Caller: “I really gotta complain. All the flowers you sold me died.”

Me: “I’m sorry to hear that, sir. Since it’s within warranty, we can send you some new ones or offer you a refund.”

Caller: “Would the new flowers die just as quickly?”

Me: “If the flowers are given the proper care, as directed on the—”

Caller: “—I don’t want an evasive non-answer. I want you to guarantee for me, right now, that any new flowers you send me won’t die just as quickly.”

Me: “Sir, I cannot guarantee that, as I can’t know what conditions the flowers are being kept in, but we also offer a refund if—”

Caller: “—I don’t want that. That’s not a solution.”

Me: “So what would be a solution to this issue, sir?”

Caller: “You tell me.”

Me: “I’ve offered to resend the flowers or a refund.”

Caller: “No. Those aren’t solutions.”

Me: *Sighing internally.* “Have you ever had any issues with our flowers before?”

Caller: “No.”

Me: “So, can we chalk this order up to being a bad batch and replace them for you?”

Caller: “No.”

Me: “Then it’s the refund, then.”

Caller: “That’s not a solution—”

Me: “—then in that case I’m not refunding you, and I am ending this call since nothing else seems acceptable. Have a nice day.”

Caller: “Wait, I—”

Me: *Click.*

He called back, and I let my manager take the call. After a few minutes of the caller complaining about my attitude, I overhear my manager say:

Manager: “We can offer a refund, or we can resend the flowers.”

Pause.

Manager: “Well, those are solutions, sir. Just because you don’t like them doesn’t mean they don’t solve the issue of your dead flowers. Now, about the issue of you being a total a**, well then, I’d have to agree, we don’t have a solution for that. Have you tried therapy? Oh, he hung up.”

My manager processed the refund.

I’m a teenager working at a gas station for my first job. I see a guy smoking while pumping. I get on the PA and say:

Me: “Sir! You gotta extinguish the butt while pumping!”

He responded by flicking his lighter and holding it up to the hose.

I call the cops. Immediately.

The cops find him (we’re in a high-risk area, so they’re always patrolling nearby). No idea what they said to him, but the guy was super angry and called my manager trying to get me fired. Turns out they were friends.

Customer: “Who’s the a**hole who called the cops on me?”

Manager: “What did you do?”

Customer: “What do you mean, what did I do? I didn’t do anything!”

Manager: “Look, dude, I know my guy. He wouldn’t call the cops if he didn’t have a reason.”

The customer mumbles through a version of what he did.

Manager: “So you were putting an open flame to a machine that spits out combustible liquids? You f****** jack-a**! I would have called the cops on you!”

He was a good boss.

The cops didn’t arrest him, but the boss told him not to come back and trespassed him from the station.

Shortly after I moved to the Netherlands, I decided to practice my Dutch by joining a volunteer organization. In my neighbourhood, there was a library which had switched from being managed by the municipality to being a volunteer-supported structure, sort of a book crossing spot: anyone could pick or drop a book, no need to bring it back, and so on. We were there just to explain to patrons how it worked and to put books back on the shelves.

Even though my Dutch was still kind of broken, most of the patrons would praise my attempt at practicing and improving it. Until she came in. 

She comes in on a Saturday afternoon, when I am normally the only one manning the place. She goes to a book rack and starts shuffling among the books, looking for something. I approach her and, in Dutch, offer my help. She starts speaking fast and almost not opening her lips, resulting in me not getting a single word of what she is saying.

To my “sorry?” she repeats again the same string of muttered and unintelligible sounds, to which I say, this time in English:

Me: “I am sorry, but my Dutch is not so good. Can you say that in English?”

She goes full banshee mode, shouting in English:

Patron: “You should not be here if you don’t speak Dutch! You’re wasting my time!”

