I sent a client an email to follow up on a number of overdue invoices.

Me: “When you have a moment, can you please provide a payment date for the following invoices?”

Client: “I have checked all the invoices, and yes, they are all unpaid.”

Me: “…”

Client: “…”

Me: *Crying*

I’m part of the problem in this. I booked flights through one of those travel websites, three tickets, cheapest non-refundable fare — a risk, but I am usually good about triple-checking myself — and paid.

Three days later, reviewing my emails, I noticed that the tickets I booked were for the wrong date! Luckily, I booked about two months out, so it wasn’t a last-minute scramble.

I knew I had screwed myself with the cheapest fare, but I figured it wouldn’t hurt to call and ask. Worst case, I eat the first tickets’ cost for my stupidity and make a whole new booking.

Agent: “Thank you for calling [Booking Site]. How can I help you?”

Me: “So, I booked tickets for [flight], and I realized I made them for the wrong day. I know I screwed up, but is there any way to just change the dates?”

Agent: “Well, it looks like you booked the Basic tickets, which don’t allow changes. But it looks like I can upgrade the tickets to Main Cabin and then change them?”

Me: “Okay? How much would that be?”

Agent: “Well, the change fee would be $99, and the upgrade would be $169 per ticket. The total for that change would be around $606.”

Me: “What?! Um… Can I just… cancel it? And rebook myself?”

Agent: “That is an option. But your tickets are non-refundable, so you wouldn’t be getting anything back. The site would issue a partial credit for the airline, but it would still generate the $99 fee if you use your credit to rebook as it would count as a change.”

Me: “I would get partial credit for the tickets?”

Agent: “Only site credit. Your tickets are non-refundable, and it would still incur a change fee if you were to rebook.”

Me: “But I could use the credit toward new tickets? Just with the change fee?”

Agent: “That’s correct. Or I could process the upgrade and change to your current reservation now.”

Me: *Pauses* “No, I’ll just cancel the tickets, and I’ll redo it myself.”

Agent: “If you’re sure. I want to remind you again that they are non-refundable and will only issue you a partial credit. You will also be charged a change fee for rebooking using your credit.”

Me: “That’s fine.”

Agent: “All right. I’ll go ahead and cancel that booking. You’ll be receiving $78 per passenger in credit. When you rebook, please keep in mind that using your credit will constitute a change and incur the $99 fee. Is there anything else today?”

Me: “Nope… I’m good, thanks.”

I only paid about $80 per ticket, all totaled. So, somehow, altering the reservation was going to cost over twice what I paid for them, but cancelling gave me almost the entire ticket price back? Better outcome than I was expecting, since I was expecting nothing back at all, so win for me. But I’m just so confused by the math. The $99 change fee I was expecting, but who on earth would double what they paid for their tickets in upgrade fees alone rather than get “partial” credit and rebook? Even getting no credit and rebooking would have been cheaper.

Customer: “I want to dispute a charge on my bill. My mom didn’t tell me she was going to charge the card, and she normally does.”

Me: “So, it’s fraud?”

Customer: “Oh, no, not that, but I wanna dispute the charge?”

Me: “Dispute it because it’s not correct?”

Customer: “No, ‘cause my mom didn’t ask me before she charged it.”

I didn’t feel like explaining to him that his card and what’s done with it are his responsibility, so I transferred him to disputes so they could break the bad news.

I’m a freelance graphic designer, and I was commissioned to do a selection of designs, including a logo, a poster, a T-shirt, and a video trailer for this event promotion project. 

Client: “We want the T-shirt with the logo on it.”

Me: “Okay. Can you send me the full-resolution logo file?”

Client: “No, no, we’d like you to make the logo.”

Me: “That’s fine; I can add that to the quote.”

I send them off the estimation, and they ask me to cut the video as it’ll be too expensive for them. I remove it and send the estimation back with all the elements minus the video. 

Me: “Is this okay? If it is, I’ll draw up the contract.”

Client: “Yes, that’s fine!”

They sign the contract and pay the deposit, and I begin on the logo first as it’s going to be used throughout the other designs. 

Me: “For the logo design, it might be worth chatting with [Original Event Hosting Company] to see if they want to reuse it for other future events. If so, then it would cost a bit extra for an extended license, which they might be willing to put up some money for.”

Client: “Oh! We didn’t want a logo. We were just using that as an example.”

Having already spent several hours on the logo, I was pretty annoyed — especially since “Logo Design” was clearly marked on BOTH invoices and the contract they agreed to.

I added the wasted hours to the final invoice.

I used to work in Internet tech support.

Customer: “My internet isn’t working.”

Me: “Well, your bill hasn’t been paid in a few months, and we’ve cut off service from here. However, if you can make a payment right now, I can have it back on within seconds.”

We took payments either via debit or credit card, but we had zero ways of turning the service back on without a payment. (Okay, we had one way, but it was limited to a very small group of employees, and the only valid reason for using it was if a mistake was made on our end.)

This guy had other ideas.

Customer: “I’ve got the cash right here. I can pay now.”

Me: “Sure, just need your card information, and I’ll get that payment processed.”

Customer: “No, I mean that I have actual money right now.”

Me: “Oh! Well… yeah, you can run down to your local office and pay, and they can turn you on right away, just like me.”

Customer: “No, no, you aren’t getting it. I’ll pay with cash over the phone.”

Me: “That— That’s not possible.”

Customer: “Well, can’t I just read you the serial numbers?”

He wasn’t particularly angry or anything, just utterly baffled that this wasn’t a valid way to pay over the phone.