Man complained about me re yoghurt brand stopped doing a flavour

[Auburngal]

I was at work. Man (early 80s) asked me why we stopped doing a certain flavour yoghurt and the other two supermarkets stopped selling too.

Had my work’s handset on me and went onto the brand’s website and there wasn’t the flavour listed. Brand have dropped the flavour. On hearing the news - he flipped

He then went to the CSD asking for a manager. Manager said the same thing as me.

Do people realise that behaving like this is making staff leave retail?

It depends though. Isn't it about wanting to do the very best you can in your job? There are ways of dealing with people that is sympathetic and conciliatory rather than winding the situation up by being aggressive back.

I've always worked in public facing roles and generally had few problems, but my roles were professional so I think the perception of the public is they can get away with talking down to shop workers because there's this idea they aren't important. It's the perception that's wrong. They kept working during covid when lots of people were sat at home twiddling their thumbs.

What I'm trying to say is it's the public that need educating about how important retail workers are, and the retailers need to put more resources into training and trying to be the best they can.

My retail nightmare story...at the height of covid I worked in a small village shop. As the only shop in the village we were allowed to stay open but with very strict mask and social distancing rules. We had a lot of problem enforcing masks, but my boss was very strict because in my area they were actively inspecting and issuing fines to businesses at the time.

My boss put a sign on the door that basically read "It's your human right not to wear a mask BUT it's our right not to let you in the shop blah blah blah" very sarcastic thing but the message was clear; wear a mask.

Que a man screaming at me telling me it's outrageous our sign says he doesn't have to wear his mask in the shop as covid is rife and people are dying etc., I tried to explain politely as I could the sign wasn't saying that - it was saying the reverse and then it turned into "are you calling me stupid?!"

A couple of other people witnessed this and gave me sympathetic looks and made remarks after he left but no one actually stepped in to help me.

Anyway I took the bloody sign down.

What am really picking up on here is that some posters really do believe that some people are OK to be violent/abusive and everyone has to #bekind and some who should expect violence and abuse in their job and go out of their way to be kind to those doing it to them?

What I'm saying is service in this country is pretty poor and better training would help. I travel extensively and you would be surprised at how bad the UK is now at most things. Other countries outshine us in many many things.

You'd be suprised... we had packs of underwear thrown at us last week as we didn't have the size he wanted in a particular colour.

🤣🤣🤣

I think staff training is woefull these days

Ive only been in this role for 8 months and never even got my induction until I had been there a month doing the job and Im still waiting my three month probation interview lol

Now Im lucky, Ive 45 years experience of working in customer facing roles, and more years then enough in hospitality so I didnt need any real training - just needed to be shown the ropes, but the young lasses who are fresh out of school dont have any idea on how to deal with rude or impatient customers and they do get upset and stressed.

But retail/hospitality attracts and actively look to employ youngsters. (Its hard heavy work and long days on the feet and lower paid ) and these youngsters get absolutely no customer facing training at all just shown how to do the job - work the till, clear tables, serve drinks - whatever the job entails thats all they are taught. Never taught how to work with the public

And Ive got to be truthful here, out of the 8 part timers/holiday workers we have, there is not one of them that would have chosen retail or hospitality, they are doing the job only because its there, and the hours suit. Not one of them is looking a career in a CF role

I'm sure you deal with awful customers everyday but if you can't understand why an 80+ year old is upset because his favourite flavour yoghurt has disappeared from the shelves, you shouldn't be in retail at all.

I am sure the OP can understand why he is upset, but that does not give him the right to be abusive to staff. Can you understand that?

I wonder if it's to do with the percentage of people getting shopping delivered or click and collect. Where want such a big thing a few years back so you had more of a variety of customers where now a percentage have gone online

I can. But the OP never said, despite the question being asked, how the 80 year old flipped. He may not have been abusive at all and be just simply upset.

Don't start me on that! People 'claimed' that they were 'exempt' from wearing masks. Yes they are the large group of deniers. They were the ones that sprayed Hoax on the council and govt signs dotted along the streets with essential retail. Some said they had asthma, which is a bloody insult to myself and another (now retired) colleague who are asthmatic. I was so tempted to ask them questions which only asthmatics knew. We couldn't question these deniers and 90% reeked of weed.

