I used to work for a third-party call center contracted to a large, national bank, where I was a Debit Card Fraud Analyst. I enjoyed the job, but I had my fair share of belligerent customers. 

My supervisor was going in for surgery for a chronic condition, and I had been teasing her all week that my last call of her last night as my supervisor, I was going to get an “Orange Flag” call. This was simply a piece of orange, laminated paper with instructions on what to do with a threatening call; you would pull it off the board by your computer and wave it in the event of a threat. These events would take close to an hour to resolve, so I was basically telling her I was going to keep her over. She would laugh at me and we’d go about business.

My crew was the last to go home from this center, we’d leave at two in the morning, and on her last night as my supervisor, we had back-to-back calls. Finish a call, the next person was on the line at once. At 11:58, my cubical partner and I both got calls and as we went to pull information up, nothing worked. None of our systems would come up, nothing. We apologized to our customers, who were thankfully understanding, and put them back in the queue. At 12:02 in the morning, nothing. No calls. Everything seemed to have crashed on us, including the phone systems.

We now had close to an hour between calls, and the supervisor found out that the bank had taken its systems down for maintenance. Nothing would go through. All debit, credit, and ATM cards would not work for the next several hours, and if a customer happened to get through to us, we were to let them know to try again at a certain time. I wrote up a phone script for myself and ended up giving it to everyone there. I sounded like an automated phone system and used it to my advantage to not talk to customers. It politely let them know that our systems were down, we were unable to help them, and to please try again at the specified time. Of the five customers who managed to get through to my phone, four of them just hung up.

At 1:57 in the morning, one final call came through. I opened with the script I’d written: “Thank you for calling [Bank] Debit Card Fraud Services. We regret to inform you that all of our systems are currently down for maintenance and customers will be unable to use their Debit, Credit, or ATM cards until six am Eastern Standard Time. If any trouble persists after that time, please call the number on the back of your card to speak to an associate. Thank you for your understanding.”

And he responded with, “WHAT THE F***?!”

I tried again, but he launched into a tirade on me. “NO! NO! YOU STUPID F****** B****! NO! SHUT UP! SHUT THE F*** UP! I HAVE A FLIGHT TO CATCH IN THE MORNING, AND I NEED TO BUY MY PLANE TICKETS RIGHT NOW, AND YOU’VE BLOCKED MY CARD!”

He wouldn’t listen to me when I tried to explain to him that our systems were just out, and I was thinking to myself, “Why would you wait this late to book your tickets anyway?”

Then, he gave me this gem: “IF YOU DON’T UNBLOCK MY CARD RIGHT NOW, I’M GOING TO FIND YOU! I WILL FIND YOU, AND I WILL F****** KILL YOU AND YOUR WHOLE G**D*** FAMILY! DO YOU HEAR ME?! I WILL F****** SHOOT YOU!’

I muted my mic, sighed, and waved the orange flag at my supervisor, who just stared at me. She took over the call from there and I sat and listened to her deal with this man for a good forty minutes, taking down information. I went to clock out, use the restroom, and get a drink, and came back to ask what happened.

Turns out, he was already on file for making threats like that against employees pretty regularly, and that was his last strike. The bank was going to close out his account with them and blacklist him as a result.

My prediction came true. On the last call of her last night, I had to give her an orange flag. I couldn’t have timed that better if I had tried.

I do the exchanges at a local retail store.

A woman came inside with a pair of boots she’d purchased weeks ago. She’d ‘accidentally’ purchased a pair that was too small and asked if I did returns.

I was in the process of explaining that I could exchange the boots, but I needed the pair she brought in with her as well as the receipt.
The woman turned her back to me mid-explanation and ran to the boot isle. (With the old boots and receipt)

Minutes later the door alarms go off and I glance up to see that the woman has two large boot boxes in her hands.
She’s been pulled aside by security.

Woman- “THAT GIRL OVER THERE SAID THAT I COULD HAVE THIS PAIR OF BOOTS BECAUSE THE OTHER ONES ARE TOO SMALL!”
Me – “Ma’am you’ll have to wait in line with your shoes to make a return. Just stand in line here. Wait here maam”

After five minutes of standing in line she tells the three customers ahead of her, “this is the returns register and she told me to come to the front.”

She was so mad and insisted that I had cheated her. I apologized and explained that she could have either the larger size or the pair she purchased originally, but not both for the price of one

(My family and I are at a parade, walking in an area blocked off from cars. We see a car turn in so I grab my youngest sister and she gets mad.)

Me: *loud enough for the driver to hear* “Sorry, sis, someone is turning in where they aren’t supposed to. I had to get you out of the road.”

Driver: “Well, I own this building! And I have permission to be here. Because I own this building!”

Mom: “But that doesn’t give you the right to run over whoever you want.”

Driver: “I was just trying to get to my building that I own!’

Dad: “At the expense of my family?”

I’ve spent the better part of three weeks organizing what should have been a fun and simple Secret Santa for my department at work. It’s been a pain from the word “go.” We set a maximum of $30 and a minimum of $20.

First, one of the kids in my department recommends a website he says his family uses every year. The thing with this website is that you have to have an email address or phone number to invite people and I don’t have everyone’s number. So, I use their work emails, but the firewalls in place prevent them from receiving the emails.

Second, my supervisor spends the entire three weeks arguing with everyone about the location one of the girls recommended, but won’t make an actual decision about where she does want to go; all she’ll say is that she wants to be able to have a drink.

Third, the day before, one girl says she won’t be there, two more say they’ll be late because of a family event, and still another says she’ll be out of town. This isn’t even to mention the ones who back out day-of.

Finally, the day of the exchange arrives and three members of our department not only don’t show, but won’t answer their phones. My supervisor stands at the head of the table and whines about how she’s worked so hard to put this together and she’s so offended by the ones who didn’t show up. My eyes are about bugging out of my head because the literal most she did was suggest the restaurant we were visiting at the last minute. In fact, she had someone else buy the Secret Santa gift for her.

I keep my peace because I need my job. But, I spent $29.87 on my SS because I know what she likes. I can tell most of the others maybe spent $20, max. The girl who drew my name is one of the ones who didn’t bother to show. A week later, she hands me a gift bag with the biggest grin on her face. I open it to find a small beading set for making earrings with and I think, “Oh, she’s noticed I make most of my own jewelry. Never mind I don’t use beads; this is almost thoughtful.”

It turns out that set cost her $8, less than half of the agreed-upon minimum, which was set in order to prevent bad gifting of precisely that nature.

I’m mad enough to spit.

(I work a summer internship at a local electric cooperative. One afternoon, I’m working the front desk when several of our power lines go down. This leads to about an hour of people calling to report outages and ask how long they’ll be out of power. It’s busy enough that every time we finish a call, the phone immediately rings again. Sometime in the middle, I get a call from an older gentleman. I give the standard greeting.)

Customer: “Hello, how are you?”

(I’m surprised enough that it takes me a couple of seconds to respond.)

Me: “I’m doing all right, how are you?”

Customer: “Good, thank you.”

(He reported his outage, staying pleasant even when I told him I didn’t know how long power would be out. It’s been over a year, and I still smile thinking about it. A little politeness can go a long way!)