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.

When I worked in pharmacy I had a guy complain about the razor he had bought the week before. He had spent quite a bit of money and was moaning that the razor had cut him and nicked him too much, the swivel wasn’t swivelly enough and the blades were too sharp. So I’m nodding and looking at his face thinking he didn’t look too bad at all , then he took his hat off and he’d shaved his head and I struggled not to laugh, he looked like he’d gone through a car windscreen.

Worked at a school, child's parents forgot to drop in their lunchbox (child left it in the bus in the morning) I went and brought them lunch from a local bakery. The next day parents rang and complained that I didn't buy there other children the same lunches, and it was unfair. There's 5 of them all together, and they didn't say thanks once, or even offer to pay it back.

I once had to listen to a customer complaining about floor staff not knowing where items were and how unhelpful he was. I asked her to point him out and she pointed to a man in a Boots uniform buying his lunch. This isn't Boots. I told her this and two days later I had a complaint lodged for not reprimanding the man for refusing to help her.

Also had a man complain that he saw me being too helpful to an elderly woman who had a bad fall whilst crossing the road to the shop I work in. Her family on the other hand were lovely and the woman made a great recovery.

When I worked in a gym someone complained that the machines looked 'cheap'.

I worked for a HA maintenance company, taking calls from tenants in relation to heating/hot water issues in their homes.

I took a call mid December from a lady with young children who’s boiler had packed in and needed an engineer to go out. We offered a 2 hour time slot but could always work something out if the tenant was struggling.

She’d called at 8am, so I said I could have someone there before 10am, that wasn’t suitable as she had to take DC to school, I said that’s ok and asked what time she was usually back from school run, 9.15 she said. I said I’d get the engineer to call between 9.15-10.15, that wasn’t ok as she was going Christmas shopping straight from the school run, so I asked what time she might be available later on, she flipped her lid, told me I was like the fucking Spanish Inquisition and not to be so fucking nosy and put the phone down. I left it a couple of hours and tried to phone her back but she kept telling me to fuck off and putting the phone down. I made notes of all the conversations and the phone logged the times I’d tried to ring her, because I knew what was going to happen.

She put a call into the out of hours service saying that I’d left her and her kids with no heating or hot water all day and refused to send an engineer out and put a massive complaint in to the HA. Luckily our team leader had been on shift at the same time so knew she was lying and told her so!

moosebetimeforsnow: wouldn’t that be resolved by rotating his sandwich 90 degrees on the plate?

It’s the orientation of the shortest side of the cheese relative to the longest side of the bread that causes the problem.

If you’re slicing from a largish rectangle of cheese the sandwich is more likely to fall apart if the long slices are vertical instead of horizontal.

I thought everyone knew that!

I work in a restaurant so how lost count of the amount of ridiculous complaints we get on a regular basis, but a few just from the last week alone:

Customer complained that all meals (3 people) were stone cold and one was even partly frozen - ^a check back had been done to that table and no complaints at the time, all meals were eaten completely and none of the food had even been frozen to begin with
^
Customer complained that their lasagne was so burnt it was inedible - again no complaints on table check back and the whole lasagne dish had been cleaned practically by them

Customer ordered fish and chips and then complained that their fish was too fishy

I worked for a bank and were told not to say "no problem" as it implied it was a problem to begin with.

When I was a medical secretary in A&E I took a call from a bloke wanting to complain and claim compo for a ripped teeshirt.
The teeshirt had been ripped by medics when they had to perform emergency life saving treatment. It really didn't help that his condition was entirely self inflicted.

It was the 80s. I was young. So instead of managing his expectations I told him he was a selfish twat and he would be dead if they had not saved him.

Couldn;t do that now. I wouldn't do that now and it could have backfired on me but I worked in A&E and there aren't many places where you have to put up with more threats, abuse and general nastiness than A&E.
He obviously caught me on a bad day

I actually hate the showing of excellent work to the rest of the class. You have no idea how shitty that is for the other kids.

Do you realise how shitty it is for the other kids when pupil's are celebrated for their artwork, dance/music/ sports abilities etc?? Apparently it's OK to celebrate those, and don't care about the kids who aren't sporty/arty/musical. But not OK to celebrate academic ability - no wonder we're plunging down the world's rankings for education!

A client once turned up 15 mind early. I popped out to tell her I’ll be with her as soon as I can. She said fine I’ll sit here in the warm don’t worry I’ve got my newspaper. All good so I though.
Five mins later our door buzzer goes so I goto see who has come in. First client disappeared. No probs I thought maybe she has gone to post a letter as she was early.

She never came back so I called and left a message to make sure she was ok. She later phoned back and spoke to my boss and said I shouldn’t be so friendly and laugh with my client!! Wtf. That’s what I’m paid for. To be nice to my clients. Maybe she should try it.....

Not at me but when we were on honeymoon in the Maldives our rep had a drink with us one night and explained how she had to deal with a couple who had booked an overwater villa and complained that the sea was too noisy and they couldn't sleep. She had to transfer them to a less expensive room on the island and then they complained it was too sandy !

That one of our domestic cleaning staff would not (and could not) do some plumbing work for him.

She felt intimidated so I told her to leave the job site immediately and come to us, and then I withdrew services but told him the excuse that something had happened to the member of staff which left us unable to attend his home for the future, he then proceeded to intimidate and threaten me until I called the police who asked me to log the harassment but they also told me to tell him the truth to give him 'closure' ... so I did. He went absolutely crazy then and I wished I hadn't but at least it was being logged. Luckily he stopped after that day but after a whole of venting at me via email and calling me names. It was a scary day as he was huge and very threatening!

I've never had a bad experience like it before or since and I've been doing it 20 years but it taught me there are some scary people out their who could charm the birds from the trees on first appearances.

