Last Day Pains

I work in a mailroom for a mail-order catalog. Mailroom workers who work the day shift have an additional responsibility to call customers whose order forms are either missing information or illegible. I am stationed on the phones today with an employee who is working their last day before moving to another state. We have thirty minutes before we clock out.

Coworker: “Oh, no.”

Me: “What is it?”

Coworker: “It’s ‘Miss Pain’ again.”

“Miss Pain” is what we call a certain customer who makes our job a lot harder. Instead of filling out an order form, she sends pages from the multiple catalogs we send out, with the items she wants circled and quantity written next to it. She also never sends any form of payment, so we have to call her in order to get her card information. Her calls take a long time to complete because she always disagrees with what she sent in.

Me: “Just leave her order for tomorrow. It’s almost time to go, and you know she’s just going to argue with you.”

Coworker: *Smiles* “You know what? It’s my last day; I want to have a little fun.”

He calls her and relays to me what she said after work, in his best customer service voice.

Coworker: “Hello, Mrs. [Customer], I’m [Coworker] calling from [Mail Order Company]. I have some questions about your order form.

Miss Pain: *Angry* “Yes, it’s about time you called me. Hold on while I grab my card.”

Coworker: “No, that won’t be necessary. My question is, did you realize you didn’t send an order form at all? You just sent us pages with items circled.”

Miss Pain: *Near shouting* “Yes! I do it that way so you idiots don’t mess it up.”

Coworker: “All right. Are you also aware that there is no form of payment with this mess of paper?”

Miss Pain: “Yes! I’m not going to just write down my card information so some random person can open my mail and steal it.”

Coworker: “We have a phone number printed on every catalog that you can call between 8:00 am and 6:00 pm to make place your orders.”

Miss Pain: “I’m not going to be placed on hold. It’s better if you call me. Now, take down my card information so you can mail out my order. This is taking way too long.”

Coworker: “In a little bit. You do realize that when we get your stack of papers, the worker who gets your order has to take time to fill out an order form, look at every single page, make sure it’s correct, and then, instead of sending it to the processing pile, they have to send it to the callbacks, because you didn’t send any payment information?”

I’m finished with my last call and I’m listening in, holding back laughter.

Miss Pain: “I DON’T CARE! IT’S THEIR JOB TO DO THAT!”

Coworker: “Yes, but we have to hit a certain number of orders processed. Taking the time to fix your mess of an order can actually make a person miss their quota, Miss Pain. I mean Mrs. [Customer].”

I walk away so Miss Pain doesn’t hear me laugh. It’s now less than twenty minutes before we are to leave.

Miss Pain: “WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY? DID YOU JUST INSULT ME? I WILL HAVE YOU FIRED! PUT YOUR MANAGER ON NOW!”

Coworker: *Sternly* “No, I will not put on my manager. You have three choices. You start filling out the form correctly, so the employees can fill your order quickly. You can place your order by phone. Or you can just stop ordering from us; we have plenty of customers. Of course, you will probably want to complain, instead. My name is [Coworker], and you can find the number on one of the catalogs; however, they are closing so you won’t have anyone to talk to. It’s also my last day, so you won’t be getting me fired since I already quit.” *Puts on his customer service voice* “Have a great evening, Miss Pain.”

He hung up on her before anything else could be said and joined the rest of us in cleaning up. We went out for drinks after to wish him luck in his new home and to celebrate someone finally telling her off. I don’t know if Miss Pain complained or not, or if anything was done if she did.