I work at a property management company. We recently took over management of a condo, and we also manage some individual units for the owners, as well. One of the other owners has rented her unit to a couple that aren’t my favorite tenants at all. When their oven stopped working and they called our office — instead of their landlord — I went above and beyond what I was supposed to do by calling the owner myself and arranging for an appliance repairman to come by.
They proceeded to thank me for that by calling me three or four times a day until it was fixed, despite the fact that, as I told them multiple times, there was nothing I could do to get the outside company to come by any quicker.
More recently, they’ve started bugging me to give them a parking spot in the underground parking lot. There are a limited number of stalls available, but last year, before the building was full, the previous manager let them park in the handicapped spot for free. I’ve explained that I’m not the one to talk about that; my boss is, but as her husband is in the hospital with cancer, she’s focused on that right now and she’ll get to the parking when she can.
Again, they’ve refused to accept that as an answer and let my boss contact them in her own time, calling the office on a regular basis but getting the same response, until this happened last week.
Tenant: “I’m calling to check on what’s happening with my parking spot.”
Me: “Well, as I’ve mentioned before, that’s my boss’ job, and I really can’t do anything to help you. She’s not in the office right now, so you’ll have to wait for her to give her a call. I’ll let her know that you called. Again.”
Tenant: “But I talked to her last week, and she said she’d get that taken care of for me.”
I am sickly sweet because I’m getting fed up with her.
Me: “Yes, well, her husband died on Thursday, so she hasn’t had a chance to look into that for you.”
Tenant: “But I talked to her at the beginning of the week; Thursday is at the end of the week.”
I am even more sickly sweet because I was really close to him, his death was sudden and unexpected, and I’m not over it yet.
Me: “Yes, and he was in the hospital before that, so she was with him, supporting him.”
Tenant: “Okay, but…”
Me: “The next time she’s in, I’ll let her know you called.”
But that’s not the end of it, because the next day, my coworker calls me.
Coworker: “Owner of a number of units in the building) just called. [Tenant] emailed him, and he’s agreed to give them the handicapped parking spot for free. Can you go get the map of that for me just to make sure no one else has it?”
Me: “I really don’t think that he owns that spot, and even if he does, I don’t think we can legally assign a handicapped spot to someone permanently.”
Coworker: “But [Owner] wants us to, so we’re going to do it.”
Me: “Wait, he’s not even their landlord; they’re renting from another person entirely! How did they even get his contact info?”
Coworker: “It doesn’t really matter, because they did, and now he wants this taken care of.”
Me: “Again, I don’t think that’s even legal. [Boss] spoke to them last week and specifically told them that she can’t give them the handicapped spot.”
Coworker: “But [Owner] told me that he bought that stall, so he can do what he wants with that.”
Me: “I’m pretty sure he really can’t.”
Coworker: “Well, [Boss] isn’t here right now, and we need to take care of this right away, so I’ll call [Tenant] and let her know she can have it.”
Me: “I really don’t like them.”
Coworker: “Oh, I was wondering why you were fighting me on this. But we have to do it.”
Me: “Fine.”
The next day, [Tenant] comes in and asks for [Coworker], the only person who is actually giving her what she wants. He’s in a meeting, so she says she’ll come back within an hour. [Boss] is in for the first time since her husband died and is catching up on the mounds of work on her desk. I really don’t want to bother her, especially with this, but because [Tenant] is coming back soon, I do.
Boss: “We can’t give away the handicapped stall.”
Me: “I know! That’s what I told him, but he did it anyway.”
Boss: “Well, I’ll email a lawyer and see if there’s any way we can do that.”
She then proceeds to email one lawyer and immediately gets back an Out of Office email, so she emails another who doesn’t respond, so she calls the office and asks the secretary, who doesn’t know, and nobody else in the office is available because they’re all in a conference. So, she checks what stalls are currently available; only two are, one of which is coming available at the end of the month, and the other isn’t actually available because the previous manager let some people swap and it’s a complete mess. So, really, there’s only one available.
We let [Tenant] know this when she comes back, and she’s clearly not happy about the fact she won’t get it until the end of the month, but [Boss] tells her that she’ll hopefully get an answer from the lawyer soon and will let her know. After she leaves:
Boss: “She’s a cow.”
Me: “I know! I don’t like her.”
And I can’t even tell [Boss] what [Tenant] said after her husband died because I don’t want to upset her more than she already is.
Boss: “But she has to get it, so…”
So, to sum it up, even though [Tenant] isn’t even one of our customers and we don’t make any money from her, even though there’s already a waiting list for parking stalls with some people who’ve been waiting months, even though she has literally nothing to do with [Owner], and even though she had no sympathy or patience, because she wouldn’t stop calling people until she got what she wanted, she now gets a $100-a-month parking stall for free.
