(I work at a famous southern supermarket as a package clerk, which is a nice way of saying that I’m a bagger. I’m one month into my job. I am bagging for a register when I overhear a customer in another lane yelling at one of the cashiers over a misunderstanding on a compliment she gave to a friend of the customer’s. Since I have finished bagging my register, I move over to bag for the customer’s friend, as the complaining customer continues to berate and yell at the cashier from afar. Take note that the cashier has braided extensions colored pure red.)

Customer: “And don’t you talk about her d*** hair like that again! You, with your fake-a** weave! I ought to get your manager here and fire you for disrespecting a customer for the way she wears her hair!”

(The cashier picks up the intercom phone, calls the manager, and says a customer wants to speak to him. The customer says nothing, but smiles and continues to look at her silently as she finishes her friend’s order. The friend seems embarrassed. She’s just quiet the whole time this is going on, and promptly leaves the store, more than likely to avoid more embarrassment. The confidence in the cashier seems to anger the customer even more.)

Customer: “I don’t know why you’re smirking, you stupid b****. Your manager is coming, and I’m going to get him to fire your a**!”

Cashier: “I’m smiling because all of this is a misunderstanding and you are flying off the rails for no reason. I’m not afraid of you or your threats to get me fired.”

(The customer just looks angry and points a finger at her.)

Customer: “And that’s the d*** problem! YOU SHOULD BE AFRAID!”

(When the manager comes, the three of them discuss the situation and the customer promptly calls the cashier a liar about complimenting her friend’s hair. The customer eventually storms off, after the manager dismisses her claim; the cashier has never been known to insult customers and most customers generally like her. After she leaves, I shake my head and look to the cashier.)

Me: “What exactly did you say to her friend to make her fly off the handle and say that you need to be afraid of her?”

Cashier: “I said that I wished I could get my real hair to look like hers.”

(I am a supervisor on the front end of a chain grocery store. We have a regular customer who doesn’t like us to scan her items though the registers. This exchange happens when a new cashier has to take care of this customer. We have told all of our cashiers that they can call us over when this particular customer comes in and are told that if she doesn’t want us to scan her items, she can take them over to our self-checkout area. But no one has told my new cashier this.)

Cashier: “I’m sorry, ma’am. This is an unusual request. I just want to make sure I can do this.”

(He pages for a supervisor to come to his register.)

Customer: “NO! Don’t do that! They don’t like me here! They don’t like me speaking the truth! The scanners are poisoning the food; the poisoned food gives us cancer! The scanners are controlled by the government to control our minds!”

Cashier: “Ummmm…” *looks over at me in confusion*

Me: “Ma’am, I have told you repeatedly that if you do not want your items scanned you need to go to the self-checkout and take care of your groceries there. My cashiers are not going to enter all your items by hand.”

Customer: “BUT I WANT THEM TO DO IT THAT WAY!”

(She reaches over to grab my cashier’s shirt. I pull him away from the register and she grabs my sleeve.)

Customer: “WHY CAN’T YOU DO AS I SAY?! THE CUSTOMER IS ALWAYS RIGHT!”

(Our store manager has watched her try to grab us multiple times. He walks over and starts talking.)

Manager: “Ma’am, can I help you with something?”

Customer: “GET AWAY FROM ME, YOU SUIT!! YOU CAN’T CONTROL ME!”

Manager: *looking confused* “Is everything okay here, [My Name]?”

(I nod and he walks away.)

Me: “Ma’am, I’m going to have to ask you to leave. This is the fourth time I have had to talk to you this week. This time you have assaulted me and one of my associates. I am within my legal rights to call the police right now. We have cameras focused on every register. No police officer or court is going to say that what you are doing is legal. We have stated what our store policies are, and have given you an option to scan your items the way you want to. You can either go to those registers, let my cashier scan your groceries the way we scan them, or you can leave right now.”

