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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Most ridiculous complaint

663 replies

PumpkinKlNG · 17/08/2021 10:01

I was in McDonald’s today (I know 😬) and a woman came in to complain to the manager that her food had dropped on the floor yesterday and was demanding her money back, she said it happened on the way home. Aibu to think this is the most ridiculous complaint? I was amazed someone would actually come back the following day to complain about that, has anyone else heard of a more ridiculous complaint?

OP posts:
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Boredmotherofone · 18/08/2021 23:34

@ThinWomansBrain

Payroll query - someone brandishing his engagement letter stating his engagement letter stating that his salary was £100k - so why had I written to him stating £8,333? Erm - because we pay you every month, so we pay 1/12 of your annual salary? This was about ten years ago, and he worked two or three days a week - so a fairly hefty salary, you'd have thought he should have been bright enough to work it out without asking! He did leave my office a bit sheepishly Grin
An actor by any chance?!?
ThinWomansBrain · 18/08/2021 23:41

@Boredmotherofone - Management Consultant type of role - businesses paying the organisation about £1k daily for his time to tell them how to organise their business FFSShock

TheMoreThisReachesTheMainstrea · 18/08/2021 23:45

We got home from shopping, unpacked and discovered the grapes were missing. We went back to the shop, no one had handed in a bag of grapes and they refunded us. We got home and discovered the grapes in the fridge We blamed each other and didn’t go back to that store for a while

Chouetted · 18/08/2021 23:52

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll

There's just so much wrong with the Argos ironing board one, though - the expectation that they will have an ironing-board-sized bag readily available is significantly less disturbing than the fact they were clearly expecting the 'lucky' recipient of such an exciting 'surprise present' to be delighted by it!

Really rough of the manager to give a service black mark for that, though - could the manager explain exactly where a suitable bag would have been available?

They certainly at one point had extremely large bags. I think I remember this only because I had bought something bulky elsewhere, then went to Argos. They saw me struggling with it and kindly bagged up my normal-size purchase in what I can only describe as an Argos branded bin bag, then helped me wrestle the bulky item in as well.
AliceMcK · 18/08/2021 23:57

Complaints I’ve had to deal with….

“Your hold music gives me a headache”
“Your customer service consultant told me I was eating his brain” then the consultant complained I was picking on him because I gave him a warning after listening to the call. Apparently it was not his fault so many people complained about him and he shouldn’t be expected to be nice to people as he was just a “customer service” consultant.
“I didn’t win the charity golf tournament you invited me to” (NB clients got a free weekend of very expensive booze, food, gifts, travel and accommodation at an exclusive golf resort.
“Your only telling me it’s not in stock because your racist”
“Your company only declined my claim because I’m pretty” she even put a picture of herself on the complaint letter and included newspaper clippings of an article where she’d made another complaint that she was being harassed and getting parking fines because she was pretty and drove a pink Porsche.

I’m sure there are more but these are just off the top of my head.

JudgeJ · 19/08/2021 00:02

@ALongHardWinter

Years ago I worked in a off licence. We had a regular customer who would come in and berate the staff for selling him alcohol, because it made him get drunk.
I seem to recall that a person who shot someone, (in the US) sued the manufacturer of the gun he'd used for supplying him with it.
Changechangychange · 19/08/2021 00:07

@PumpkinKlNG

Thinking about these my mum actually complained once to a Chinese take away that the food was disgusting, they said that’s ok bring it back then and we will give you your money back, she said she can’t because she’s already eaten it (couldn’t have been that disgusting then!)
I was sitting in a takeaway waiti Ng for my order once and somebody came in saying the same thing!

Apparently she’d ordered some food about a week ago, hadn’t enjoyed it, and so wanted some money back off the owner now. Obviously no proof of purchase. Looked like an obvious scam to me!

yacketyyak · 19/08/2021 00:10

Place mark 🤩

WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll · 19/08/2021 00:14

Recently in a local arcade I heard a woman complaining to management that they’d spent about £30 on a claw machine and hadn’t won a teddy and that it was a ridiculous amount of money to spend and not win a small toy and they should be given one out of the machine

I actually have a tiny bit of sympathy for her there - although certainly not to the point of continuing to play, spending so much and demanding to be given one free.

I used to be amazing at the teddy grabbing machines - even to the point of expectantly taking an empty bin bag with me on school trips to Alton Towers and bringing it back nearly full (never cared about the rides) Blush - but then, other than the odd rogue one, grabbing machines just about everywhere were fair and it was possible to win in two or three goes with a keen eye and a steady hand.

Then, at some point around 20 years or so ago, as if due to some kind of country-wide arcade conspiracy, teddy grabbing machines just about everywhere suddenly became a universal scam, meaning that, however accurate you were, the claw was suddenly far too loose/limp/greased to lift the teddy and would open right up again on its way back up, without even the slightest jerk or dislodging of the teddy.

