(I am a pharmacist. While I’m on lunch, a customer comes up to the counter while my technician is helping another customer in the drive-thru.)

Customer: “Do you have a pharmacist working? It’s an emergency! I need to speak to her now!”

(My technician calls me back to the pharmacy. The customer sees me arrive and tries to stop me outside the pharmacy, but I make her wait until I get in the pharmacy.)

Customer: “I just bought these pills off the street, and they are supposed to be Xanax. But I looked on my phone with Google, and it said they weren’t Xanax. I need you to tell me what this is now. It’s an emergency that I know what this is.”

Me: *looking blankly* “I will not identify any medication that is purchased illegally.”

Customer: “I need to know what this is. It’s an emergency! Why won’t you tell me what it is?”

Me: “Because it was illegally purchased, and I’m not helping people purchase drugs on the street.”

(She looked at me for a few seconds and then walked off.)

(I’m working third shift in the control room at a police department, and it’s currently one in the morning. I have my main screen fixed on my sergeant, who is outside in the dimly-lit parking lot taking a smoke break. The parking lot is completely empty except for the cars belonging to the jail staff. She’s about to come back in when two teenage girls walk across the parking lot and ask her something. The sergeant shakes her head but leads them towards the main lobby door. They take a seat as the sergeant radios me.)

Sergeant: “[My Name], call Communications and have them dispatch [Patrol Sergeant] here. Those juveniles he’s been searching for have shown up.”

(I see the girls look at each other uneasily on the camera as the sergeant takes a seat between them and the door.)

Me: “Roger that.”

(I make the call, and not a minute later I see two patrol cars come flying into the parking lot. One officer jumps out of his car before it’s even parked. I turn on a speaker in the lobby just in time to hear:)

Patrol Sergeant: “Where have you two been? And who have you been with?”

(The girls pretend to ignore him before the other deputy gets in their face.)

Deputy: “HE ASKED WHERE THE H*** HAVE YOU TWO BEEN? DO YOU KNOW HOW WORRIED YOUR PARENTS ARE? WHAT THE H*** WERE YOU THINKING?”

(Two more cars come flying into the parking lot, and an older couple, a young man, and a middle-aged woman come storming into the lobby. The sergeant takes that as her cue and comes back into the jail, shaking her head.)

Sergeant: “Stupid idiots. What the h*** were they thinking?”

Me: “Is everything okay, Sergeant?”

Sergeant: “Those two were the fifteen-year-olds that the deputies have been looking for all night. They decided to skip school but realized they missed their ride back afterward.”

Me: “But the high school dismisses at three pm! What were they doing? Just wandering around for the last ten hours?”

Sergeant: “I don’t know. What’s it looking like out there?”

(I look at the camera just in time to see the mother of [Girl #1] throw a book bag across the lobby while the other woman and the father are shouting and waving around a cell phone. The young man is turning red, and he yells at the girls before walking back outside. Meanwhile, the deputies are standing back shaking their heads.)

Me: “I think there is more to the story, Sergeant. The families look pissed off right now.”

(The next morning we got the full story from the deputies. The girls had skipped school to spend the day fooling around with their secret twenty-some-year-old boyfriends in the next county over. The plan had been for them to get back in time to catch the bus so no would know they were gone. Unfortunately, [Girl #1]’s mother had gone to pick her up early, and when they found out she had never shown up to school, they asked about [Girl #2], who is their neighbor. That’s when they realized that BOTH of them had not shown up for school at all and were reported missing. The young man was [Girl #2] brother, who had driven up from South Carolina to help their mom look for her, during his finals week, no less. The girls did end up missing their buses back, but it was because their boyfriends got them back late. Instead of owning up to it, they tried to find someone who could give them a ride and eventually gave up. After wandering around for hours, they saw the sergeant smoking in the parking lot and decided it was time to ask for help. When the parents arrived, everyone was already stressed out and pissed off. That’s when [Girl #1]’s mother — who is very conservative — saw hickeys on her daughter, and she lost it, throwing her book bag across the lobby. The dad was screaming because [Girl #2]’s mom had unlocked her daughter’s phone and found explicit photos of them with their boyfriends. The brother, realizing he missed an important final because of his sister’s booty call, snapped and walked out before he hit her. Last I heard, the boyfriends had been criminally charged and one of the girls had been sent to a private school.)

