To have been horrified by shop assistants complete lack of empathy

[WDY23]

Hello,

I have just come back from the local (ish) shop and the lady in front of me was taking her time at the till adjacent. Didn't think much of it initially, until I hear "no, that's not enough, you need to put x amount back". Very sharp and very cold. The woman, who I would say was in her 50's, had hearing aids and possible learning difficulties and was really struggling to understand what she needed to do. The 'assistant' was just staring at her through narrowed, icy eyes and folded arms.

The woman kept asking exactly how much did she have to put back, but the assistant clearly didn't think it was her job to offer any help whatsoever - just said "keep going", as this woman nervously scrambled through her shopping bags, putting them back on the counter. She clearly wasn't trying to get away with stealing or anything, she just needed a bit of help. I heard her say it was so expensive now, to which, you guessed it, the assistant responded with another cold, judgemental glare. She clearly didn't deem her worthy of a response. She then started apologising for the trouble, very nervously and I honestly could have cried for her.

The items she put back were essentials - bread, milk etc and I was appalled at the complete lack of humanity shown by this woman. I asked her if everything was OK and was even tempted to offer to help her pay for those essentials, but was also worried I might offend. She didn't really understand and just said another very sad "sorry" to me and to the assistant and she just rolled her eyes and shouted "next!".

My blood boiled. I was so cross, but I didn't know what to do. I was very close to confronting her, but my dd was with me and wasn't feeling well, so I didn't want to make her feel worse. Tempted to call and suggest that they offer this woman some extra customer service training, which would hopefully include some training in kindness and compassion. Maybe you can't teach this.

Anyway, I needed to share.

I sincerely hope I'm not alone in thinking how depressingly cold hearted this was....

That was a strange mixture of fonts! 😀

@CassiniG Yes, I did.

I'm horrified that there is a vulnerable woman, who doesn't have sufficient to eat, probably not the support or the means to help sort out her benefits and help with sustaining a tenancy. It is a truly sad state of affairs. She needed compasion and understanding from the shop assistant and yourself. If you can help it doesn't hurt to offer.

It’s very easy for people to say you should do this / that / the other. But benefit of hindsight and all that. We all know after the fact but at the time. not always that simple.

The sales assistant sounds like a knobber. Hope the lady was ok.

Sure this is an episode of What Would You Do?!

Id have paid for her shopping and bollocked he bitch behind the counter

@Ladyofthelake53 yes, I wish this is what I had done.

JohnnyYenSetHimselfOnFireAgain "If a shop assistant can't serve a customer without being polite they should look for a different role."

😆Yes, we can't have assistants being polite left, right and centre, can we? Customers might pass out with shock and hurt themselves.

I'd have called the manager straightaway and very loudly alerted them to the fact that their staff member was rude, unprofessional and discriminating against someone with a disability.

I don't understand why so many Brits are so reticent about speaking up for others.

In this situation I would have stepped in in some capacity.

I get frustrated about this post-event hand wringing, but hopefully after this experience you'll be more likely to step in at the time instead of lamenting afterwards.

Christ I'd hate to be a shop assistant nowadays. I thought teachers had it bad on MN but it seems to be a free for all against retail workers.

We normally get 'The assistant shouted' or 'sneered', 'mumbled', 'lazy' etc.

'Cold, judgemental icy stare' is upping the game at least 🤔

@andrainwillmaketheflowersgrow This is in her first post.

I asked her if everything was OK and was even tempted to offer to help her pay for those essentials, but was also worried I might offend.

She asked if she was okay.

That to me, is offering help.

Paying for the shopping is something different.

Maybe 'asking if she was okay' is not helping in your opinion?

It's not helping, no.

Helping is actually doing something - not offering platitudes but ultimately doing nothing.

You don't know the full story. Someone might have paid for her shopping another and since then it's become a routine and she's trying it on. This is the type of thing my nephew would do in supported housing. But being on the autism spectrum one kind gesture they may expect the same to happen every time they go in that shop.

@FuckingHellAdele thank you for the laugh

This post reads like a 14 year olds first attempt at Creative Writing, however the professionally offended are getting some mileage out of it so well done OP

Honestly doesn't surprise me. I'm increasingly finding in shops that the person serving is rude and dismissive. Literally doesn't even look at let alone speak to me (no response even when I say hello!) and only speaks to say the amount due. If that's the experience of someone moving quickly and efficiently through the till I can only imagine the rudeness to someone who might need a bit of support.

Don't know what's changed as it's noticeably worse recently. Maybe people are burnt out after a disruptive few years and just generally can't be bothered? Or society is overall becoming more focused on the self and that's being reflected in these type of day to day interactions?

And yes, I have worked in public facing roles for 10+ years so know the pressures. Even a nuisance customer can be chivvyed along and dealt with without resorting to rudeness (barring abuse, of course). Dealing professionally with a range of people with varying needs is literally what you sign up for in a public facing job!

If this happens just tell the shop assistant you will cover the difference and let the lady continue her day without embarrassment. Never know what any of them have been through. Even if the customer is a con artist, at least you did your good deed.

I can see two sides to this - retail workers often get treated with contempt, aggression and rudeness. We don't know what sort of day the woman behind the counter had had.

Compassion is always a good thing. Action even better, obvs. But why do you mention this lady was 'in her 50s with a hearing aid?' Neither being 50+ nor having a hearing deficit makes you a hopeless case!!

So you pay for her shopping then.
You have no idea if this women is a regular who behaves like this all the time.
Retail work is hard and can suck. Working with the public is very taxing, you put up with a lot of shit for very little money.

If you felt bad you should have stepped in

Rather than looking on 'horrified', you could have just said 'it looks like everyone's getting frustrated. Can I help?' And then offered to help the customer do whatever needed to be done.

Sometimes it just takes a friendly gesture to break up a load of escalating tension.

Neither are you. 🤷‍♀️

where the queue of people behind spontaneously burst into rapturous rounds of applause and booh-ed at the icy-starring evil shop assistant folding her arms like a pantomime villain.

This would have bothered me too OP and yes I probably would have complained about her. Some people are just rude for the sake of it.

If you have your receipt it will have the cashiers name or id number on it. I would definitely put in a complaint about the lack of 'customer service' at the end of the day it is part of the role when you work in retail, it won't fix the issue that happened but it might stop it happening to someone else.