I still see the grabbing machines now and again and get an urge to go on again 'like the old days', but on the odd occasion that I forget and do just that, I invariably re-learn that they're still rigged nowadays and absolutely impossible to win. I waste £1, though - I don't go on and chuck away £30!

JudgeJ · 19/08/2021 00:18

@riceuten

Parent applies for a place for their son using 3 variations of their christian names (i.e. using each one of the boy's 3 names, and then the other 2 names to follow). Same address, same date of birth. System threw it up as "possibly triplets (no sibling data)" and "possibly fraud".

Spent AGES on the phone to the mum that if the child didn't get in due to distance, the number of applications she made were irrelevant. She didn't get a place, so she put in a formal complaint! (She lived way away from the school)

She also told us she was" planning her appeal" She even used 3 different mobiles to make the application to make it look less suspicious.

I had a parent who didn't get their first choice of secondary school, refused the offer we made (they'd only made one choice), so instead they just bought the uniform of the school they were rejected from, and sent the child there on the 1st September!. When the school rang us to query who on earth this child was, the mum went absolutely ballistic, but at least the Councillor she then contacted gave her short shrift.

BUT...I had a nightmare experience when I worked in social rented housing. I had a tenant come and surrender a tenancy on Friday afternoon. No rent arrears, she'd paid up to the end of the month, said we'd refund her the rest minus a weeks' notice. I then visit the property with a Sitex bar (for those of you not housing officers, it's an anti-theft bar that fits through the letterbox and secures the door). Normally we fit a Sitex door (which covers the whole door) but Friday pm...not a chance, I did try, but they couldn't do it. I got an operative down to disconnect the gas and electrics, I go back to the office to complete the paperwork and go home. Monday morning, I come in, and the manager orders me into her office. She then questions me as to "why I hadn't secured the void property "properly"?" My heart sunk as I thought squatters had moved in there, but no. A gang of kids had broken into the flat and one of them had electrocuted himself trying to reconnect the electrics, and had to be taken to hospital. The parents had contacted a local councillor, who immediately blamed me for "leaving the property wide open" (I had the foresight to take a picture of the locked door). The Estate Manager was completely useless and had only been appointed because she was a member of the ruling party in the borough and a CPF of the Councillor so backed him 100%. I had been neglectful and I "should have tried harder with Sitex". She, of course, was not present on Friday afternoon, so it was not as if she could have talked them round. Every time I tried to turn the conversation to "Why are we defending someone who broke into one of our properties?", she subject was changed.

I had to get the union involved, and they threatened to go to the press about it, before they backed down.

I wonder if the mother was the same one we had problems with when she couldn't get her own way. Year 11 were told in September that we were having a proper Leavers' Party, dinner and disco at a posh hotel, one on the first schools locally to do it. They started Year 11 with a clean sheet but if the exceeded a certain number of serious offences they wouldn't be allowed to go and this boy managed that. A letter was sent home and she went totally ballistic, he was going, she was reporting us etc etc. Come the evening a coach was picking up everyone outside school and she was there with son, all dressed up, demaning he should go. Eventually she lay down in the road in front of the bus! The staff offered the driver a few fivers to roll forward a bit.....!
WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll · 19/08/2021 00:20

They certainly at one point had extremely large bags. I think I remember this only because I had bought something bulky elsewhere, then went to Argos. They saw me struggling with it and kindly bagged up my normal-size purchase in what I can only describe as an Argos branded bin bag, then helped me wrestle the bulky item in as well.

Hmm, I seem to remember the ones that were about the same size as a very large bin bag, if not a bit bigger - so ideal for a big bulky boxed toy or a gigantic teddy bear; but how would something the size, shape and consistency of an ironing board (which would in any case need two bags to cover it) ever be suited to a carrier bag? You would either tuck it under one arm or otherwise carry it at the front with both hands - who has ever wanted, needed or expected to transport a full-size ironing board in a carrier bag?!

Mamanyt · 19/08/2021 00:44

I was in a big box store at one point, and a customer was loudly complaining about being forced to move to the back of the store. A TORNADO had touched down in the parking lot, and she wanted to watch it through the plate glass windows! She finally shut up when a car was tossed through one of those windows.

Justilou1 · 19/08/2021 03:28

I was a flight attendant prior to having kids. I had a customer write a written complaint because I rudely refused to get him a cup of coffee and was “too busy paying attention to the passenger next to him.” This part was bsolutely factual. However when he said that I deliberately turned the other passengers against him and made them “abusive” towards him, he was using a bit of creative license. I had been doing CPR on a passenger in the aisle next to this sociopath who repeatedly pressed his call bell and called me “Sweetie” and “Honey” and saying “When you’ve got a minute…” until two guys nearby yelled “Will you shut up and leave her alone???” I had to do CPR until we were strapped in for landing, again once we were taxi-ing and the paramedics took over. No way did the poo bloke make it. This arsehole was bitching the entire time.