(The customer looked confused but let my cashier scan her items, but as soon as she got her receipt she made a beeline to the customer service desk to get a refund or exchange on the food she bought. She was denied, and kept mumbling things about the government and the scanners on her way out the door.)

(I work at the checkout at a grocery store that, on Thursdays, offers a 5% discount to seniors. Naturally, we get a lot of seniors on Thursdays. Near the end of my shift, an elderly gentleman comes to my lane.)

Me: “Hello, do you have a [Store Card] today?”

Customer: ‘Yes, it’s [telephone number].’

Me: ‘Okay. Did you find everything okay today?”

Customer: “Yes, I did.”

Me: :Great. Are you having a good day so far?”

Customer: “Well, you know how people say T-G-I-F?”

Me: “Yeah…”

Customer: “Well I say, S-H-I-T. So Happy It’s Thursday.”

(I could only fake laugh and quickly get him out of there, making sure I give him his senior discount.)

(I work part time as a jack-of-all-trades in one of the UK’s chain supermarkets. Because it is busy, I am helping out on checkouts. An older lady approaches my till wanting to purchase a tub of vanilla ice cream. I scan the tub of ice cream.)

Me: “That will be £4, then, please!”

Customer: “That’s not right. It should be £1.67!”

(I void the item, and scan it again. It still says £4.)

Customer: “IT’S £1.67! DISCOUNT IT FOR ME IMMEDIATELY!”

Me: “I’m sorry, ma’am; I can’t do that without supervisor permission. I’ll call one over now to check.”

Customer: “IT’S £1.67! ARE YOU ACCUSING ME OF LYING?!”

(One of the supervisors arrives, having heard her raised voice. I explain the situation, and he disappears to the freezer aisle. He finds the ice cream and checks the price ticket. It says £4 and no offer. He comes back and explains this politely to the lady.)

Customer: “SO, YOU ARE CALLING ME A LIAR! I CAN READ; IT SAID £1.67!”

(The supervisor went and fetched the ticket and showed the lady. She screeched, shoved the ice cream across the checkout at me, and stormed out of the door screeching like a pterodactyl. The supervisor and I exchanged “WTF” faces, and carried on with our lives.)

(We sell more expensive products, so our customers are often given what they want simply to appease them, and they know it. Many of them are also highly wealthy. I am working a late shift. A woman and her daughter come through my register. She isn’t exactly friendly, but it starts off civil enough. Her daughter is at the end of the register counter, where some bags are located for anyone bagging — employee or customer. I have a limited supply of my own bags across the counter by my hips, quite a reach for a customer, but they still do it. This lady suddenly does that, and it freaks me out a little. Calmly, I suggest that the bags at the end will be easier for her to access, because they are. She can only grab two from my side, anyway. Big mistake.)

Me: “Ma’am, if you’d like, the bags at the end of the register would be easier to access, instead of leaning over the counter.”

Customer: “No one else has ever told me not to use those bags before! Why do you think you’re so special?”

Me: “Ma’am, I just said the bags there are…”

Customer: “I know there are bags there! How am I to reach them? I can’t get to them!”

(Sure, her daughter and cart are over there, but the carts have wheels for a reason. I don’t say that, of course. She turns to her daughter, who has stopped bagging.)

Customer: “Stop! Make her do it!”

(Meaning me. I will have to bag her order. Alone. Because of a suggestion. I finish in silence, and she says:)

Customer: “Since you think you’re so smart and have taught me a lesson, let me teach you something: you don’t know everything! Huh? You don’t! So don’t go around acting like you know things like that, because it’s not your place! Think!”

(She jerked the receipt from my hand, which left a paper cut. She later filed a complaint, from which my manager took her side. Funny enough, the woman after her called her an asshole, but I shrugged it off to avoid making it worse. That same lady has come through my line twice since then, and both times she’s said absolutely nothing to me despite my attempts to be nice. Rather childish, in my opinion. Also, funnily enough, after she came through the second time, another woman right after her said, “What a b****! And you’re such a nice young lady!”)