There is nothing positive to achieve from being vile towards retail staff. Why act this way?

[uihd]

Yesterday evening I bought a few items from a supermarket on the way home from work. There were some customers being very rude and disrespectful towards the staff. It has got worse in the past 5 years.

Why do people think it’s ok to act like this? What do they want to achieve with this attitude? Do they realise that people are leaving retail and avoiding looking for work in the retail sector due to their behaviour?

Nothing positive can be achieved from acting like this. If people get a kick out of this, they are just pathetic people.

The staff in supermarkets have no control over
. Prices
. Stock availability
. Products that have been discontinued. Both in store stop selling it and brand stops making it
. Staffing issues
. The number of self checkouts installed
. The law
. Company policies
. Lottery rules

I have done my share in working in retail. Never I want to do that again

Nurses too and most properly a lot of different professions have seen this over the last years.

I don't know why people are like this. I am always pleasant, respectful and polite with public facing staff and find that I get the same in return.

What happened to "treat people how you want to be treated"?

Teachers too are treated badly. It's a breakdown of values since Brexit/covid....

Wish more people knew this.

I worked retail jobs from my late teens to my early 20s and never again, no matter how good the pay was or how much I needed a job.

Thankfully the younger generation are a lot kinder and understanding in my experience so eventually the abusive behaviour will die out.

I work in hospitality and we are abused and insulted at least once a day. I’ve been spat at, attacked and have to call police regularly to escort customers out. It’s a hellish job for no thanks and very low pay BUT on the flip side I have some customers who make my day and make it all worth while

I’ve had my share of snotty retail staff but generally excessive politeness shuts them up.

People can be so unpleasant to service staff and I do think they feel they need to kick someone because that person is trapped by their role into managing their rudeness.

I'm always surprised that the staff at the tip all wear bodycams & there's signs about not abusing staff, what can people abuse them about... I had to queue for 5 mins to unload my old sofa?!

Veterinary teams too, if you shout and swear at us we are less likely to use what little resources we have to help you out with the bill.

I agree OP, it’s awful. It makes me so sad that so many places actually have to put posters up saying not to abuse staff. What is wrong with some people!

I've worked retail. People treat you badly when you work on retail because they can do it without any consequences, unless they commit a crime.

They're angry and want to let their anger out on someone. They can't do it to friends, family or colleagues because there will be consequences. They might get someone being rude and shouting back (or sacked of course).

Retail and hospitality staff can't do that, so they take the oppurtunity to be pigs. There's no come back. It's a power thing.

I do think we should all make a conscious shift in expectations to where retail and hospitality staff are supported in being rude, insulting and shouty right back if the customer did it first. It would likely stop most rude customer behaviour, knowing they'll get it back.

Can I give you my experience re the supermarket?
For me it’s the frustration of the self service tills. The wait for a member of staff to eventually come and reset it and then it doesn’t work again within seconds. The noise of the alarm going off constantly. The screaming and whining of other people’s children regardless of what time I go. The people who dither, block the aisle and have no awareness of anyone else around them. I could go on.

I do realise how this makes me feel and I make adjustments, like queue for one of the few members of staff scanning at a till, however I get it why people are rude and snappy. If you’ve already had a long day at a work, you are hungry and tired and you get “unexpected item in the bagging area” for the fifth time and no one around to help, you do run out of patience.

There’s an expectation that everyone is “kind” regardless of the level of service received and shit service is hidden behind “do not abuse our staff” signs. It’s become an environment where people are expected to shut up and suck it up or be accused of being abusive (even where they have legitimate cause for complaint).

I do absolutely agree that people shouldn't be rude. Staff are not responsible for the decisions made by management and shouldn't have to take the blame for them.

However, a lot of the rudeness could be avoided if staff had better customer service skills, which tend to be pretty poor in this country. If staff were trained properly on how to deal with difficult customers, how to respond appropriately to dissatisfied customers, how to de-escalate situations etc, then they would get a lot less abuse.

