Rude customers!!

[skimask]

I'm just wondering if any of you have ever been unnecessarily rude to a staff member in a shop or if you've intentionally loudly complained about a price or if you've been the staff member in a situation like that?

I work at a charity shop as an assistant manager and the amount of rude customers we have/customers asking for money off/people saying we're a rip off is crazy!!

Also people coming in 5mins before close and then ignoring us when we say we're closing, is my town just full of rude people or are there people everyone that are so ignorant and rude!!!!!

Rant over lmao

Also when I used to work in a supermarket on the tills, on a Sunday we shut at 4. I used to see people coming in through the exit doors challenging the security guards saying “I only need to get some milk” etc.
Also the people that came to the supermarket at 3.55pm expecting to do their weekly shop were told by the security guard as they came in “just so you’re aware, we are shut at 4 so you’ll need to finish your shopping as soon as possible” and people would tell them “well I’m a paying customer you can’t chuck me out.”

Like really 🤔

I came to realise that the issue with closing time lay with employer, not customer. If a shop closes at 10 staff should be paid until 10.15. This gives them time to serve stragglers, cash up, lock up, shutters down.
You will almost always work 15 minutes a day for nothing, and whilst I wouldn't go in with a full trolley at 9.50 I cant really blame the customers that do.

Oh and I now work for the NHS. The vast majority of people are lovely but you do get some "interesting" characters.

No but then I worked in retail and hospitality for a few years and realise how difficult a job it can be.

Story time!

As a teenager I once worked at a bar for a posh event. The bar opened at 11am for drinks but did coffee and breakfast from 8 am although hardly anyone came to that.

At around 8.30 am three businessmen walk in and one asks for champagne in a fairly abrupt way. I (very politely) told him the way the bar worked, coffee and food and then I could get his order ready for 11am on the dot but couldn't do it before.

He went ballistic. He demanded to see the manager. Manager comes out. He shouts that he is from THE BBC and this GIRL won't give him his champagne. Manager grovels and says he can have it. Manager vents to me what a c u next Tuesday we have on our hands.

Mr. BBC then demands I take the champagne over to him personally and serve it. OK. The two men with him looked absolutely mortified but Mr. BBC is clearly enjoying what in his mind is an enormous victory over me. Mr. BBC then starts lecturing me about how I said he couldn't have the drink and now he has it.

I am like

Manager (a lovely man who had seen it all before) calmly walked over and discreetly put down the bill.

"What's this?!" Mr. BBC gasps..

Turns out the only reason he bulldozed in demanding champagne for him and his two highly embarrassed companions was that he thought working at the BBC meant he got it free. He went beetroot red and slammed his card down on the table. The two guys he was with could barely stop laughing.

I've suffered many a rude arsehole but at least that one got some karma.

I work at a university, and now the students are customers in every sense of the word.

Far too many of them have terrible attitudes, manners, don't listen, lie , harass or threaten you .

Also, having worked in a university library, there is a staggering amount of theft of university property and resources, and peoples property, which can only have been done by students or staff.

Public facing roles are never dull, I'll say that.

It’s not just in shops. I make jewellery and attend craft fairs quite regularly. People seem to think you’re invisible. A woman was looking at my stuff once and said ‘they’re lovely but I’m not paying that price’. Another time a young girl came to look at my stall. An older woman, presumably her mother, came over and said ‘come on, we’re not buying crap like that’.

The worst was a lady who had a stall next to me once, she was selling knitted baby items. Man and woman came along. Woman picked a sweet little jumper up. ‘What do you think of this for so-and-so?’ Man looked at it, ‘bloody horrible!’ he said and off they went. You learn to develop a thick skin doing craft fairs!

AdobeWanKenobi that is sometimes the case although I have had the situation where unless you shut and lights off at 10 customers take advantage even more. I can think of 2 times in particular 1 in retail we shut at 9 and as I was leaving at 9.30 someone pushed past through the door just needing a few bits. The 2nd in a pub quiet night 1 customer in at 9 not ordered a drink since they first came in. Around 10 I said I was shutting, at 11 I turned the lights off at midnight I informed them I was locking up and leaving at 12.30 they finally got their stuff together and sat outside to keep using the free wi-fi, wish I could have turned it off!

I remember when I was 16 and worked in a shop, and a customer was hellishly rude to me. I was upset. My manager, who was an awful person too, didn’t back me up or support me. He parroted, “The customer is always right!”

So I said, fair enough. see that one over there, just called you a twat.

Oh yes, I briefly worked in a university library and the way some students talk to you...

Leave rubbish all over the floor, shout at you when they can’t submit an assignment at five minutes to the deadline, pick up a book, read the back and then put it on the floor or throw it back on the shelf. I was forever saying in my head “put it back where you found it!”

I ended up sitting next to the manager of our local very large Sainsbury’s at a social event recently
He kept me amused with tales of awful customers all evening ( none of which were identifiable before anyone gets outraged). He did tell me about some lovely ones too but he said that sadly they were in the minority

I just remembered a classic story. Middle of my shift the fire alarm goes off most people just leave except 1 with a full trolley who not only insisted om finishing her shopping but then paying for it before she left! Fortunately it was a false alarm but it was at least 5 minutes from the alarm going off to us leaving. Though she was reasonably polite.