My medication at the time meant I didn't need to shield but having covid twice, I am on stronger and additional meds since then and carry a steroids card.

I would have googled the brands number, wrote it down for him and told him to direct his complaints to them. End of, goodbye.

I've been saying for decades that we need to bring back National Service in the form of making everyone work in retail for two years. Maybe if rude customers experience it first hand, they might think twice before they go off on one at retail staff

The general public are bellends. I work for a social housing company and oh my god, all I can say is thank god the money is good otherwise we'd all have quit.

It isn't just retail is it, it's any job you have to interact with members of the public as lots of people are just awful. I have friends across lots of front line roles (retail, council housing team, hospital medicine etc) who have had horrendous behaviour from customers/patients/service users including violence. It isn't even just manners is it, it's as basic as don't be a complete dick.

On the more mild end of the scale I saw an elderly man in a cafe arguing about why they charged more for decaf than caffeinated tea. The lady explained that the teabags cost them more. Simple explanation, job done you'd think. Except the man then proceeded to go on and on about other cafes not doing the same, and decaf removing caffeine and therefore it is less good as it is missing an ingredient (?). The lady was reasonable and polite but he just went on and on until she managed to excuse herself. I wouldn't have been able to be so polite.

Come on OP, I think you will get over it.

Clearly the chap in question had some degree of cognitive impairment if not actual dementia which is much harder to cope with than being unreasonably shouted at by a customer.

There is a huge difference between entitled, unreasonable behaviour from fully functioning adults which is NEVER OK, and that exhibited by vulnerable people for example those with dementia or learning disabilities etc.

The latter I’m afraid is a part of your job as a customer facing worker that you will have to deal with. You need to take responsibility for ensuring you have the skills to deal with people who suffer additional challenges if you want to be a member of a truly inclusive society.

Perhaps you could request some training, for example your employer should offer a course on Dementia awareness.

Did he blame immigration? 😁

Do you not think the way retail staff are treated is related to the service received?This is a bit of a bizarre example and likely the other side would tell it different. But most retail staff I come across are completely unhelpful, often rude and almost always uninterested. Then there's the entitlement, we should put up with this to 'save the high st'. No thanks, I get better service and vfm online!

People that have worked in retail or the service retail understand. There are a minority of people that are uncouth arseholes.

I am so glad to have my days working with the public far behind me. YANBU.

People can be awful but they are the minority. I guess the question is whether he had the mental capacity to realise his behaviour or whether he had diminished cognitive ability?
As a former NHS worker I was scratched, bitten, hit, spat at and had more swear words directed at me than hot dinners but fortunately, the majority of the incidents where by elderly with dementia / pain and no concept of what they were doing. There are ways to deal with that behaviour which should be taught to you by management. The other minority of abusive people are just assholes which you require protection from by management. V different coping strategies.

To a degree you expect violence from people who are scared and in pain though. I am not saying it's an excuse but it's quite an instinctive way to behave.

The way the general public treats people working in hospitality or retail beggars belief though. When I worked in hospitality, I regularly had (male) customers asking me my bra size - or trying to guess it - and generally being massively inappropriate. Some of the comments I got were eye-watering. You need a thick skin - well, what you ideally need is a customer base who knows how to behave. This (and the crap money) is exactly why nobody actually wants to work in retail or hospitality. It won't change until the industries start properly investing in their staff.

That you Hyacinth?

I worked in retail for years. To be honest I would have found this funny, rather than abusive.

I had this when I worked in a supermarket, though it was mostly from women. I remember being asked where the 3 litre containers of milk had gone, and I said that we had plenty of 2 litre bottles. Oh no, they bought 3 litres every Saturday morning, it was 11p cheaper. Could I stop what I was doing and go and check the storeroom? We didn't have any, I had to return and break the news, they weren't pleased. Sometimes I couldn't believe the hassle some customers were prepared to put staff through. Yes, for something important like a certain kind of baby formula or medicine, but to save fucking 11p on a container of milk? Lunatics.