@TheFirstMrsDv. Have had this happen so many times!!!!! “Why did you cut my shirt off”? Because you were dying, and we stopped that happening. Well buy me a new f*%cking shirt. Erm, no. You’re still alive to be able to buy it yourself.

Not me but a workmate, many years ago, whose mother had died, and the funeral was arranged. Our (total and utter shit of a) boss moaned that this person going to their mother's funeral was happening on a really inconvenient day workwise as there was a lot on, and did this person really have to go, as it would cause problems?!
Sadly, this person needed their job so much they agreed to have just a few hours off for the funeral and come back into work after.

Sabine just Google dress shoes. The first results that come up are Jones Bootmaker and House of Frazier.

littlemiss if you were on an hourly rate to look after a child you should have eaten first. When we go to work it's usual to eat before we go, after we leave or during breaks.

I'm an academic in humanities. A student who received a much lower mark than they felt they were entitled to once complained that I looked "unprofessional" and couldn't be taken seriously because I wear skinny jeans, heeled boots and statement necklaces.

This was in a department where one of my male colleagues would wear the same grubby jumper for several weeks, slowly accumulating various meal-stains and another actually smelt so badly of cheese that students would refuse to go and see him in his office.

The complaint wasn't upheld and the little bastard was brought in for a thorough dressing down about sexism, respect etc.

I work in a restaurant and have heard most things over the past 8 years. One of the best was a woman who complained her salad was too cold.

I am of mediterranean descent so have olive skin. Gets darker in the summer, obviously. Having returned from my holidays to my Saturday job, I was removed from said job because customers complained about the 'brown girl' serving their food to them. This wasn't some rural outback, this was London. Admittedly it was 1972 but it stays with you.

“I worked for a bank and were told not to say "no problem" as it implied it was a problem to begin with.”

Good! I wouldn’t complain about it but the ubiquitous mindless ‘no problem’ irritates me to death. ‘I’d like to pay this in please’
‘No problem’
‘No, I wouldn’t expect there to be a bloody problem, it’s a bank, it’s your job, why act as if you are doing me a favour by solving some issue for me?’

I work in an industry that supplies products to companies that are open (and very busy) over the Christmas period.

Every year without fail I get shouted at for not being open on Christmas Day as if they have to, we should too. Totally ignoring the fact we lay on extra deliveries over this period and release our Christmas delivery schedule around 6 weeks in advance!

Another corker is when a customer swore up down and sideways they had ordered a product from us the previous week that we do not stock. I run reports to confirm not only do we not stock said item, but to give a blow by blow of previous orders from the last several years.

Nope, I'm just being awkward and they definitely did.

Oh and my all time favourite... wanting to order something that has been discontinued by our supplier. That's my fault and I should ask this huge company to re release the product for them to order 1 single bottle every 3 months and keep that stock readily available 'just in case' they ever want it again.

I have another ruined Christmas one. 18 yo DD was working in the food hall at M&S one year and on Christmas Eve someone came in and asked for the Madagascan Vanilla custard. DD told them that particular custard had sold out and showed them various alternatives. The customer was not happy and screamed in her face ' well I hope you are happy that you've ruined our Christmas'.

At the time I was outraged that someone could be so rude to an obviously very junior staff member but now I just think it's sad that someone could be so highly strung or have such a tense homelife that something so trivial could be so important.

One and only complaint while Nursing, upet me very much. Patient was going home, so fit and wel. Called me from her room saying she needed help, was really busy, called back I would be there as soon as I could, another nurse was nearby, she didnt ask her for anything. She carried on standing in her doorway watching me. When I had finnished I went to her, "How can I help", she wanted her bed turned down, she could have done it herself, or asked the nearby Nurse. INSTEAD, next shift I get called into the Office by the Sister, Son has made a "formal" complaint about me! I couldnt believe it, nor could the Sister, had been Nursing many years, never a complaint, and this one was ridiculous, still upsets me to this day, 7 years on.

Way back when, when I was a loan underwriter and account manager for a small loan business I got a complaint made about about me because I declined a loan application from one of my previous customers.

Applicant claimed I was discriminatory, hated her because of 'previous mistakes', was 'too posh to understand what it was like to be poor' (I'm not posh, just come from a part of the country with no distinctive regional accent, so I speak like a stereotypical English person in a film). My decision would lead to her children starving and them all becoming homeless and she hoped I could live with that. She also needed to money because she was a carer for her elderly mother, etc etc etc.

I had declined her application because the last loan she'd had she'd paid over a year late after telling the company (me,
mostly) that her mother was dying in hospital, then her mother died and she had funeral arrangements to pay for, then she was off work because she'd become guardian for her young siblings after her mother's death... this went on for months and months. A whole huge tale, and she'd sometimes be on the phone to me for a good half hour at a time. She was treated with the utmost sympathy, had interest free payment plans, all late charges removed etc etc - it was a small business so I had a lot of discretion.

Until her mother rang (it was definitely her, I needed to ID her to take the payment) and paid the balance for her daughter. I was most surprised to hear from her! She had a good rant about how sorry she was that her daughter hadn't paid, that she was bloody irresponsible and still lived at home and kept losing jobs.

Unsurprising the complaint was not upheld.

I dealt with a lot of complaints over the years, but this one always sticks in my mind. Another one who I remember for sheer audacity complained about me again for declining her loan application - because she'd made six previous fraudulent applications and when she sent her documents in I put the pieces together (our system picked up matching details on some of them - like where the funds were to be paid!) linked them all and blocked her. I told her why and she said it wasn't my job to do that, it was only my job to look at the application in front of me, and complained.

"If you’re slicing from a largish rectangle of cheese the sandwich is more likely to fall apart if the long slices are vertical instead of horizontal."

I don't understand this. I feel like I need.... a diagram.