This happens right before Christmas.

Sister: “Why don’t you get the tree out?”

Me: “It’s heavy. You’ll have to help me.”

Sister: “Okay, but hurry up. I have things to do.”

We go take the big, heavy box out and carry it upstairs. I’m pushing and she’s pulling, and she gets a phone call and DROPS the box. It is too heavy for me.

Me: “Help!”

Sister: “Oh, you’re strong; just keep on!”

The box falls down, and I fall, too, on my bare knees. The stairs are wooden and I writhe around, moaning.

Sister: “Oh, poor baby!”

She rubbed my knee once and walked away, talking on the phone with her boyfriend. She didn’t get why I was so mad, and after that, she declared all Christmas trees evil.

“If you need help at closing,” they told me, “ask a manager.”

So, one night, I was overwhelmed and asked for help. I did not get it.

The next day, they called me into the office to ask why I was not getting my work done. 

I didn’t ask for help after that.

My family and I are visiting Krakow for a long weekend. At the end of a long day, we want to grab a bite to eat, so we wander around the city centre to look for a suitable restaurant. It is raining, and not every restaurant is suitable because my sister is a vegetarian and not every restaurant has a vegetarian option on the menu.

After an hour of searching in the rain, we finally spot a “vegetarian-only” type of restaurant, so we quickly hurry inside to get dry and finally eat something. It is empty, but we think nothing of it.

This is also an “order-at-the-counter” type of restaurant.

Brother: “Let me fetch some menus.”

He goes to the counter and the waitress hands him the menus, saying nothing. Everything looks good on the menu, so we take a while to decide our orders. The two waitresses just stand behind the counter, doing nothing. Once we have decided, my brother walks over to the counter to order.

Brother: “Hello! We would like two carrot burgers, three Indian koftas, and one veggie stew, please.”

Waitress: “Sorry, we don’t have any more burgers or stew.”

Brother: “All right, let me go back and change our orders”

He returns, and we take a while to decide again. Again, the waitresses remain doing nothing behind the counter. After our second decision, he goes back to the counter.

Brother: “Hello again! We would like three Indian koftas, two enchiladas, and one soya chops, please.”

Waitress: “Sorry, we have only one portion of Indian kofta left, one portion of enchiladas, and for the rest only soya chops.”

Brother: *Sighs* “All right, let me go back to the table.”

After he explains to us what our options are. We all look at each other and stand up together.

Brother: *Hands back the menus* “We have decided to take our business elsewhere. Have a pleasant evening!”

We went to the Italian restaurant on the other side of the street, in full view of the waitresses. The food there was delicious!

I still do not understand how they could have given us the menus, said nothing, and only when we got to the counter twice admit that they had virtually nothing left! No wonder it was so empty! Worst customer service I’ve ever received!

I have had vertigo on and off since I caught a bug in 2017. I usually bed rest and it goes away after a few hours. I have a bout of it in May 2019; it’s just not going after two days and my anxiety over it is making it worse.

I call the doctor and his receptionist says as it’s an existing condition I can have a telephone consult. Two minutes after I put the phone down, the doctor calls back and says he’ll send an electronic prescription to the local pharmacy. I can’t drive. I can only just stand, but the pharmacy is seven minutes’ walk, so I figure I’ll stagger up to the pharmacy, get the meds, and then stagger next door to the tea room, take the tablets with a drink there, and wait for them to kick in so I can walk home. My friend runs the tea room and will let me sit quietly in the corner.

So, the plan is made, and after fifteen minutes of stumbling up the road with the world spinning, I get to the pharmacy and hang off a display unit for another ten minutes until it’s my turn.

Assistant: “How can I help you?”

Me: “I’ve come to collect a prescription that the doctor has just sent through electronically as urgent for me.”

Assistant: “I’ll go look.”

She disappears for ten minutes. By the time she returns, I’m almost lying on the counter as my head is spinning so much.

Assistant: “No, there’s no prescription for you.”

Me: “Can you check, please? The doctor said he would send it through as urgent.”

Assistant: “Well, if you insist.”

Me: *Through gritted teeth* “Yes, I do!”

She goes away again and comes back after another ten minutes, by which time I’m starting to feel nauseous.

Assistant: “No prescription. When did the doctor send it through?”

Me: “As I said, he has just sent it through as urgent. Just now.”

Assistant: “Why didn’t you say?”

Me: “I did.”

Assistant: “Oh, we don’t look at the electronic ones until the afternoon. Can you come back in two days?”

Me: “I have chronic vertigo. I can’t see too well, and I can’t stand up, walk, or lie down. The doctor has prescribed these as urgent. No, I can’t come back in two days!”

Assistant: “Are you insisting that you have your prescription made up now?”

Me: “You think?”

She looks blankly at me.

Me: “Yes, I am. Please make it up now or I will throw up and collapse here.”

