I work at the fish counter in a grocery store.

Customer: “Give me the third one from the top.”

Me: “Which fish do you want? I can’t see where you’re pointing from here.”

Customer: “Salmon!”

I grab the third salmon from the top.

Customer: “TOP!”

I reach down at the bottom of the case.

Me: “You mean this one at the bottom?”

Customer: “I guess some would call that the bottom.”

I’m ringing up a woman with a very large order. By the time I’m done, the next woman says nothing to me.

Me: “Hi, thank you for waiting! How are you today?”

Customer: “You know the old saying? If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all?”

Me: “Yikes. Bad day?”

Customer: “Well, I didn’t want to be waiting in line for a million years!”

Me: “I’m sorry, but that was a big order. It couldn’t be helped.”

Customer: “Good thing I can’t hear you behind that mask of yours, because I’m sure you’re being as rude as the last guy.”

I say nothing to her for the rest of the transaction. 

Me: *Rings her up* “Okay, have a day that’s as nice as you are.”

Sometimes I wish my life was that privileged, to the point where waiting for five minutes like all the common folk puts you in a huffy snit.

My bookstore has struggled with a program where you get coupons in your email, which you can print up and bring into the store. Then, we get a new cast of “regulars.”

THESE regulars come in every time there is a coupon, pick the cheapest clearance sale book on the shelf, and slap their 20% coupon on top of it. Normally, I don’t care that some random idiot is saving $0.40 on an ancient, out-of-print clearance book, but corporate gets wise to this and adds on every coupon, “Not valid with any other offer,” which immediately causes problems.

Customer: “I want to add this discount.”

Me: *With a pained smile* “I’m sorry, sir, we cannot add your percentage off on top of your already discounted book, but you’re still getting a $15 book for $4.99.”

The man attempts to stare me down. I refuse to have a staring contest with him over his last-chance clearance item.

Me: “Let me know when you’ve made up your mind.”

Customer: “I’ve made up my mind. I want to add this discount to this book.”

Me: *In the best HAL voice I can manage* “I’m sorry, but I cannot do that.”

Customer: “I want to add this discount to this book.”

Me: “I’m sorry, but I cannot do that.”

Customer: “I want this discount on this book!“

Being LOUDER does not make it magically happen!

Me: “Sir, I heard you the first three times you said what you wanted. And I told you three times that I cannot do that. You either need to buy the book at the clearance sale price without the coupon or not buy the book at all.”

He tries to stare me down again. The manager swoops in during the man’s attempt to glare at me, takes the man’s book off the counter, and walks away with it tucked under his arm.

Manager: *With a sweet smile* “Sir, it is obvious that you do not want this book if you cannot get the discount, so I’m going to put it away for you.”

The man stares in shock that anyone would outright block his obsession for being repeatedly denied, and then he chases the manager, bellowing at the top of his lungs that he wants his discount and he wants it now!

He skids to a stop when [Coworker] cuts in and matches him stare for stare. [Coworker] is the kind of guy that looks like a federal agent, or one of the Men In Black.

Coworker: “No.”

That was it. No raised voice, no inflection, no anger. Straight out “No” with this blank, soulless expression.

I was six feet away and my stomach dropped to my ankles and my heart stopped beating. The man, much closer, went dead white, lost his nerve, and fled.

Mysteriously, he never returned to harass us again.

I work as a catering agent at the corporate office for a popular somewhat-local restaurant chain. My job includes placing catering orders as well as making sure the actual store locations can handle the orders. The stores that deliver have scheduled drivers. It’s the middle of our holiday rush.

A customer calls, concerned because her catering order was more than forty minutes late. As is standard, I get in touch with the store to see what the issue is.

Me: “Hi. I just wanted to call to check on [order]; it was a delivery for 5:00.”

Manager: “Oh, yeah, it’s ready.”

Me: *Pauses* “Okay, it was a delivery, though. You guys need to get it out there.”

Manager: *Snottily* “I don’t have drivers. You guys are supposed to dispatch the drivers.”

I misunderstand, thinking this means that we are supposed to reassign stores when one can’t handle an order, which is true.

Me: *Getting frustrated* “Did you call and tell us you don’t have any drivers?”

Manager: “Uh, no, you guys are supposed to dispatch the drivers. It’s always been like this.”

It hasn’t. At this point, I just put the manager on hold to get in touch with my supervisor who is working remotely.

Supervisor: *Aghast* “So, the food’s been sitting there for forty minutes and he didn’t bother to call us?”

Me: “Yeah, but I have the customer on the line. What should I do?”

Supervisor: “You get it refunded and let the customer know we can get them fresh food if they would like to pick it up. I’ll call the store.”

My supervisor isn’t the type to chew someone out for mistakes. Unfortunately for that now ex-manager, corporate isn’t nearly as kind. I think he was probably lucky not to have been fired for that stunt.

I had been working at a factory for about a year when they hired another new guy. The new guy immediately singled me out as some sort of enemy after being told that I was also fairly new, and he was always running off to our supervisor trying to get me in trouble. Our supervisor always “investigated” just to appease him, but he never even pretended to discipline me because he knew what the new guy was up to.

One day, I got done using a specific machine, cleaned everything up, and headed out for a short break. This machine has a lot of different settings, so every time you use it, you have to make sure the settings are correct before you start. If you don’t, the best-case scenario is that the parts come out wrong and fail inspection. Worst-case scenario, the entire machine breaks, and the factory basically has to shut down until a new machine can be bought and installed. The new guy had been trained on this machine and knew that he needed to check the settings, but he never did.

I got back from my break, and the new guy was running parts on the machine that I just finished using. The machine was making some bad noises, and I realized that he had forgotten to adjust the settings. I tried to warn him to stop the machine, but he brushed me off, so I hit the machine’s Emergency Stop button to stop him from doing any more damage than he might have already done. Obviously, this enraged the new guy, and he stormed off, returning a few minutes later with our supervisor.

Supervisor: “Hey, [My Name], [New Guy] tells me you were screaming at him for using the machine?”

Me: “I was using it before my break, running different parts than he’s trying to run. The machine was making all sorts of sounds when he was using it like he hadn’t adjusted the settings for his parts, but he refused to stop when I told him the settings were wrong, so I hit the Emergency Stop.”

Supervisor: “[New Guy], did you check the settings?”

New Guy: “I was just using this machine yesterday, and it was running fine. If anything is wrong with it, it’s [My Name]’s fault for messing with the settings.”

Supervisor: “[My Name], what parts were you running this morning?”

I tell him, and [Supervisor] checks the settings on the machine and confirms that they are correct for those parts.

Supervisor: “What parts are you trying to run now, [New Guy]?”

The new guy tells him.

Supervisor: “Then it’s pretty obvious what happened. [My Name] adjusted the settings correctly to run his parts, but your parts need different settings. [New Guy], are you sure you checked the settings before starting these parts?”

New Guy: “Well, [My Name] should have put the settings back to normal after he went and changed them!”

Supervisor: “There is no ‘normal’ setting for this machine, [New Guy]. That’s why you need to check before every job.”

Our supervisor told me to head on to my next job and ended up training the new guy on the machine AGAIN.

A few weeks after this happened, the new guy forgot to check the settings on the machine again and completely broke the machine. He tried to blame me for “messing with the settings again,” but our supervisor obviously didn’t believe him. The new guy was fired for negligence, and the factory lost a lot of time and money waiting for the new machine to be installed.