There are two agents in the office; I can only take payments for the one I work for as, when I type in a name, only his customers will come up. The other agent is busier than ours, so their customers will sometimes try to pay with me instead of waiting.

A guy comes up and gives me his name. The last name comes up, but I am unsure of the first. I repeat it back to him and verify the address. He pays and I give him a receipt.

He comes back later.

Customer: “You stole my money! It’s not showing in the system!”

Me: “Can I see your receipt? I’ll try to find where the money went.”

Customer: “No! You’ll tear it up!”

Me: “There are several people in the office. Do you really think I’d tear it up in front of all of them?”

I took the receipt. The money was applied correctly… except it was to his son’s account. It took some time to figure it out. His son had insurance with our agency, and he had insurance with the other agent. They had similar first names and the same address, so my bad. I apologized and called to have the money moved over and I showed him what happened.

Not the end.

He called the police on me for stealing his money… and sat outside until they came… and they laughed at him.

Caller: “I asked you guys to email me a copy of my receipt last Thursday and I never got it.”

I find the transaction, and I can see that we tried sending it several times but it kept bouncing back as rejected by the customer’s domain.

Me: “Sorry about that; it looks like the email failed to send several times. Let me read back the email address we sent it to: S-T-E-V-E.[last name]@[domain]. Is that correct?”

Caller: “Yep, that should be right.”

Me: “Okay, well, let me get in there and email it again. One sec.”

Caller: “You spelled it with a V, right? Sometimes people put a PH, instead.”

Me: *Light bulb* “Sorry, was that supposed to go to steven.[lastname]@[domain]?”

Caller: “Yes, Steven with a V.”

Me: “Sorry about that. We sent it to just steve.[last name].”

Caller: “It’s weird that I didn’t get it if you sent it to steven.[last name].”

Me: “I just resent it. You should see it any moment.”

I swear, tunnel hearing is just as real as tunnel vision!

I am craving a smoothie, so I pop into my local smoothie shop to order one. I’ve only ordered from this franchise once or twice in the past and am not familiar with their drink names, but I want to get something similar to what I had last time. The only thing I remember about the drink was that it had mangoes and spinach.

Cashier: “Hi! How can I help you?”

Me: “Hi there! I’m sorry, I don’t order from here often. In the past, I ordered a drink that had mangoes and spinach in it. Do you have a drink like that?”

Cashier: “Spinach is in it?”

Me: “Yeah… or maybe it was kale? I don’t know, I definitely remember spinach. It had mangoes, too. 

Cashier: “Ah, okay. So, spinach is in it?”

Me: “Yup, it had spinach.”

Cashier: “Okay, your total is [total].”

I just assumed she knew what I was talking about, so I paid and moved to the side. As I was waiting for my drink, I glanced at the menu board, wondering what the name of the drink was. My eyes scanned the board until I found it. 

The drink name? “Spinach Is In It.”

The cashier and I had a good laugh about that one!

Me: “Thank you for calling [Office]. How can I help you?”

Patient: “I need to make an appointment.”

Me: “Okay, sir, what’s your name?”

Patient: “John Miller.”

Me: “And your birthday?”

Patient: “John Miller.”

Me: “I apologise, sir, I mean what’s your date of birth?”

Patient: *Pauses* “John Miller.”

Me: “Yes, I got your name, sir, but I need your date of birth now, please.”

Patient: “I don’t feel comfortable giving that to you.”

Me: “Okay. What about your phone number?”

Patient: “Just look up John Miller. You can’t have that many of those in [Small Town].”

Me: “That may or may not be true, but our office is nationwide. Your name is going to bring up every John Miller in fifty states, and if I narrow it to Texas, it’ll still be too many. May I please ask for something to help me narrow down your information?”

Patient: “No.” *Hangs up*

A man comes into my well-known coffee shop and walks up to the mobile order pickup side.

Me: “Hi! Are you here to pick up a mobile order?”

Man: “Yes.”

Me: “What’s the name on your order?”

Man: “William.”

I check the mobile orders and find one hot blonde roast for that name.

Me: “Here you go!”

Man: “I didn’t order anything hot. It should be two cold drinks and a food item.”

Me: “Huh, that’s weird.”

The man is obviously starting to get irritated. I check the mobile order screen and find nothing under “William” matching that description.

Me: “I don’t see that on my end. Do you have your phone to check? Sometimes weird things happen.”

The man pulls out his phone, pulls up the order, and shoves it in my face.

Me: “Ah, I see the problem. Your order was sent to the store at [Next Block Over] and [Twenty Blocks Down].”

Man: “That’s f****** r*****ed. I’m sorry to use that word, but that’s f****** stupid. I ordered from your parking lot and gave it access to my location. How is it sending my order to another store?”

Me: *Putting on a very bland customer service face* “I’m sorry, sir—”

Man: “I bet you hear a lot of this, huh?”

Me: “Yes, our app isn’t the greatest at locations and it is a problem. I’m very sorry. Would you like to pick up your order at the other store, or we could make it here for you?”

Man: “Well, obviously I want to get it from here!”

Me: “Of course. What was on your order?”

I grab two cups and scribble his order on them and then hand them off to a barista. The other barista gets his food order started while I walk to the back to tell the manager in frustration about the man who apparently couldn’t check where his order was being sent at any of the steps in the process, where it straight-up asks you where to send it at least once.

When I come out from the back, William is still standing at the counter with both his drinks and his food.

Man: “Hey, I wanted to apologize for being short with you. None of this was in any way your fault.”

Me: “Thank you, sir. I’m just glad we could get everything together for you quickly.”

Man: “I appreciate it. Have a good day.”

Me: “You, too.”

As he walks away, another man walks up to the counter.

Man #2: “Hi, I’m here to pick up for William?”

Me: “Ah. Here’s your hot blonde roast, William.”