To wonder why so many people are so awful to serving/retail staff?

[KevinTheKoala]

Just that really, I am a waitress and have been a retail worker before this and while there have always been horrible customers it genuinley seems to be getting more frequent. Myself and my colleagues are on minimum wage just trying to do our jobs so we really deserve such vitriol? Just yesterday I was given abuse from a very large table of people because they wanted to buy their very young child an age restricted product, then lied to another waitress about how long I had left them waiting (we have a timer on the food we can clearly see how long a table has been waiting) when I had a full section and really was trying my best. I don't think a single day goes by anymore without receiving some sort of abuse or false complaint and its really starting to get me down, are we really so worthless that we deserve to be treated this way? I can't stick up for myself, luckily my managers now are fantastic and will stick up for me but not all managers are. I feel trapped, I dread going to work because people can be so awful (some are lovely but you never know who will be nasty) but I can't afford to not go to work and every job in my pay grade means I will be subjected to some sort of abuse. I m not very resilient I admit that, years of childhood abuse, domestic abuse from previous relationships, bullying etc. Have left me a shell who is petrified of confrontation/dissapointing anybody. Unfortunately NHS doesn't offer much help for that and I can't pay for private therapy because I am on minimum wage and still rely on tips to get by at the end of the month so there isn't alot I can do about my lack of resilience but even so, a that isn't a reason for people to be so vile.

@DeclineandFall

People can just fuck off with the whole women 50+ are the worst. I'm that age group and there's no way they are any worse than any of the other arseholes out there. I worked in hospitality when I was younger and I generally liked serving middle aged women. Middle aged pervy entitled men were way worse where I was because there were more of them. It's just sexist and ageist bullshit.

Men were definitely the worst for me. Given most of my retail work was in stores with a largely female customer base, I've got a disproportionate number of stories of rude angry men.

Because to public we are "just a waitress" or "just retail staff."
I don't really talk to my brother now as he was vile to me for getting a retail job. Yeah we get abuse every single day and lots of my colleagues have been threatened or even physically assaulted.
It does seem if you work in retail or hospitality you are not seen as a real person but someone for the public to have a go at.
I've left work in tears before now. Manager is okay when he's there but I've seen him get a mouthful of abuse for sticking up for his staff more other than once.
You'd think everything we've been through would make people nicer but clearly not if you're in retail or hospitality.

Men were definitely the worst for me. Given most of my retail work was in stores with a largely female customer base, I've got a disproportionate number of stories of rude angry men.

This exactly. It depends on where you work and who your customer base is who's doing the complaining. Dicks are dicks. They don't get to 50 and just turn into one. And the point I was making earlier was that middle aged men were mostly our clientele so they made up most of the complainants. So not ageist.

Entitlement is a big factor these days.

Should see the shit that goes down in a job centre, every hour there is someone being verbally abused, police having to be called at least once a day. I understand to an extent that it’s stressful but most of the staff are just trying to help.

I’m always nice to waitresses etc and do tip if I’ve received good service, because I know it’s nice to feel valued.

I have to say I notice very often that it is people of a certain age group...

I wouldn't say women +50 are ruder but there's different types of rudeness and women employ more varieties than men, across all age groups. Men are more likely to try to intimidate, though.

Something I did notice working for a "naice" brand was that older ladies- 70+ are more likely to want to be waited on or expect your full, undivided attention no matter how busy your shopfloor or how low your staff count. Sometimes it's because they are in need of more assistance - which we are happy to give- and some of it is because they just expect that style of service still. The latter is fine when it's quiet but when it's busier and they get petulant, it doesn't come across well.

I volunteer in a charity shop (I'm over 60 myself) and find that older people can be the rudest. At least once a day I get someone being unnecessarily rude. I was told once that if it wasn't for them I'd be out of a job. (For refusing to haggle). By others that I was lucky to have a job and not have to live on a pension. (For refusing to haggle). That I was losing money for the charity (by refusing to haggle). On a couple of occasions I've had people threaten to speak to my manager and I "could lose my job" I'm not some horrible tartar and I've never been rude to a customer, even when they're rude to me. I love the job, which is why I've done it for 10 years and never been put off by the odd arsehole. But I wish more people realised that the till person in the charity shop is doing it for nothing. Zilch. No money at all, and as such am way more valuable to the charity shop than they are if they're going to behave offensively. We're thin on the ground in the the COVID hotspots around the country. There. I feel better now.