Retailers really need to invest in this training if they want to retain good staff - they shouldn't just leave it to chance and hope that their staff will instinctively know what to do. Some do, but many clearly don't.

Has it got worse? I worked in loads of retail/bar/food outlet style jobs as a student and people always talked to me like a piece of shit. They sometimes looked at you like actual dirt on their shoe, I guess because they thought they were better than you since they don’t have to spend their weekends working in a shop… I don’t know.

The worst was Greggs, I fucking hated that job. No idea how I stuck it out for almost a year tbh. I walked out of a particularly hideous shift one day and never returned, sent my ugly ass uniform back in the post. If you’ve ever noticed, most Greggs staff look miserable as sin. I largely avoid the place now as a result and if I ever do go in, I go out of my way to be overly kind to the staff.

I couldn't disagree more.

Retail staff shouldn't have to tolerate rudeness but being rude back will merely escalate situations further. Far better to train staff to provide better customer service in the first place so that situations don't spiral.

And yes, dealing with the public will always involve dealing with some people who are angry and rude no matter what, but proper training can massively reduce the proportion of interactions that end up like this.

I get that too, especially after a long day at work when your head is banging. I feel they’re usually understaffed since most of the supermarkets are now at least 75% self service but they only hire one person to stand there usually. I don’t snap at the people though, I get really irate under my breath in a very controlled British way with the stupid fuckwit machine.

I add another two:
. Your balance on your bank account
. Technology when it fails

There must be someone here who has screamed “these were £1.89 last week and now £2.09” at a poor shop assistant. Hopefully you felt guilty

Tips, depending on council have limits on disposal of certain items - cans of paint and charge for disposal of things like bathroom fixtures and plasterboard

The members of the public have been abusive towards tip staff as tried to bin more paint and refuse to pay.

Hence why these items are flytipped

Thats just an excuse.

People fly tip because they are stupid selfish pricks, spend all that energy loading up a sofa or a fridge, then drive to a gateway and dump it, despite a tip that will take it for nothing 3miles away.

I get the cost thing for some items and thats clearly counter productive but fly tippers will dump any rubbish regardless.

Our council have now introduced a booking system for tips, making life even more awkward BUT does reduce queues.

I've worked in retail twice once in 2002 until 2004: and again between 2018; and 2022. The first time customers were generally polite and friendly with the staff. The second time it was horrendous. Every single day at least one member of staff would get verbally abused and two of my colleagues were physically assaulted (one ending up with a black eye) over something that wasn't even his fault.
I think everyone should be made to work in retail or hospitality for a year because then I think people wouldn't be so rude (and hopefully it would work in general not just in those two jobs, as a nursery nurse I've also had a couple of parents reduce me to tears). As I know what a crappy job retail can be I'm always polite to the staff and say hello but I also do that with anyone who's providing me with a service.
Attitudes towards service staff has only got worse since Covid and I'm not sure why. I will never go back to retail.

Some people are just rude and their number seems to be rising.

No idea the reason, seems to be worse since Covid or is that people have got used to being rude on forums and now it is just the way they are in all respects?

I get second hand embarrassment over hearing people be rude to retail staff. It's so unnecessary. It's a real shame people behave like that.

All these examples of frustration you have highlighted aren't the fault of the shop assistants though are they?

I work in retail and I can't control it if there are kids whining in the shop, or if the self service tills are constantly causing issues, or if people are blocking aisles. It's also not my fault if there's limited staff available, and who can't be in two places at once dealing with different customers.
If only some customers would take a moment to realise that we aren't super human and have some compassion, and patience.

If you have a legitimate cause for complaint obviously you wouldn't be putting your complaint in to the self service staff or checkout staff so why would you be accused of being abusive to them.

I think there are loads of very valid reasons why people get frustrated, annoyed and even angry.

However… those feelings do not give anyone the excuse to be rude to someone else.

Would you be happy for someone to be rude to you because they were annoyed at something? I certainly wouldn’t! In my opinion it shows something is really lacking in these people.

What is driving the change do you think?