Bet He Doesn’t Have Any Girl’s Numbers On There, Either

(A man comes into the store holding his phone.) 

Me: “Hi. How can I help you?”

Customer: “I need help with my phone.”

Me: “Of course. Could you describe the problem?”

(As he talks, it becomes clear that I’m not trained well enough or experienced enough to help him. There are only a couple coworkers in the store, including my female manager in the back. She’s the only one I can think of who would be able to solve his problem.) 

Me: “All right, well, I can’t help you, but I can go get [Manager] from the back. She’s good at this kind of thing.” 

Customer: “[Manager]? No, thanks.” 

Me: “Excuse me?”

Customer: “[Manager] is a girl’s name. This is too complicated for a girl.” 

Me: “Sir, [Manager] is the most qualified person here. Nobody else would be able to help you.” 

Customer: “Look, you’re a man. I bet you could do this better than this [Manager] girl.”

Me: “I just started working here last month. I don’t know how to do this. [Manager] is your best bet.”

Customer: “No! I’ve already said I don’t want a ‘[Manager]’ touching my phone. She’d probably mess it up even more. Look. If you can’t do it, get me another man who can.”

Me: “There aren’t any other men.” 

Customer: “Well, why don’t you go look through your book? I know you guys have a book in the back that tells you how to do everything.” 

(Wanting to get rid of him, I agree to go look in my “book.” I find [Manager] sitting at her computer.)

Me: “Hey, are you busy? I’ve got a real a**hole customer out there who needs your help but doesn’t want to talk to you.”

(I describe the whole situation)

Manager: “Yeah, I’ve seen things like this before. Just bring the phone in and I’ll look at it. “

(I go outside. The man is waiting where I left him.) 

Me: “Could I take your phone into the back with me, please?”

Customer: “I’m not letting my phone out of my sight. For all I know, you could hand it to that [Manager] b****.”

Me: “Okay, well, sir…”

(Unsure of what to do, I trail off and run back into the back room. I tell [Manager] what happened.) 

Manager: “Oh, he’s one of these customers…” *sigh* “Ask him what kind of charger he has.” 

(I spend the better part of an hour running between the back room and the table where the customer is sitting, relaying information from the man to my manager and back again. After the phone has finally been fixed…)

Customer: “Now, that wasn’t so hard, was it? I bet that’s a better job than [Manager] would have done!”