A guest checked in last night into one room, claims to have found problems in the room, and wanted to be switched. She claims that the room was all dirty and they found someone else’s panties in the room. The afternoon concierge switches them to another room, but they fight with him to get a room with an outside door.

They stay the night, bringing in three small dogs with her, despite our hotel not allowing pets. She says that she told the guy last night that they were service dogs.

I get in in the morning, knowing none of this, as there is not a note regarding a dog in any of the rooms. But I know there is one somewhere, because a different guest came up to complain about a turd sitting in the hallway all night. 

I cleaned up the mess; thankfully, it was not soggy or anything, but I don’t know where the dog was.

Check out time (11 AM) comes, and the housekeepers report that one room has multiple dogs in it. I put two and two together, so I charge a fee to their card and call them to inform them that they have to leave, because we don’t allow pets.

Guest: “Oh, but these are my service dogs, you have to accept them!”

Me: “Well, your service dog dropped a turd in our hallway last night, meaning it isn’t trained properly and we are allowed to exclude it.”

They take a while and a couple of reminders to leave, but they eventually do, coming up to the front desk for a receipt. At that point, they notice the charge, which was signed for at check-in.

Guest: “You can’t charge me extra for my dogs, they’re service animals. You need to take this charge off!”

Me: “Ma’am, as I said before, a service animal has to be trained not to bark randomly and not poop where it shouldn’t.”

Guest: “You can’t tell me how to deal with my dogs! They’re service dogs!”

Me: “Okay, what services do your dogs provide for you?”

Guest: “They run around at my feet, sometimes quietly, sometimes loudly.”

Me: “That isn’t a service. That’s being a dog.”

They took my manager’s business card and will probably call corporate, but they left.

Going into the room afterward revealed that their “well-trained service dogs” had started to tear up the edges of the carpeting, which will need to be replaced. 

When I showed this to my boss:

Boss: “Charge them and put them ‘Do Not Rent’.”

Already done.

I was ordering an upgrade for the server room at work; it was a large, expensive upgrade that cost in the six figures. If you have ever had to call a manufacturer to order equipment at this amount, you may know that once you get a good reputation with a manufacturer, they tend to cut red tape for you to maintain a good working relationship with your company. 

In the past, I have bought equipment for my personal use at home, and it takes forever to get a rep on the phone, and they often screw you on the deal. While I was making the order with the manufacturer, I inquired about getting personal equipment to see if it would be possible to make a separate order for myself with my own money.

The rep had no issues with it and was happy to make the second order. He placed both orders and even gave me a company discount for my order.

Now, I did make it perfectly clear that the second order was a personal order and not in any way connected to the corporate account or order. He confirmed this, and the order was locked.

A few months went by, and the equipment showed up in the loading dock at work, and everything was in order. However, my order never arrived at my house. I attempted to contact the manufacturer but got put on hold for hours. I gave up for now and figured I would try again in a few days.

The next morning, the equipment showed up. It was an exact match for the equipment that was sent to my work. Now, keep in mind the order I placed for my house was a blade server that was just over $6k USD.

This was not what I ordered. 

I went into panic mode as I can’t afford this equipment, and when they bill me, I will be screwed. I checked my bank account and found no charges… yet.

I’m really panicked as now I think they billed it to my company, effectively double-charging them. I expect I will get fired. When I returned to work after my weekend, I emailed billing and got a copy of the invoice.

Well, they didn’t bill my company for the equipment sent to my house, so now I’m really confused. At this point, I drop it. It is a pain to get them on the phone, and I can’t call the corporate line when it’s a personal order. 

A month later, I got an invoice in the mail with a late charge for failure to pay. Okay, now I can get this fixed.

I see they want $6k plus $250 for late charges. That’s odd. I call the retention number and get a rep. I gave her the account number, and she told me she needed to transfer me to a manager due to the amount. Okay, cool. 

The manager picks up the phone, and I try to explain that the bill is wrong and the equipment they sent wasn’t what I ordered, but he immediately cuts me off.

Manager: “You need to pay the invoice. You’re in violation of the contract, and we will sue you if you don’t pay it immediately!”

I tried again to explain the equipment issue, but again he cut me off.

Manager: “No. You need to pay.”