Soubriquet · 19/08/2021 05:06

[quote Meeklynamechanged]I had a friend who made a lucrative hobby out of complaining Grin

www.google.com/amp/s/www.thesun.co.uk/living/2528648/uks-biggest-complainer-claims-to-rake-in-400-worth-of-freebies-every-month-by-whinging-at-companies/amp/[/quote]
Wow….

I’ve only complained once and got £40 worth of vouchers for it

Mind you, it was a spider in my chocolate bar so £40 was a reasonable compensation

Cantbelieveit101 · 19/08/2021 05:07

used to work at a department store in the kitchenware area, I had a customer buy some nice rice bowls. I wrapped them up nicely in tissue paper and off she went.

About 30 mins later she rang the department and said that when she got home she tripped over her dog and dropped the bowls and they smashed. She wanted replacements.....

FakingMemories · 19/08/2021 05:26

I used to work in the complaints department of a well-known package holiday company. One of the most common complaints was that the hotel in Spain/Turkey/Greece didn’t serve chips at meal times.

One of my favourite complaints was someone who missed the flight home because they hadn’t changed their watch to local time. They had kept their watch on UK time the whole holiday and also assumed that because they booked the holiday with a UK travel agent and the tickets were in English that the time of the flight was UK time.

BananaMilkshakeWithCream · 19/08/2021 05:46

@TreeSmuggler

Mine is similar to the OP, also happened in McDonald's. Customer came in and told me that the day before, she bought take away, then in the car park she had a seizure and got taken to hospital by ambulance. She wanted a refund on the food because she never got to eat it. Confused

Thank god I don't work there anymore!

😂 This has happened to me before (I’ve got epilepsy) but I would never think to ask for a refund. The latest was abandoning 2 cakes and 2 drinks for £20 due to a seizure 😞

Anyway, when I worked in a call centre as a teenager, I once had a man call up and demand a full refund on two weeks payment of his monthly plan as he wouldn’t be there to watch the telly. NO!!

Bogeyes · 19/08/2021 06:34

@Iamclaracowbell

Used to work at a supermarket. Lady came in at Easter time wanting our TTD/Finest super duper fancy HCBs (as opposed to the generic store branded ones - this was in the days when you din't get all the fancy apple / marmite / choc chip ones). We had sold out as they were on offer, so I suggested she might want to pop back the next day if she really needed those particular ones, or we had plenty of the others. She went absolutely ballistic, screaming at me that I had RUINED her Easter, it went on for ages. I just stood there and stared at her totally bemused, eventually she ran out of steam and flounced off.

My fave ever complaint was a man who had bought our chinese crispy beef ready meal, which was labelled for 2 people as a main. He didn't think it was big enough to be for 2 people, so he'd actually gone and bought the same dish from his local takeaway and weighed it, and then compared the amounts. He was demanding we contact head office and tell them to relabel it as just for one person, we had to ask him to leave the store in the end and write to head office.

Some people are just totally batshit.

What's a TTD? HCB?
Toria1586 · 19/08/2021 06:40

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll I too have a little bit of sympathy because of the reasons you say - years ago you could actually win on them. But after a couple of quid lost I walk away - it’s renown they are a scam I just can’t fathom why she kept putting the money in

OoglyMoogly · 19/08/2021 06:49

@Bogeyes

TTD Taste the difference
HCB Hot Cross Bund

At a guess Grin

maddiemookins16mum · 19/08/2021 06:59

@FakingMemories

I used to work in the complaints department of a well-known package holiday company. One of the most common complaints was that the hotel in Spain/Turkey/Greece didn’t serve chips at meal times.

One of my favourite complaints was someone who missed the flight home because they hadn’t changed their watch to local time. They had kept their watch on UK time the whole holiday and also assumed that because they booked the holiday with a UK travel agent and the tickets were in English that the time of the flight was UK time.

So did I (for 8 years), we could be here all night 🤣
mogsrus · 19/08/2021 07:05

was wondering when someone would start about claw machines in arcades,unless it states,win every time,look for the little black sticker that says,this machine provides facilities for gambling,. as for the person that claims she put 30 quid in,don't make me laugh i hear it ever day as I actually service these m achines& it's just not true,

idontgetpaidenoughforthis · 19/08/2021 07:11

I worked at M&S years ago and had a woman come in after Valentine's Day to complain that the flowers she had sent to herself at the office had the senders name on them.

youdoyoutoday · 19/08/2021 07:23

@idontgetpaidenoughforthis

I worked at M&S years ago and had a woman come in after Valentine's Day to complain that the flowers she had sent to herself at the office had the senders name on them.
That made me chuckle!! 🤣🤣