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

Moaning at store staff doesn’t register on the complaints file.

Absolutely.

I work in a well known card shop. That allows staff over the age of 18 to lone work. This can be anywhere from one hour to a whole 9 hour shift.
Even when I have explained I am on my own, haven't been able to go to the toilet in four hours and I'm close to a break down
They still tut, snap their fingers and demand I be ready to serve them but there are cards that need tidied, balloons to be blown up, refunds to be done, delivery to be worked so there are cards available to buy, we have to count stock every single day. I had one lady come in to collect her balloons 5 hours earlier than planned, they weren't ready of course and she demanded a refund, told me I was a joke and a karen
Even after explaining I was completely alone and close to tears from her shouting she did not let up.

I just don't understand it

Some people are just miserable and/or angry and see retail staff as an easy target to pass some of it on. Horrible people

The fact is, across the board, management teams are making choices to run on a skeleton staff and force customers down routes they don't want (like undermanned self service tills) knowing that an inevitable consequence is their front line staff are going to get abuse as a result. They're ok with the trade off if their numbers look better.
The numbers may look better in the short term, but not in the long term. Customers will vote with their feet.

There is quite a bit of victim blaming in there.

Yes CS training is important BUT situations do not escalate if customers don't behave like morons in the first place.

People getting angry and rude, even violent because they cannot find an item or there is a queue etc is totally unacceptable and if i had my way, people would be blocked from returning to a Supermarket, any Supermarket for bad behaviors.

One reason why people do as they like is there is no consequences for their actions.

Wasn't it the previous Govt that said "Shoplifting below £200 should be classed as a low level offence" effectively de criminalising it.

I think you have a point.

Having had many years experience in retail the MAJORITY of problems are the customer doesn’t like what they are being told not that there’s poor service or anything wrong

demanding refunds there not entitled to

wanting online offer in store

refusing to contact customer service instead just shouting at staff who have no remit to help

complaining about no stock

self service tills ( I prefer them ) how is shouting at staff going to change that

more to the point right or wrong if the shop only has self service available ether don’t go or shop there and shut up about it

We were there last year and a tip worker tried to stop a visitor doing something. I didn’t see the start of the altercation so I don’t know what it was. Anyhow, the car drove into the tip worker and knocked them off their feet 😮 More fool the driver as it was all caught on ANPR cameras so the Police would have come knocking.

But that's quite an interesting one. 8 minutes is a fairly long time in someone's mind when they are trying to achieve a task. It's worse if the 8 minutes is accompanied by a message telling the person that "most tasks can be done on our website, have you checked our website", etc. Clearly the task I'm trying to achieve can't be done via the website or I'd have done it by now.

Is it any wonder that people are angry by the time the phone is answered? Then the caller has to navigate the script being used by the calltaker, interpret the keywords that they need to use to make progress with their task while having incomplete information (they can't see the script that the calltaker is working from, so can't pre-plan the script they need to use to navigate it).

The whole phone customer service interaction is designed to render the caller (and often calltaker) powerless and essentially push both into navigating an interaction in a set way that is compatible with downstream automation. People get angry when they feel power is being removed from them - that's a human design flaw.

The general public is definitely awful. Most people are fine but some members are just awful.

However, there are also some terrible or lackadaisical retail staff out there. I put it down to low morale / low pay / over work so it doesn’t bother me but I definitely go into most shops with low expectations of service.

I worked in John Lewis where the customer service is good but the attitude from senior shop floor staff to junior shop floor staff was awful. Not sure if it was because I was part time.

In all honesty, I've found the customer service at JL to be very poor. Perhaps it's just my local store. Now I just go in buy what I want and thank the assistant at the till and don't ask for anything further.

What about staff being rude to customers? That's even more baffling.

I agree, I am now very surprised at receiving good service in most shops. The bar has been set low.

I think online shopping is taking over so people just feel grateful to be able to go into a shop and buy something they need/like.

See the endless automated "did you know you can do this online" messages give me the rage as well, and agree no ones listening to shit music for (usually a lot longer than 8 minutes) ages for fun if they could easily address the issue online.

However im always really relieved when I speak to an actual human! And i often find if youre stubborn enough to stay on the line or call when they've made it almost impossible to find a number, the person can generally sort the issue quite efficiently.

Absolutely this! I've worked retail for years, and staffing hours have been cut year on year. This means that staff can end up single-handedly managing a store: running 2 different counter services, taking in deliveries, date-checking stock, sorting out Uber/Just Eat collections, restocking, cleaning & maintaining store standards, constantly on look out for shoplifters... then dealing with impatient/rude customers with a smile 😃

The only thing that keeps me working where I am is some of my colleagues, and a number of genuinely lovely customers (oh and the not-insignificant need to pay my bills!). Covid definitely brought out the worst in a lot of people it seems.

I think so. I don't do much shopping online, but I now keep JL to a minimum, especially as I've found how much better M&S is.

Spot on!

When I started, it was just manned tills. Now self scan, smart shop, Just Eat, click n collect!

Some people think retail is easy work. It’s not. Made worse with staff not being replaced when they leave and the behaviour of customers.

I have said to customers when I have been a customer myself- both during working at the supermarket and afterwards. “Have you ever worked in retail or public facing work? at rude customers. They always say No. Funny that.

Then “you wouldn’t last a minute”. Love shutting up people who can’t respond

Training in retail and customer service has gone down a lot.

When the store I worked at opened around 40 years ago. Staff were taken to a store by coach and trained there.

Now it’s a couple of hours of reading and watching videos on the training platform. Then expect existing staff to shadow them.

Yeah that's just not on.
I do think retail staff should be trained better though.
Is it just me or is it rude to ask staff where something is, whenever I ask a question, many staff just seemed annoyed I asked 🤣

So you expect children to control their emotions and yet you cant after a long difficult day at work? The retail staff on the ground have nothing to with the decision to add the self service tills and are managing several at once. If you have a legitimate complaint, write to the company not to pointlessly complain to the staff on the ground (who are also likely having long difficult days).

Its not rude to ask but what you need to understand is the pressure retail staff are under and the amount of time to do tasks is short and it can be quite irritating when people also want a personal shopper. Where's the frozen pizza (im guessing the freezer) you take them to the freezer then its ok where is the milk (its in the fridge) take them there and then they look at their list to see what's next. We would love to give better personalised service then we do but we just don't have the time.

YANBU - I think everyone should work in retail or hospitality for a year to see how vile the public really are. It might stop people from talking to people like shit

But that's a system problem. The system requires the worker to take the shopper to the item, rather than just giving them a location (personally I'd just prefer to be told "aisle 5"). But the system doesn't provide enough resources for the worker to do that well alongside their other tasks, and the service to other customers breaks down. So then they experience the powerlessness of a system that isn't functioning, they get angry and so the process goes on.

And to the people who are sick of hearing unexpected item in the packing area. Stop bloody touching it. Its basically a weighing scale everytime you move something or you lean on it or put your phone/purse on it or let your kid touch or climb on it, it will go off.