Me: “Okay, I’ll take care of it then. Sorry for being an inconvenience; I will call my bank right away.”

I then confirmed the bill amount and the part order number from my equipment labels. He confirmed it and said:

Manager: “See, there was NO mistake!”

As I was about to hang up, I heard him say in a smug tone to someone else:

Manager: “That’s how you deal with poor d***-heads.”

I called my bank and got them to unblock the transaction, as it was stopped for a fraud alert. The amount was paid.

I am now the owner of a six-figure dollar server room in my basement. 

A few months later, I had to order some more connectors for the fiber lines and spoke to their rep again. I inquired about buying personal devices again, since the last time went so well. Apparently, they can’t do that anymore. Something about a manager’s fraud investigation. Can’t imagine what that’s about.

This gentleman at a table with his wife and kid asks:

Customer: “What kinds of iced tea do you have?”

Me: “We only have black, unsweetened, iced tea.”

Customer: “Great, I’ll take a raspberry iced tea.”

Me: “Sorry, we only have plain, unsweetened iced tea.”

Customer: “Okay, well, I’ll have an unsweet tea, and my wife will have a sweet tea.”

I’m a bit annoyed at this point, but I’ve dealt with worse, so I tell him:

Me: “Sir, we only have plain, unsweetened tea.”

Customer: “Okay, so I’ll take a half and half.”

Arnold Palmers are pretty popular at my restaurant (iced tea and lemonade, also known as the half and half), so I think that’s what he must mean.

Me: “Half tea and half lemonade?”

He breathes the biggest sigh in the world because I’m clearly the most incompetent person on the planet.

Customer: “No, a half-sweet tea and a half-unsweet tea.”

Me: “Sir, we only have plain—”

Customer: *Cuts me off.* “—Fine, I’ll have a half “plain” tea and a “plain” sweet tea, and I’ll just mix them together myself!”

He was short and sarcastic when he said it. 

At this point, it wasn’t just the condescension; I was upset at the lack of actual active listening skills, and I did kind of just snap:

Me: “Sir. We do not have sweet tea. Our tea is not sweet; it has no flavor, it is just plain… black… tea.”

He looked at me like I just told him the restaurant he was in didn’t carry food. He snapped at me:

Customer: “What do you mean you don’t have sweet tea?!”

It took everything in me just to say politely:

Me: “We don’t have sweet tea. We don’t have any flavors. Just tea that is not sweet. It is plain tea. It is black tea.”

I am basically just dumbing down the same sentence I’d been saying for the past five-ten minutes.

He went on to be a nightmare for the rest of the forty-five minutes they were there.

I went to a local bar to watch the College World Series final. There’s no sound on the TV.

Bartender: “We can’t play the sound for the game because more patrons want to play the jukebox than watch the game.”

There are about twelve people in the bar total, including my party of four. This seems silly, seeing as how it’s a sports bar and there aren’t any other major sporting events occurring at the same time as this game.

I decide that since the patrons want the jukebox, the jukebox is what they’ll get. 

I cue up the “Cotton Eyed Joe” by Rednex, six times in a row, and pay the extra to bump it to the front of the queue.

After the first play-through, the jukebox skips to a different song. I call the manager over.

Me: “You need to refund our jukebox money since you won’t play our song.”

Manager: “I’d rather listen to Cotton Eyed Joe six times than refund the money.”

He comes back a few minutes later, hands us $13 cash to cover the songs, and turns on the sound for the baseball game. Turns out his patrons didn’t want to listen to the jukebox that badly after all.

A woman tried on some shoes from the sale rack. They fit her, and she was happy. I ring them through at the counter, and she says:

Customer: “Oh, actually, can you get me a duplicate pair? I don’t want to wear the shoes everyone else has been wearing.”

Me: “These ones out are the only ones we have, because they’re the sale shoes.”

Customer: *Angry.* “Well, go check the back anyways!”

So I did. There was none. No s***.

Instead of telling her and missing out on a sale, I just wrapped up the ones she tried on and gave them to her. She tried them on and immediately went:

Customer: “Yep, I can tell these are new. They feel stiffer and look cleaner! See? wasn’t that hard, was it? I knew you’d have some in the back.”