very heavily

If I remember correctly, Boris Yeltsin himself believed that drinking a bottle of vodka, stripping naked in the snow and trying to fight a bear were signs of true masculinity* His autobiography was a cracking read.

*It's 25 years since I read his autobiography so some of those details might be completely made up.

Yes obviously that was what I was implying Rainbows.

Or not. Maybe HCPs have a shit time sometimes. That doesn't mean that patients don't sometimes have valid complaints. Why would you think it doesn't?

Are you posting about all the times you've made a valid complaint about a retail worker on this thread and saying they're implying that retail workers are never in the wrong?

Or are you one of those people who had a bad experience with the NHS and therefore think that every HCP is probably shit and moaning unnecessarily?

You do realise that I'd been assaulted? During the course of my working day? Which wasn't my fault? And I carry on doing a great job for not great pay when in my working life I've been physically and sexually assaulted?

Jesusm Not everything is about you you know.

I used to work for a bank in the call centre. Had a guy call me and he spent 10 mins telling me how his money had gone missing from his account. He didnt have the account number and i trued every combination of name/address/date of birth etc to try to find it. Couldn’t find his account anywhere. He was getting more and more irate, and he eventually went off to find his account number. He came back to the phone and gave me his Nationwide account details...except I didn’t work for the Nationwide. He’d spent 20 minutes ranting at the wrong bank 😂

In the mid 90s I worked in a call centre and had a man shouting at me because he 'phoned up asking how he could use email to contact a company and I said you have a computer and make an email address and ...
Which led to him shouting that of course you didn't need a computer and I must think he's a complete bloody idiot to suggest he did and was I working for the company he wanted to contact and being deliberately obstructive?

I was once berated for having an HGV that was "too orange". Apparently when I unloaded at the shop next to his house the reflected glare made his living room look funny.

Less amusing are the vast numbers of the public who want goods but not the trucks who bring them. There's a vicious little arsehole in Newbury who complains EVERY SINGLE DAY about our firm's vehicle, because, and I quote, "I don't want to look at dirty fat men and smelly lorries going past my house". He got one driver suspended until the tracking record and CCTV showed him to be lying about indecent exposure.

A friend of mine had a complaint made against her that she didn't introduce herself to the family before treating their mother on her ward last year. She was part of the team rushing in with the crash trolley, the lady was happily resucitated. But apparently they should have stopped to speak to the family before saving someone's life