@MrsToothyBitch This is tricky. There is a certain standard you expect, which varies by the type of place. But an awful lot of the time there just aren't the staff to do the job properly. (And this was true pre Brexit and Covid). So I don't think people are unreasonable to think it's a bit crap. What is unreasonable is taking it out on the staff on the frontline. But even then there's a difference between saying, 'I know this isn't your fault, but this is a bit crap' and giving someone abuse. And people do forget the qualifier.
And yes, I have been the shop assistant trying to balance phoning customer services with serving customers. I made sure I acknowledged to customers that I should be giving them my full attention, but couldn't etc.

I work in charity retail and find some of the behaviour of others quite funny but I'm quite sharp and not worried about politely putting people in their place.
We sell furniture and despite explaining to people all of the conditions of accepting furniture, they absolutely lie through their teeth about the condition, age etc of furniture they want us to pick up, so we book the van to collect and if they don't pick it up, sometimes customers go mad because they really think we are a dumping ground for their crap, unsellable items! It doesn't even occur to them that they are literally costing the charity money and taking services away from people in need! All they can see is their own need.
We also get people who decide to collect furniture themselves from the shop but don't bring anyone to help. They really expect 85 year old Doris from the back room to hoik a 6 foot sideboard on her back and lug it to their car!
Don't even get me started on haggling.....!

The thing is when people are saying that it's women ages 50+ who are the ones who are the rudest they are talking about their own experiences and unfortunately I have to admit that it's my experience as well, but that's not saying all women in that age group are like that at all. I have two regular women who insist I serve them each time they come in and are absolutely lovely but I don't think its fair to discount other people's experiences.

Think it was Blackadder who said "The abused kick downwards, Baldrick". I always thought this sort of thing just said a lot about the person behaving that way - they must be unhappy or have some sort of problem to come out and speak to a stranger like dirt just because the stranger can't argue back. Of course, that doesn't make it OK or easy to deal with. I used to handle it by being very clear in my mind that it wasn't about me and by "killing with kindness". I'd make a lot of sympathetic noises, give them my full attention and go out of my way to make them feel heard. 9 times out of 10 it worked.

It's funny b/c I'm not really a people person at all, but I was good at mollifying irate customers and often would step in to deal with them to spare other staff members who were getting it in the neck, especially younger women / teens, who seem to be targeted by dickheads sometimes.

Having done a lot of waitressing, I disagree that middle aged women are any worse than other demographics. I had trouble from people of all ages and both sexes and didn't recognise any pattern in that regard.

ATEOTD I think it's still true that MOST people are reasonable and pleasant enough and the twats are still in the minority.

@CoolOven Volunteers are heroes!
I also say to anyone who moans that we can't accept their donations as we're full 'oh we are desperately short of volunteers at the moment and really need more people to help out if you know anyone who might be interested'
They soon stop moaning and leave quickly!!!

@lorw lots of people at job centres are in desperate situations. If I had no food in the house and the job centre told me I was being sanctioned and I had kids, I would probably get upset or angry too.

People are shit.

Society is sick.

Social media and tech are killing manners and how we relate to people. Community and compassion are dying.

Companies pit customers and staff against one another to maximise profits.

No training for not enough low paid staff and shit products/services at a high cost for customers make for a healthy balance sheet (temporarily) but a powder keg in the shop floor.

