(I am working in a store that mostly sells t-shirts and since the store is located in a big tourist area and nearly all our customers are from out of state or country, we’re encouraged to mess and joke around with our customers. One day I’m working the register when this exchange happens.)

Me: “All right, your total today is going be [amount].”

Customer: “Do you take credit cards?”

Me: “Yup, we take all forms of payments… except imaginary money. We can’t accept that, unfortunately.”

Customer: “Darn, I’ve got a lot of imaginary dollars piling up at home, too.”

Me: “You should take it to an imaginary store and go on a shopping spree, then.”

Customer: “You might be on to something there.”

(I work in the bakery department of my local grocery store. One afternoon, a man approaches our counter.)

Me: “Did you need any help today, sir?”

Man: “Yes, I’m here to pick up a cake for my son’s birthday.”

Me: “Okay, what was the name the order was placed under?”

Man: “I don’t know.”

Me: “Do you know what the cake looked like? Anything descriptive?”

Man: “No, I have no idea. My wife ordered it.”

Me: “Okay. What’s your son’s name? That might help me find it.”

Man: “Oh, it’s Daniel.”

(I check both places we store cakes for pick-up, but we don’t have a cake for Daniel. I return to the counter.)

Me: “Sir, unfortunately, I’m not finding your cake back here. Is there a way you could get in touch with your wife and ask her about it?”

Man: *becoming annoyed* “I mean, I could call her, but all I know is she said to go to [Grocery Store Chain] at this time to pick up the cake. And this is the only store we ever shop at. We always come to this store. We never go anywhere else.”

(The store I work for has three locations within a three-mile radius, so it happens sometimes that people come in to pick up orders placed at other stores.)

Me: “Are you sure she ordered it from [Store #1], and not from [Store #2] or [Store #3]?”

Man: “No, we always do our shopping at [Store #1]. We never shop at any other grocery store or anything. It’s always here! Let me call my wife…”

(While he calls her, my coworkers and I sift through completed orders and future orders to see if it was glossed over, but we have no cakes for Daniel’s birthday. After about ten minutes of looking, I approach the customer again, and he tucks his phone away to speak with me.)

Me: “Sir, we don’t have any orders for a birthday cake for Daniel, from the past week or for the week coming up.”

Man: *getting angry now* “That doesn’t sound right! My wife ordered our cake from [Grocery Store Chain]! We don’t ever shop anywhere else! My wife swears she ordered it from [Grocery Store Chain], and we only shop at [Store #1]! We don’t shop anywhere else!”

(While he continues talking to his wife to try to figure it out, I head to the back and call Store #2 and Store #3, just to see if he’d come to the wrong one by mistake. After spending another ten minutes on the phone — now spending twenty minutes looking for his cake — neither of them have had a birthday cake for Daniel in the previous week or for the week ahead. I head back to the customer, who is now off the phone and seems completely calm.)

Me: “Sir, I called [Store #2] and [Store #3], just to double-check that your wife didn’t place the order there, and neither of them have a birthday cake for Daniel, either.”

Man: *as he’s walking away* “My wife ordered the cake from [Big-Box Department Store whose name sounds nothing at all like ours]. Have a good day!”

(This exchange occurs at a popular sandwich shop as I a start my order.)

Employee: “Welcome to [Restaurant]. I’m sorry to tell you that we’re out of meatballs, bacon, and cucumbers.”

Me: “Well, that sucks. Let me guess, you’ve gotten yelled at a bunch of times by customers thinking it’s your fault.”

Employee: “Once or twice, but it’s almost closing time and we get a new delivery tomorrow, so it hasn’t been too bad.”

Me: “That’s good. What are you out of again?”

Employee: “Meatballs, bacon, and cucumbers.”

Me: “Is any of that on the Chicken, Bacon, Ranch?”

Employee: *pauses* “Uh, yeah. The bacon.”

Me: “Oh, god, I’m one of THOSE customers.”

(I ended up ordering a different sandwich, and the employee had a good laugh at how tired I was.)

Me: “Okay, sir, your total is $12.90.”

Customer: *pulls card out and waves it around in the air*

Me: “Sorry, is that credit or debit?”

Customer: *continues to wave the card around in the air*

Me: “Gift card it is.”

(I have recently started working in retail, and this is my first time on the checkout. I am serving a customer who is paying by card.)

Customer: “What do I do?”

Me: “You put the card into the bottom of the chip and pin machine.”

Customer: “How do I do that?”

Me: “Umm, there’s a slit at the bottom you insert it into.”

Customer: “Which way?”

Me: “Chip facing up and into the machine.”

Customer: “And how far do you push it in?”

Me: “As far as it will let you.”

(He stares at the machine for a LONG time before doing what is expected perfectly the first time. I process the charge.)

Me: “Okay, just put your pin number in and press okay.”

Customer: “How do I do that?”

Me: “You press the number buttons?”

Customer: “…I would like to speak to your manager.”

Me: “Oh, sure. Have I done something to upset you?”

Customer: “You have terrible customer service!”

(A manager is called. She walks up to me and rolls her eyes at the customer. She looks at the register screen.)

Customer: “Oh, [Manager]. Excellent—”

Manager: “You need to enter each number of your pin number sequentially in order of left to right as they were originally dictated to you when you first received them.”

Customer: “And th—”

Manager: “You then press the green button labelled OK on the bottom right of the machine. There are 18 buttons on the machine. Starting from the top left button, you go left to right by two, and top to bottom by five.”

(The customer spends an excruciating amount of time staring at the machine, so long that the machine times out, and the manager gives an very long and detailed description of what happened. Finally, after several minutes, he enters his number and the receipt prints out. The manager takes it.)

Manager: “This piece of paper is your receipt of purchase. You need to hold on to this to ensure you are able to return your items without difficulty should they fail to meet your expectations.”

Customer: “Thank you very, very much.” *to me* “THAT is how you treat your customers. *to Manager* You need to train your staff more!”

Manager: “Of course; however, many of our staff assume that our customers have the common sense to know how to pay in the same manner that have done every week for years without having their hands held through the entire process.”

(The customer sputters out of a retort before screaming that he’s calling our HR department as he storms out.)

Manager: “Here’s hoping he doesn’t come back this time.”

Me: “Does he have a mental illness or something?”

Manager: “I thought that at first, until I met his ex-wife on a night out, and she told me he puts it on to make our lives difficult.”

Me: “Can’t you just ban him?”

Manager: “After five years of trying to, he just keeps coming back. Even getting the police involved doesn’t stop him.”

(He came in a week later but I was more prepared this time, and I gave such a convoluted description of the entire process, with as many large words as I could think of, that he didn’t come back for nearly a month. I got Employee of the Month for “excellent custom service.”)