(I work in the dog and cat department of a big pet store in a local mall. Probably half of our customers come in from out of town. This happens when I answer a call for my department one day.)

Me: “Thanks for holding for [Pet Store]. This is [My Name] speaking. How can I help you?”

Customer: “Yeah, I was in the store earlier today, and I bought a kennel, but the cashier also charged me for a bag of [Puppy Food].”

Me: “Oh! I’m sorry. If you could bring your receipt to the store, we’d be happy to get you a refund.”

Customer: “She also gave me the food.”

Me: “I’m sorry; did you say you have the bag of food?”

Customer: “Yeah. But I don’t want it.”

Me: “Okay. Well, if you could bring the bag of food and your receipt back to the store, we’ll get you a refund.”

Customer: “I live in [Nearby Town].”

Me: “Okay. Well, our return policy is thirty days, but if you don’t think you can make it back within that time, I can pass you on to my manager, and she can extend that window.”

Customer: “Can’t you just do the refund over the phone? I paid by debit.”

Me: “Uh… no. No, we can’t do a refund over the phone.”

Customer: “Well, why not?”

Me: “For one thing, you can’t do debit transactions over the phone, period. For another, you have the product. You need to bring the product back, and your debit card, for us to do the refund.”

Customer: “But I don’t want the dog food.”

Me: “That’s fine. You need to bring it back to the store so we can do the refund.”

Customer: “Fine.”

(I answer the phone at my mother’s house, and since they have old party-lines in her area from forever ago, whenever the lines get wet from rain or condensation, they sound really static-filled and have a lot of feedback.)

Me: “Hello?”

Lady: *mumble mumble mumble*

Me: “Sorry, I can’t hear you. Can you speak louder?”

Lady: *slightly louder mumble mumble mumble*

Me: “You might have to yell; I really can’t hear you, sorry!”

Lady: “I’M CALLING FROM [TOWN] HEARING CLINIC TO ASK WHEN YOU LAST HAD YOUR HEARING CHECKED?!”

Me: “Never; my hearing is fine, thanks!”

I am the customer here. I was just starting junior high so, naturally, I didn’t have a job at the time, but the announcement of a new game console had me excited. I started saving money from gifts, loose change, etc, and keeping it all in a glorified piggy bank.

Fast forward several months, about one month before the console launches, and I count out my money, and find I have enough for the console plus a couple games, even after tax. However, due to not having a chance to grab coin rolls, and the fact that stores need to manually count change anyway, the majority of this change is unrolled.

The console comes out, and my family brings me in to buy it, and I come in with this tin containing all of my saved-up change. I grab my games and the console and get up to the counter and buy them. The cashier greets me in a friendly manner and rings through my stuff, for a total around $400. I pay with the cash and gift cards I have amassed, leaving still around $200. Then I start having to dump the coins onto the counter, and I see the cashier’s eyes open wide.

They politely help count the change and we go as fast as we can, but it takes about ten minutes, at which point I think we’ve miscounted and I actually only have $350 total, meaning I have to put back one of my games. I start recounting the now-organised money, to make sure I have enough, but in my panic I can’t keep count. The cashier politely says I have enough, and rings me through just fine.

However, to this day I still think they said I had enough just so they could get me out of the store faster. Despite this, I still have that console and it’s my single favourite purchase I’ve ever made.

(I work in a call centre for a major pizza chain. Our wings are also very popular with our customers.)

Me: “Thank you for calling [Company], [My Name] speaking.”

Customer: “Hi, I want to order some wings.”

Me: “No problem. I just need to start with your phone number, please.”

Customer: “Before we start, I need to ask you something.”

Me: “Certainly, sir. What can I help you with?”

Customer: “Are all your wings buffalo wings, or do you carry chicken wings, too?”

Me: “…”

I took a foods course that was divided into “Theory” and “Cooking,” with half the class doing each at any given time, then swapping to the other. I always did the theory first for any given unit, and was one of the few who actually did the work, and one of fewer who actually got good marks from it.

Most of the rest of the class were, unfortunately, the types who scraped by if given the chance, and it showed during the cooking portion when they barely got passing marks. They all saw that I frequently got good marks, and because our paperwork was kept in a public area, they tried to use mine to cheat for marks.

I saw this, but had no real way to take care of it; if I kept my work in my locker, it wouldn’t get marked by the teacher. However, for the final assignment, effectively a “Final Exam” worth around 35% of the final mark, I concocted a scheme to punish them for cheating. I informed my teacher about my suspicions, and told him that I would submit a “dummy” exam with intentionally wrong answers, and give him the proper exam later. He agreed that would be fine. I did so, leaving this “dummy” exam in the main pile, and then let my fellow students know my opinion on cheaters. They laughed at it, and I went about my business.

We got our final marks back, this final assignment included. The cheaters all looked shocked at their final marks, until I heard them at the next table over trying to whisper, “That makes no sense, I copied him…” and “That means [My Name] also got a 0!” as they walked over to me, laughing. “Hey, [My Name]. What did you get?”

“I got 95%,” I said.

They just stopped, took a moment, and walked away, as my professor sat in the corner laughing at the exchange.