(I work at a popular grocery store. A customer approaches me with a WIC transaction. I see that she is a couple of months pregnant so when I notice she has the wrong WIC milk, I offer to walk it back.)

Me: “Ma’am, this is the wrong milk. It is supposed to be the half-gallon. Do you want me to go back and get you the right kind?”

Customer: *looks confused* “I don’t know what a half-gallon is.”

Me: *looks at her and pauses* “It’s okay. I’ll go back and get it. No worries.”

(I proceed to take the gallon of milk back and get the half-gallon. I sit the half-gallon of milk on the counter.)

Customer: “That’s a half-gallon?”

Me: “Yes, ma’am.”

Customer: “Oh, okay, I didn’t know that.”

Me: “No worries.”

(As I’m doing the rest of the transaction, I hear the pregnant girl’s mother speaking to her.)

Mother: “[Daughter], you are nineteen. You have a baby on the way and you mean to tell me you don’t know what a half-gallon of milk is?”

Customer: “Well, I do now.”

(My boss is watching and approaches me after she leaves.)

Boss: “I feel sorry for her child if she’s 19 and doesn’t know the difference between a gallon and half of a gallon.”

(I am a cashier at a large grocery store and I have been working there for more than a year. A customer walks up to my till and ignores my normal greetings of, “Hello! How are you? Did you find everything okay?” all done with the utmost cheer and smiles. He starts rattling off the phone number attached to his rewards card so I can look it up in the system. Being used to this kind of disregard by many customers, I enter the phone number. The last name of the cardholder pops up automatically on my display. It is policy to read the name back to the customer so we can ensure we heard the number correctly and that the discounts will be attributed to the proper account. So, I read back to the customer the name, “Steele.”)

Customer: “What?”

Me: “Steele? Are you Steele?”

Customer: “I didn’t steal anything! What do you mean? Are you calling me a thief?!”

Me: “No, sir! Of course not! I…”

Customer: “Check my pockets! I didn’t do anything!”

(This exchange is getting louder and more frenzied as the customer talks and I try to get a word in to assure him I did not think he stole anything.)

Me: “No, no! Your name is just a homophone…”

Customer: “WHAT DID YOU JUST CALL ME?!”

Me: *very taken aback and frightened as to his apparent misunderstanding and reaction* “Nothing!”

(I finished scanning his groceries in silence and gave him his receipt. I was called into the manager’s office later while a customer service manager watched — for “our mutual benefit” — as I was instructed on not saying anything the customer might deem as offensive, even if it’s a joke. Similar situations occurred multiple other times in the years following that I have continued to work there throughout college. I have met with the managers several other times regarding customers claiming I told them their house stunk after buying a literal cart load of broccoli — in all likelihood, it did after all that — intentionally not giving customers sale prices, and not counting $0.03 cents of change back to a customer.)

(It’s a busy day. The store is short-staffed and as a manager, I pick up some slack taking orders. Our establishment requests that we be fast, but also ensure that we take care of the orders. It’s a take three, bag three orders rule. I have already taken five orders, because two of them were drinks only. A customer approaches me.)

Me: “I’ll be right with you.”

Customer: “Okay.”

(He then starts ordering. I gaze at him for a moment, and then take his order. After completing the order:)

Me: “I took your order this time, but I won’t do it next time, as I have to be fair to the other customers.”

Customer: *screams* “I’m here now and you should get my order first!”

Me: “In order to be fair to the other customers, and since they were there first, I needed to complete their orders first.”

(He calms down until I give him his food and he leaves, but it’s far from over. He leaves a comment on our online system, saying that I refused to serve him and that I intentionally didn’t want to deal with him. He also made some disparaging comments about my appearance and weight. However, the general manager watches the tapes with me and sees this guy acting a fool. Next time he comes in, the general manager stops him:)

General Manager: “We can no longer serve you, due to your previous attitude towards our employees.”

Customer: *yelling* “I’m a customer and you should do whatever I say!”

General Manager: “Let me stop you right there and ask you to look around. There are other customers in the restaurant, and the world doesn’t revolve around you. You should think about that the next time you want to be rude and ruin someone’s perfect score because you’re a douche.”

(The guy left in a bad attitude and hasn’t been seen since.)