In the earlier days of cell phones, this customer steps in.

Customer: “I want to return this cell phone.”

The phone’s dead, and when I start to remove the rear battery cover, he starts to grumble.

Customer: “Just give me my refund! I’m in a hurry!”

When I remove the battery cover, I see that every single screw holding the unit is now missing. I point this out to the customer.

Customer: “That’s how it came!”

Me: “That’s not how I sold it to you yesterday, so who took it apart?”

Now he’s silent, and I return it back to him.

Me: “Go back to whoever took it apart to put it back together as it was yesterday.”

I don’t know what they were trying to do, but no longer my problem!

I’m a bartender, and a customer comes up to me with a picture of a drink from another place.

Customer: “Can you make it?”

Me: “Uh… no. I have no idea what’s in that.”

Customer: “Oh, it was with gin… I think!”

Me: “Great, here’s a gin and tonic; have fun.”

Customer: “I’m looking for cucumber sausages.”

Me: *Confused.* “Do you mean a cucumber and sausages?”

Customer: *Annoyed.* “No! It’s one item, not two!”

Me: “The only thing we have that sounds like that is Cumberland sausages.”

Customer: *Ranting and more annoyed.* “No! It’s definitely not that! It’s cucumber sausages!”

In the end I just take him to the sausages and grab the Cumberlands.

Customer: *Smiles.* “Yes, these are the ones! Cucumber sausages!”

I work in a large retail store with a coworker who is well known as a walking safety hazard. To our disbelief and anger, he never gets much more than a slap on the wrist.

One day, I’m in the backroom and see him operating a walkie-stacker — basically a smaller version of a forklift that you walk with instead of sitting in to drive — with the forks all the way up and nothing on them.

Me: “[Coworker]!”

Coworker: *Stopping* “What?”

Me: “Put those forks down right now! If you hit something like that, the balance will be off, and it might tip over!”

Coworker: “Nah, I’m almost where I’m going.”

Before I can say anything else, he starts moving again and almost immediately hits a shelf with the raised forks, losing control of the walkie-stacker. The machine tips over, breaking a camera and a monitor on the way down, landing with a very loud clang. Fortunately, nobody is hurt.

[Coworker ]and I stare at each other, me in fury, him looking like a deer in headlights.

Coworker: “I gotta go.”

He runs in the opposite direction. I immediately go to find a manager.

Me: “[Manager], you need to come look in the backroom right now.”

Manager: *Sighs* “Let me guess. [Coworker]?”

Me: “Yes.”

Manager: “He always does something. I’ll deal with it later.”

Me: “No, [Manager]. Seriously, you need to go look right now.”

The look on his face is as if the thing he has been dreading has finally happened. He nearly runs to the backroom, and in minutes, his voice comes over the intercom.

Manager: “[Coworker] to my office IMMEEEEDIATELYYYYY!”

We don’t know exactly how that exchange went, other than the fact that [Coworker] astoundingly wasn’t fired.

I work in the ladies’ clothing department. A tall blonde woman approaches my counter. I remember her appearance well because she’s so tall and has a really awful fake tan. She pulls a pair of jeans from a brown bag.

Customer: *Nonchalantly* “Take the security tag off these jeans. You forgot to take them off.”

Me: “May I see the receipt, please?”

She finally looks at me; she hasn’t before this. She stares straight into my eyes.

Customer: *Very serious* “You think I stole these? How dare you! Who do you think you are?!”

Me: “We have to see the receipt of anyone who needs that taken off. One reason being that I need to talk to the associate who rang you up to make sure they don’t leave tags on in the future. The receipt will show who rang you up.”

Customer: “Stupid little b****. You’ll always be at this dead-end job!”

Me: “I am now refusing to help you. You can either leave or wait for me to get a manager to further assist you.”

She looks shocked and says a few more choice words to me, and I think I had better get my manager. She comes over and I briefly tell her what transpired. My manager approaches the customer but immediately says:

Manager: “Those jeans aren’t from our store. They’re from next door.” 

The customer burned red and stormed out but still glared at us. I hope she was nicer next door — though experience tells me that probably wasn’t the case.