When I was a teen I worked at a supermarket on weekends while I did my a levels. Every Saturday evening a man would come in with his wife with a hugely laden-down trolley and he would make it his mission to seek out the checkout with the "this till is closing, another colleague will be happy to help you" sign and deliberately ignore the staff who would say "I'm closing now, sorry", shouting and ranting and intentionally making staff cry.

There was a fabulous older lady called Doreen on the tills who took no nonsense, and I remember one weekend I was feeling quite ropey and she'd got my till ready to close so I could go home. He marched up as she put the barrier across and was unbelievably rude to her. She let him unload his whole trolley onto my conveyor belt and watched as he stood in front of me and at the very last minute told me "you can go now" and shut down my till. He went absolutely off his nut and she smiled and said "perhaps next time you'll listen when we tell you this checkout's closing".

I've never seen anything quite so lovely as Doreen's face that day, merrily smiling at that hideous man who made it his mission to be rude and unkind every week. I've also never, ever been rude or unkind to anyone in a shop or customer role because a) who the fuck does that and b) everyone's just trying to get through the day. If I see people being rude in supermarkets now I always say something to them because it drives me mad how unkind and rude people are.

I still work in retail and the rudeness I face is unbelievable. A colleague was told that they should get cancer for not doing a refund (they were not eligible for one), I was shouted at for overcharging a customer by 12:52, I had to explain what they were pointing at was the time and that it was ten to one in the afternoon-no apology for the shouting. Only two weeks ago I had to mop up piss because someone decided to use our changing room as a toilet and tried to hide it by piling our clothing on top so all new clothing was ruined and had to be destroyed! I saw someone shoplift once and they threatened to wait outside the shop after my shift and rape me. The list goes on

From reading this we are all lovely! So who are these d*ckheads ruining our days???

I have been rude when I've been waiting and the staff just deliberately ignore you instead of acknowledging that you are there and saying '1 minute'. I've walked out of several pubs because of this - and the staff weren't serving, they were faffing about with shit behind the bar. I also do it when they a chatting and ignore you too.

@JacquesHammer haggling at a CShop isn't rude but it's incredibly ignorant.. we put that price because that's what we are told to put. If they don't like it they don't have to buy it.. we're a charity raising money for unfortunate children not a charity for the general public!

I suppose I haven't been rude as such, just assertive.

We once had a gun pulled by someone who couldn't have their own way!
We were waiting to check in to a hotel in the States, the man in front was told the hotel was fully booked, another clerk then started to check us in and the man went ballistic, we were f***g foreigners, he should have the room we're getting etc etc. and eventually he pulled a gun! The staff were very quick to disarm and contain him but it was a bit nervy!

Coniferhedge

I understand what you're saying, and I'd never say anything like that, though I do admit that I hate shopping at craft stalls for this reason!

Looking at what I like and don't like, but not being able to say because the maker is right there - makes for a very uncomfortable experience! Maybe you guys should all switch stalls so that everyone can speak freely!

The customer who wanted a particular brand of champagne that was buried under boxes in the back, despite there being 20 alternatives on the shelf? I used to dig out the one he wanted and give it a violent shake in the stock room before handing it to him with a smile on my face

This is just spiteful!

If someone prefers a particular brand, then they prefer it. Do you not have preferences of your own?

And I assume that if it was in the stock room it was there to be sold?

Asking for a particular item is not "being rude".

Regarding last customers, one of the funniest thing I've ever seen was on Christmas Eve in an Asda, 3.45, closing for 4. One woman, stinking of alcohol, was yelling at a manager because there were no fresh sprouts, how stupid to have to sprouts at Christmas, complete with the foul language. The fact that a lot of customers laughed didn't make her any happier.

Last minute customers of course.

One look at the recurring threads here about being asked for ID should tell you everything you need to know... how "furious" they are they couldn't buy their wine, it's "ridiculous", we're all just "jobsworths on a power trip", etc...

I have one customer I'll never forget - she came in at 16:50 (we closed at 17:00) and as she entered the shop I said 'I'm just letting you know we're closing in 10 minutes' she acknowledged and then came to the till at 16:59, by the time I put everything through it was 17:05.

Then as she was leaving she asked to look at a pair of shoes that were very high up I'd need to go up and get the ladder so I told her 'I know they're a size 7, the ladders upstairs and I can't leave the shop floor but we are actually closed now so I'm going to have to ask you to leave'. Then I got the whole 'I HAVE WORKED IN RETAIL 30 YEARS I KNOW YOU CAN LEAVE THE SHOP FLOOR' so I just told her it was the charity's policy that I couldn't leave the shop unattended.

She then refused to leave and I threatened to call the police and I was literally begging her lol, it got very boring until I said 'I have a home and family to get back to' she replied 'well so do I' so I just said 'well I'm sure they're missing you then, go home!!!!!'

Now every time she comes in and I serve her she doesn't even talk 😂