Unfiltered Story #193743

(My company used to have paper loyalty cards that the cashiers rubber stamped [buy 10, get one free]. At the time of this story, we were transitioning to a computer loyalty system where the cashier looks the customer up by phone number and the points are saved on our computers. I was sent by our corporate office to train and support the cashiers at one of the stores during transition.)

Cashier: *flags me down while speaking to customer* I’m not sure, ma’am, but this lady here is an expert.

(During training, I had emphasized to the cashiers that I was their “meat shield” and angry customers were my job. So I paste on my best customer service smile.)

Me: How can I help you?

Customer: I was in last week and he took away my card, but he SAID he would put that day’s stamps on my account. I have the receipt right here.

(Her receipt says she should get loyalty points for six card stamps, plus two items she purchased that day. I look up her account – she has the correct number of loyalty points.)

Me: It’s all here. Your account has all those points.

Customer: No, it doesn’t! The card I turned in had six stamps, plus two more for what I bought then!

Me: Okay, so we stopped giving out stamps, but you did get your points. See here, where it lists your purchases, and then at the bottom it says how many points you earned? That’s what you got instead of stamps.

Customer: But he should have given me points for eight stamps! I had six and he gave two more for those items.

Me: Well, he gave you points instead of stamps.

Customer: No, he put two more stamps on the card before he threw it away.

Me: *pause* Let me make sure I understand you correctly. On the day you got this receipt, you turned in a card with six stamps. The cashier took the physical stamper and physically gave you two more stamps, before throwing the card away and giving you this receipt?

Her: Yes!

Me: I’m very surprised to hear that, because I personally mailed the stamper back to our corporate office before our receipts ever started printing loyalty points. *points to the place on her receipt where loyalty points are mentioned*

Customer: …

Customer: REGARDLESS, I should get two more stamps.

Me: I’m sorry, I can’t do that. You already have your points for this purchase.

(I ended up just repeating that last sentence in different ways until she finally realized she couldn’t scam me out of extra loyalty points and left in a huff.)