I work as a customer support phone operator for a large insurance company. We send reminders through email and post running from one month up to the day before their policy is due to be renewed. Depending on how busy the postal service is, it can take a few days, a week, or even longer to reach customers.

I can’t even begin to count how many times I have had the exact same conversation.

Customer: “I just received a request for payment for this year! I already paid this on [date]! What are you trying to pull here?”

Me: “I’ll be more than happy to check that for you… and I do see that payment was taken successfully. You said you just got this letter? Can you tell me the date on it?”

Customer: “Well, it says here [date before he called to make payment], but I don’t see what that has to do with anything!”

I understand you’d be upset to pay twice, but if folks wouldn’t only take two seconds to read the paperwork we send, it would prevent a lot of hassle on both our parts.

My late brother related this story to me many years ago. It was the mid-1980s, and all his children were still in school. He’d always wanted to get a set of that well-known encyclopedia and figured this would be a good time, since his kids would also make great use of them.

He contacted the company and they sent over a salesman. My brother was interested in buying the whole set all at once, as opposed to one or two volumes a month. He also was not interested in any kind of financing. He had some friends that had told him more or less what to expect and that he would save a decent amount of money by purchasing the entire set all at once. They warned him that the salesman would probably try to hide the true price behind all kinds of financing tricks and whatnot. He had at least a ballpark cost in mind, and he was prepared for any tactic the salesman would try to pull on him.

The salesman showed up and had brought a complete, brand-new set with him. He spent about twenty minutes showing all the features to my brother, his wife, and the kids. He also mentioned that this edition was the newest version that had just come out in the past couple of months, so my brother would be getting the newest version available, and that the next version would not be released for several years.

After the salesman completed his spiel, my brother asked him this simple question:

Brother: “Okay, I really like this encyclopedia and would like to get the whole set from you tonight. What is the price to buy the entire set from you right now?”

Salesman: “Well, we have payment plans starting at only $20.00 a month and—”

My brother interrupted him.

Brother: “I asked you for the price for the whole set, no financing or payment plans.”

Salesman: “Well, we have plans where you can buy just one volume per month—”

My brother interrupted again.

Brother: “That’s not what I asked you. How much is it to buy the whole set?”

Salesman: “We can do another type of plan, where you can purchase either two, three, or four volumes per month, and you’d pay around $20.00 a month, per volume, so you’d get the complete set much faster, with the payments then spread out over—”

My brother interrupted yet again, now really aggravated.

Brother: “What part of ‘What is the price of the entire set?’ do you not understand?”

Salesman: “Well, we have several payment plans that fit any budget.”

Brother: “Hold it right there. You are not listening to me. The next words out of your mouth will be the full price for the whole set, or you’ll be leaving my house.”

Salesman: “Well, it depends on several factors—”

My brother stood up with daggers shooting out of his eyes.

Brother: “Enough! Get out of my house right now!”

Salesman: “But Mr. [Brother], I haven’t finished explaining all your options and benefits.”

My brother led him to his front door.

Brother: “Oh, yes, you are done here. I told you the next words out of your mouth were to be the final, full price for the entire set, or you were leaving my house. You ignored my request, ignored every question I asked you about the final price, and were very evasive every time I asked about it. You are leaving my house, right now.”

At this point, my brother all but shoved the salesman out the front door and slammed the door behind him. He was so aggravated that he never bought the set nor even bothered to look into it ever again. 

The salesman lost an all but guaranteed sale, all because he wouldn’t listen. He was probably afraid that mentioning the full price would scare people away, but he lost a sale by not listening to a customer that was obviously prepared and willing to make a purchase on the spot.

I work in a hardware store with a pretty strict uniform policy. The store’s logo is plastered all over my clothes. There are four logos on my polo shirt, three on my jacket, three on my trousers, and two on my lanyard, and today, I even happen to be wearing branded socks that were a silly little company Christmas gift last year. Besides this, the uniform has a very recognizable colour scheme that surely no one would wear of their own free choice. Despite this, I get asked this question all the time, and today, I guess my brain-to-mouth filter failed.

Customer: “Excuse me. Do you work here?”

Me: “No, I’m just a huge fan.”

I walked away. The customer stood in confused silence while her husband dissolved into hysterical laughter.

For the record, I did, of course, go back to help them, and thankfully, they both had a good sense of humour about it.

A lady came in looking to buy an Anole lizard from us. I pointed out to her a good starter cage size — 24 by 16 by 16 inches — and other essentials she would need.

Me: “You should know that Anoles don’t like being held, so if you want something you can hold, this is not the best choice.”

Customer: “I don’t have the money for that! I’ll just use this since it’s a small lizard.”

She grabbed a small cricket cage, maybe 5 by 6 by 12 inches.

I refused to sell her the lizard due to the cage size she was putting it in. She came back three days later and got the big cage and two lizards from my coworker. I had warned him she might be back, but he forgot about it.

Two weeks later, the woman returned the lizards in a cup.

Customer: “These lizards are boring, and they don’t like being held!”

I live in a very rural area of Wales. At the time of this story, I was sixteen and had just started college, which was a good hour and a half away. Thankfully, there was a special bus program that went through my village that consisted of two separate connecting bus routes.

I was on the second bus back one evening and my friend had gotten off, so it was me and a couple of random people. I had my headphones in and was zoning out when I suddenly realised it was taking longer than normal to reach my stop. I am very socially awkward, so I waited for a while, but eventually, I made my way up to the front.

Me: “When will we reach [My Village]?”

Driver: “This bus doesn’t go through [My Village].”

Me: *Shocked* “What bus number is this?”

He told me. It was the right bus route, but the driver insisted that this bus NEVER went through my village. We were already past the turning for the village, so I went to my seat and checked my phone. However, it was an old piece of garbage, and I’m a little forgetful, so it had gone dead. 

In the end, I got off at the next stop — a small town a ten-minute drive from my home. I planned to find a phone box, but the only one around was out of order, so I walked into a pub and asked to borrow their phone. The people were very nice and let me stay there until my parents arrived since it was pretty dark out. 

My parents were furious at the driver, and my mum called up the next day to complain. Turns out the bus only goes this route at certain times for the school run. The driver must have not worked that shift in a while and didn’t bother checking the route. I don’t know what happened to them, but hopefully, they will be more careful in the future.