People can just fuck off with the whole women 50+ are the worst

Without wanting to seem argumentative, as I said upthread, I've worked regularly in a charity shop sometimes 3 or 4 shifts a week for the past 10 years and the vast majority of rude customers are 50+ women.
Some men too, but they are, for some reason, generally in the 30 -50 age group. I've been at leisure to make these observations.
I'm a 60+ woman myself - maybe that explains why they think they can be rude to me, and skews my observations. Who knows?

melrosewasrobbed I used to use "kill them with kindness" a lot, especially in retail where you'd get those particular customers who would try to goad you into being rude back so they could demand compensation, I'd be sickeningly polite to them (while not giving them what they wanted). They'd end up looking foolish effing and blinding at the sweet tiny 5ft shop girl.

What about physical violence? I have had my share of rude customers (men and women) but I've never been attacked.
My colleague though has a black eye at the moment given to him by a customer.
Do people think it's not acceptable to hit a female shop assistant but for some reason the rules change if its a male shop assistant?
And it was an older man who gave him the black eye.
Just wondered if women get physically attacked at work or if it's mostly verbal? And why would anyone think it's okay to hit anyone who's doing their job.

@StrawberrySquash it is very tricky. I would always rather give as much help as possible but people bitching about how busy it was- despite knowingly walking into a busy shop and getting a face like a slapped arse when staff had to step away to help other people rather than just follow them round in silence seemed to be an older +70/75 lady thing.

As a customer, I don't see much rude behaviour from other customers, but I do see some ridiculously demanding behaviour and I often want to say something but don't because I don't want to embarrass the member of staff.

Examples - at a hotel someone moaning about the length of time their egg had been boiled for, having said how long they wanted it to be boiled for. Waitress brought them another one which was "perfect" but had been boiled for longer than they had said they did at home.

Another example, guy on hotel terrace taking his shirt off and showing off his hairy beer belly. Says to hotel staff "you don't mind do you". Of course she politely said no, I would have said I minded but as mentioned didn't want to put her in an awkward position.

And then the people who constantly ask the cabin crew for things on a plane - when the flight is about 55 minutes...

So it's not just being rude, it's just being demanding or disgusting for the sake of it.

Retail is an ordeal though. You either have virtually no staff at all (Boots) or staff following you round hassling you (some department stores). What about a happy medium where you can find staff easily if you need help, but don't get hassled or have to go from till to till trying to find one that is open?

Do people think it's not acceptable to hit a female shop assistant but for some reason the rules change if its a male shop assistant?

Neither is acceptable, thankfully I haven't been hit the worst I've had is my wrist being grabbed, but two of my female colleagues have both been physically assaulted. Verbal abuse is far, far more common but physical attacks also happen.

I wonder if women 75 plus ask for more help because service standards used to be higher? Not the fault of staff, but it is frustrating when there are not enough staff.
I worked in a toy shop for a bit and had time to help grandparents for example shopping for toys but without much idea of what to buy.

Re hitting shop staff, not ok to hit anyone! Ever!

When I trained with a big sporting goods brand (I worked under their retail umbrella so had their manager training but didn't work in the eponymous), the loss prevention and security training included self defence- including a "safe" way to counter strike people trying to hit us. I had a female manager colleague who'd almost been stabbed with a dirty needle and my trainer had been throttled over a counter before. He hit the under till panic button and staff involved the police.

I do wonder if technology adds to it.
In Nandos other week you scanned a thing with your phone and were told to take a seat. It said wait was x time. It then jumped to a longer time.
Man opposite was absolutely vile to young waitress - it said 9 minutes now it says 11. If he’d just been told wait is approx 15 mins then he’d have had nothing to kick off about it was like it set him off.

@julieca

I wonder if women 75 plus ask for more help because service standards used to be higher? Not the fault of staff, but it is frustrating when there are not enough staff. I worked in a toy shop for a bit and had time to help grandparents for example shopping for toys but without much idea of what to buy.

I think this is incredibly fair - and we hated being under staffed, too, but the attitude of some of them was very much that they wanted pretty much everyone available to fawn on them and a dedicated person to just follow them round. These ladies would walk into a busy shop during peak office lunch break hours on a day near Christmas and basically sulk because they weren't being toadied after the second they graced us with their presence, basically.

I will add that not everyone older was like that, but the people who were like that were all older.

That's a stupid level of expectation setting - and entitlement!