I work as a supervisor, and I get called over to the refund desk to help a customer who wants to return a bracelet. She says that she’s been trying to return the bracelet for almost six months, but no one would do it. I find that odd because we have a 100% return policy on pretty much everything we sell. She is accompanied by her disabled son who is about forty years old and in a wheelchair.

Me: “I’m sorry about that. I’ll take care of you. Just give me a minute to look up your receipt in our system.”

Customer: “Oh, thank you so much.”

While I’m looking up her receipt, she starts to tell me the back story about why she’s returning it.

Customer: “You see, it fits too tight on my wrist. I put it on, and it cuts into my wrist. It was so tight that I couldn’t get it off. Plus, one of the beads is sharp… Here, feel it.”

I feel the bead and it is indeed a bit sharp on the crease where the two halves come together. I apologize and tell her I will take care of her as soon as I find the receipt. This is when the story gets weird.

Customer: “Thank you. You see, my son is disabled and only has 30% of his brain left. He was in a motorcycle accident a few years ago. I’ve been taking care of him since then. I was changing him, and the bead cut his scrotum, so I want you to compensate me for his pain and suffering.”

I realized at that point why the people before had not refunded her bracelet.

I was completely disgusted that she’d had me touch the bead that supposedly cut her son’s ball sack. I told her that without some medical records or some sort of proof, I couldn’t just give her money. She proceeded to pitch a fit about how I was discriminating against her because her son was disabled. After I finished rubbing my hands vigorously with hand sanitizer, I called my manager over to take care of her from there.

Related:
On The Need For Hazard Pay, Part 31
On The Need For Hazard Pay, Part 30
On The Need For Hazard Pay, Part 29
On The Need For Hazard Pay, Part 28
On The Need For Hazard Pay, Part 27

Content Warning: Gross

I work in an office supply store. Before my shift one day, an older lady went rushing into the store.

Lady: “Where’s your restroom?”

The front-end cashier directed the customer to the restrooms and continued working. The lady rushed out of the store about ten minutes later.

Lady: “Sorry about the mess.”

The cashier checked the restroom and came back to the general manager.

Cashier: “That older lady who was just here had explosive diarrhea all over the accessible stall.”

General Manager: “Go clean it up, then.”

When I came in later, the cashier told me about the mess and everything and then went home without having cleaned the restroom.

I had a slow night in my department, so I took three pairs of gloves and the strongest cleaning supplies we had. I ended up spending half my shift cleaning the restroom because, by the time I got in there, it was already crusty.

This was one time I had no problem dropping the dime on a coworker’s negligence.

I sold hosiery at a major department store.

Many, many times I had customers expose their naked a**es… on the sales floor… in front of everyone… to ask me:

Customer: “Can you read the tag on these and tell me what brand they are?”

You know, the tag adhered to their sweaty hindquarters.

I’m a printer and copier tech, currently taking care of a couple of large hospitals. I go to a surgery department to fix a printer that the user describes as “printing colors weird and now jammed”.

I arrive, power it off, and unplug it. I fix a pretty standard problem that causes jamming — the paper backstop was out of place — and power it back up. Now, to the issue of the colors.

Once it’s powered up, the print jobs that were held up by the jam start churning out. I pick them up and start to study them for color issues. These are pictures that have printed, but I can’t figure out what they are pictures of, so I don’t know what the colors are SUPPOSED to look like.

Me: *To a nurse* “What is this?”

Nurse: “Aww, sugar, that’s a butthole.”

My brain is instantly horrified, and I don’t want to look again.

Me: “Oh, God. Okay, well, does it look okay to you?”

Nurse: “Naw, sweetie. That’s why he’s here.”

What.

WHAT.

Me: “I MEANT THE COLORS!” *Pauses* “Never mind. I’m going to print the fruit.”

I work at the customer service counter in a home improvement store. A customer brings in a poo-smeared toilet seat.

Customer: “It came this way!”

Funny how he didn’t discover the Hershey stains until he had guests visit a week after the transaction.

Customer: “It’s egregious that you would sell disgusting merchandise! You owe me money and an apology!”

Me: *In diplomatic customer service fashion* “We can’t return it due to the health hazards associated with it.”

He then shouts at everyone at the return desk and at the manager that walked over after seeing the commotion.

Customer: “Fine! You’ll throw the toilet seat away for me.”

Me: “We can’t do that for you since it’s a health hazard. You will need to throw it away yourself.”

He stormed out of the building, yelling obscenities.

A few minutes later, the store janitor came to customer service to inform us that there was a toilet seat on the trash can outside. Our trash cans sit outside of the main entrances/exits and have ashtrays on top of them. The disgruntled customer had laid the toilet seat so that the ashtray was in the center of the seat, exposing the poop stains to entering customers, and the lid resting against the building.

The coup de grace was that the customer had left a note on the seat which read, “If it looks like crap, they won’t take it back.”