Unnoticed by me, [Senior Volunteer] had just entered the place, just in time to hear my conversation with her. He goes to her, holds her arm, and, while guiding her to the exit, he tells her, in Dutch, which I can understand:

Senior Volunteer: “You are totally right, but unfortunately [OP] is the only one who volunteers here on Saturday, so if he cannot be here because his Dutch is not up to your expectations, it means that this place is closed as of now until the next volunteer is available on Monday. Goodbye.”

And in saying so pushes her out of the glass door, locking it behind her.

While she is staring at us behind the glass, processing what just happened, [Senior Volunteer] looks at me and says:

Senior Volunteer: “You did nothing wrong, and complaining about your Dutch is very rich coming from someone who only speaks [Local Dialect]. I couldn’t understand either what she was muttering! We are volunteers here; we don’t have to put up with such people. You can have the rest of the afternoon free and keep this place closed.”

A woman is standing close to the customer service desk in the lobby area of our superstore. She’s looking around, confused for a moment, so I ask:

Me: “Do you need any help, ma’am?”

At least that’s what I had intended to say. I got maybe two or three syllables in before she recoiled from me and let out a blood-curdling scream that would feel at home in a horror movie.

Customer: “Oh my god! You terrified me!”

Me: “I’m sorry, ma’am, I didn’t mean to startle you.”

She had looked right at me a couple of times, so I was a bit confused.

Customer: “I thought you were part of the building! Since when did [Store] start hiring such tall women?!”

Me: “Ma’am, I’m 5’10”.”

Customer: “They should keep giant Amazonian women like you in the back where you can reach stuff! Scary giants shouldn’t be at Customer Service waiting to pounce on poor customers!”

Me: *Trying to change the subject.* “Ma’am… did you need any help?”

Customer: “Where is your food court?”

Me: “That’s the other side of that display, ma’am.”

Customer: “Such a big display, too! It’s blocking the view! I bet you put that together, didn’t you, with your giant manly hands!”

Me: “…good day, ma’am.”

My manager came by later, laughing her a** off to tell me about a complaint she’d received about “a giantess attacking customers at the entrance”.

Me: “What did you say?”

Manager: “I actually told her it was our entrance troll, and she should consider herself lucky as normally she’d only be allowed in if she could answer your riddle…”

Our store has a customer who comes in like every couple of months purely just to spread her own brand of misery. I don’t always realize it’s her and greet her, and she just holds her hand up and snaps:

Customer: “No talking! I don’t want you talking to me!”

Good enough for me! So, the rest of us just leave her alone. One time, there were no other customers in the store apart from Ms. Misery-Guts. Since she didn’t want us talking to her, we were talking among ourselves.

Customer: “I said no talking!”

Me: “We weren’t talking to you, ma’am.”

Customer: “No talking among yourselves, either! You’re all at work! You shouldn’t sound like you’re having fun!”

Me: “Ma’am, we are happy to respect your wishes and only talk to you when you ask us to, but you can’t control who else we talk to.”

Customer: “If it bothers the customer, then you need to stop doing it!”

Me: “No, ma’am. We’re not behaving in an antisocial or disrespectful manner; we are simply talking. We do not need to stop doing it.

Customer: “Then I want to talk to your manager!”

Manager: “That’s me, ma’am. I’m one of those people you don’t want talking, so I can’t help you.

She gave us all an unhappy “hmph!” and left the store to go darken someone else’s day.

Since that day, every time she came in, it was immediately obvious that she hated it when the rest of us looked like we were not miserable at work, so we made sure to overplay how much of a good time we were having.

Manager: “Why couldn’t the jalapeno practice archery? Because it didn’t habanero.”

Us: *Laughs.*

Customer: “What did I tell you about work?! This is not a place to have fun! Your work ethic is deplorable!”

Manager: “Ma’am, if existing in public is such an inconvenience for you, have you considered online shopping?”

She half gasps, half glares, and storms out again. Our manager just shrugs:

Manager: “I swear, she’s like that “quit having fun!” meme.”

Thanks to that awesome manager, we didn’t always have to pretend to be having a good time at work.