Assistant: *Sighs* “If you insist. Can you go sit over there?” *Points at a chair behind a pillar* “You are stopping other people getting their prescriptions.”

I looked at her as if she had lost the plot and went to sit in the chair and lean on the pillar which was nice and cold on my head.

After another thirty minutes, still no prescription. I staggered over and asked the assistant how much longer it would be as it was now nearly an hour since I’d gotten there. She told me to go sit down and wait.

I stumbled back. After another thirty minutes, a different assistant came over with a clipboard and asked me to fill out a customer satisfaction surgery. I must have looked shocked and possibly homicidal at this point, as she said in a caring way, “Are you okay, love?”. I explained that I’d been there all morning waiting for my urgent prescription. She grabbed the clipboard out of my hands and dashed off. She came straight back with my prescription made up.

She explained that the pharmacist had started to make it up but had been called to the telephone. Then, it was given to the assistant pharmacist who started it, too, and then went to early lunch. The assistant I’d been dealing with had gone out on her break and it had been forgotten, and because I was behind the pillar, they had forgotten me.

This different assistant had been filling a display up, saw what looked like a dead woman on the chair, and brought over the survey as a way to talk to me. I dry-swallowed two of the tablets as she spoke, staggered home hours after I had left, and finally collapsed in bed. About thirty minutes later, the tablets kicked in and I filled the survey out in line with very honest replies.

Two days later, I moved to having my prescriptions filled by post — they come three days after you request them — and for urgent, I now send my husband.

My aunt recently moved into a new house and has to do some renovations, so she’s hired a worker from a local construction company to do so.

He set off a big red flag on his first day on the job; he was asked to clean out the gutters, and yet he didn’t bring a ladder. This meant he had to climb out of the window onto the roof to clean them, dealing some damage to the shingles in the process.

For some reason, my aunt still goes with this guy. Unsurprisingly, it only gets worse.

The next day, he comes in to install a curtain pole on one of her second-floor windows. When it comes out crooked, this happens.

Aunt: “Why is this thing crooked?”

Worker: “What do you mean? It’s up the right way.”

Aunt: *Sighs* “Okay, measure it again, then.”

The worker uses a TAPE MEASURE instead of a bubble level to see if the curtain pole is level on both ends, using the SOFT CARPET to base it on.

Worker: “Again, it looks level to me, ma’am.”

Aunt: *Pause* “Okay, repeat what you just said to me and think about it.”

Worker: *Pause* “I said it’s level?”

Aunt: *mental facepalm*

At this stage of the renovations, she now has several big, ugly holes in her wall due to the worker having to realign the curtain pole.

On another day on the job, the guy says he’ll install plumbing and connect them to some washing machines in an upstairs room, which my aunt bought specifically FOR the new house. She gets back from an errand, and no progress has been made on the room OR the washing machines. My aunt looks on her back porch and catches this guy talking on the phone to one of his friends about a potentially lucrative music commission he got assigned, as he is apparently a composer, as well. My aunt, who the guy still hasn’t noticed, loudly announces that she would like to see how it turns out. The guy doesn’t last too much longer after this.

When my aunt texts the guy to tell him that she is changing to a different company — no surprise there — he still has the gall to try to guilt-trip my aunt into paying through their last series of texts.

Worker: “I would like to remind you that you still have not paid for my services. Please do so as soon as possible, as I’m struggling and need to put food on the table for my family.”

Aunt: “Man, are you serious right now?! I told you in person why I’m not paying you, and apparently, I have to tell you again! When I asked you to clean the gutters out, you didn’t even bother to bring a ladder.

“When you installed my curtain pole, you didn’t even bother to use the proper equipment to see if it was level, instead half-a**ing it using a tape measure and the carpet, and left a bunch of holes in the wall you didn’t even bother, nor offer to fix!

“When you were told to install plumbing upstairs, you not only did nothing during the time I was gone, which should have been more than enough for you to get started at least; no, you spent that time talking on the phone about another job!

“That’s an entire month down the drain with almost no progress on my house! You want your money? Go find a client for a commission; of course, with an experience like this, it sure as h*** won’t be me! Do you want to know why you’re not getting a d*** cent out of me for this job? There’s your reason! There are your reasons, plural!

“And I’m sure as h*** not going to regret this. I am more than perfectly capable of doing most of these tasks; I’ve moved into multiple houses and performed repairs on all or most of them. I hired you because I wanted to, not because I needed to. Goodbye, and do not contact me again.”

A few days later, she got a call from the construction company itself, saying she had been “constantly rude and abusive” to one of their employees, and they were also inquiring about the payment. She cleared the situation up and they said they’d look into it. They also said they were now VERY interested in talking to [Worker]. Apparently, he had been getting similar complaints from lots of his clients.

A few weeks later, when she checked the website of the construction company, [Worker]’s contact information was no longer there. Thankfully, the company she switched to actually did the work they were assigned, and her new house looks amazing!