If you work with the public - are you finding things are getting scarier?

[CurdinHenry]

More aggression, more delusions to a fairly extreme degree?

And now I'm of an age when people I love are sick or dying and I just think

How fucking dare these wasters take up so much resource why aren't they ashamed

Since COVID I feel like people only care about themselves and their families more than ever before. The solidarity of the first lockdown quickly shifted into the selfish stockpiling and 'sod everyone else' attitude.

I am encountering more and more teenagers with crippling lack of confidence who have difficulty with telephone conversations and face to face conversations.

Yes absolutely.
I work in the hospitality industry, the one that upsets me most is the demand for disproportionate compensation for even a perceived minor inconvenience with the threat of public humiliation through online reviews if they don’t get what they want!

They aren’t the problem.

Yes. People are much more volatile at present and we make a great target. Customers can come in with unchecked bags, liquids etc. We have no protection really other than a panic button which summons guards. Could have been stabbed or had acid thrown at us by then. There are more checks when you go to a gig. Oh and if someone does throw acid there's a plastic milk bottle full if water to throw over us

It's certainly worse than it used to be, but I could tell you a few tales of when I worked in Tesco's twenty-odd years ago. There were more than a few customers who were a little... troublesome even then. And of course, the customer was always right.

Yes there's definitely also a stream of sadness and fear alongside the aggression

I think there's a lack of comforting adults in the room

Jesus is that official management policy to keep it around??

I have a friend who is a strategic complainer and it's awful and cringeworhy (she's a teacher so not rich but not exactly mudlarking for pennies)

I honestly think that the daily diet of paranoia inducing programming churned out by the bbc and the like has a lot to do with it. Everyone is out to get you. Fight for your rights. Claim for compensation.

Definitely got worse since Covid I think.

Try working in a GP surgery. Its always been bad - the last 5 years it has been horrific.

I wish there were more appointments to give out - it isnt personally my fault. I have no interest in what is wrong with you (I really dont care) - the partners tell us we have to ask - we arent nosey - just doing the job we are paid to do.

If one more person tells me that if they die it will be my fault I will scream!

Fortunately I am rarely on reception but the poor staff that are - the abuse is awful. They are doing a job to earn money to live and doing what they are told to do - dont take it out on them.

Yes agree, lots more people threatening self harm and social media shaming. Then even the green pen brigade seem to have grown in numbers fuelled by email and AI.

Yes. And threats to either the member of staff or other people. Plus threats to kill themselves if they don't get what they want. Abuse and threats almost from the outset. Not even giving us a chance to get it right before presuming we'll get it wrong. Copying in people as if those people give a shiny shit about the issue which is something we can help with without Big Brother breathing down our necks. An unpleasant atmosphere to say the least. Coupled with AI demanding things that aren't possible in timescales that aren't realistic. Or threat will happen.

Fortunately I have a brilliant team and an understanding boss. Also in an industry where essentially I'm bulletproof and what I say goes. I wouldn't want to have to spend every day or evening worrying if the threat will happen next time we're in contact.

Unfortunately, a lot of staff in shops are also rude. No manners and borderline rude quite often. Society is just going this way, unfortunately.

We used to go on holiday with another couple who had kids the same ages as ours. We probably went four or five years in a row, always to the same site, to the point where we got quite friendly with the farmer who ran it. Then one year we went without them and the farmer told us that every time, without fail, the other couple had manufactured a complaint after the holiday in order to claim some sort of refund or discount. I genuinely don't understand how they thought that was OK, it wasn't like they were fleecing some faceless international mega-corporation.

sorry edited as probably too outing

I find people’s demands astounding at times but just pray for common sense and try to find friends to keep me grounded!

I am always friendly and polite, but I only work seven hours per week. If I were subjected to rude behaviour from customers for 37 hours per week I think my standards would drop too.

I agree, people are angrier.

Part of the reason could be because everything is just such a fucking battle these days. My ds has just got into a sen provision and the journey to get here could be turned into a movie. Mistakes, incompetence, and just plain ignorance from grown adults who are determined not to do the job they're paid for. Now he's in I thought I could finally relax but nope, more shit and fighting to do.

Then there is the quest to get a gp appointment. Fill out an online form, ring up at 8am to play fastest finger first, download an app, do a video consultation, wait for an email, oh sorry we can't help with that but here's a link to read. Then there's the shitshow that is the CMS, banks that are nowhere to be found or have no humans in them, schools that send 6 billion emails a day about mufti but forget to mention that its parents evening next week and now its too late to get off work. I admit I am that angry person sometimes 😔

Ah yes cc in the CEO..very clever... Plot spoiler, that inbox re-routes directly back to me.

There was a phone in on LBC earlier about this. The abuse some people have to put up with is just awful.

This is it. Things become a cycle of abuse.

If someone threatens suicide they can absolutely go to hell

That is not my experience at all. Most are lovely.

Copying in the CEO always makes me cackle at work, as if those people give a toss 🤣