(I’m a broke college student supporting myself with student loans, whatever hours I can get at my work-study job, and the small amount of money my parents can spare. Luckily, I’m still on my parents’ insurance. When I get into a bad bike accident and have to get stitches and x-rays at the hospital, their insurance covers the bill. It’s been a couple of months since then when I answer a call from a number I don’t recognize.)

Caller: “Am I speaking to [My Name]?”

Me: “This is her.”

Caller: “My name is [Caller], and I’m calling on behalf of [Debt Collection Agency] about an unpaid medical bill.”

Me: “What? I didn’t think I had any unpaid bills.”

Caller: “The bill is [amount] for an ambulance ride on [date of the bike accident].”

Me: “But my insurance covered that!”

Caller: “Sometimes insurance doesn’t cover certain services, like ambulances, if they are seen as unnecessary.”

(The ambulance was definitely necessary since there was a suspicion at the time that I’d seriously injured my neck and I was bleeding profusely from my head.)

Caller: “The billing department attempted to contact you multiple times, but you’ve consistently ignored them. Now the bill has been sent to us, and it will negatively affect your credit. However, if you pay it right now, we can try to remove it from your credit report. How will you be paying today, [Card #1] or [Card #2]?”

Me: “Um, I won’t be paying today. I need to contact my insurance company to see what’s going on. This should have been covered, and I’ve never heard of it before today.”

Caller: “If you don’t pay today, your credit will be negatively affected. You will never be able to get a loan, a mortgage, or a credit card.”

Me: “I need to talk to my insurance company before I do anything.”

(He keeps trying to convince me, so I eventually just hang up. I contact my insurance company and find that no claim was ever submitted for the ambulance trip and that they would have covered it if it was. Then, I call the hospital billing department to figure this out. It takes a very long time to reach the right person, but I finally find out what happened.

In an amazing display of incompetence, someone had billed it to the wrong insurance company in the wrong state using the wrong contact details. Obviously, that claim was denied, so they sent the bill to whatever address they’d written on the claim. With this level of screwing up, I’m guessing they mixed up my file with someone else’s.

Luckily, the person I talk to is more helpful, and she gets all the information she needs to submit the claim to my real insurance. She also promises to take the whole incident off my credit report once everything’s done. However, it will take several weeks at the very least for the claim to go through. In the meantime, I get another call several days later from the same bill collector.)

Caller: *after making sure he’s speaking to me* “Our records indicate that you still haven’t paid your bill. What payment method–”

Me: *cutting him off before he can get too far into this* “I’ve contacted my insurance and the hospital’s billing department and gotten the whole thing sorted out. There was a billing mistake. Many, in fact. But the claim has been properly submitted to my insurance now. It just takes a while to go through.”

Caller: “Well, you still haven’t paid. It’s on your credit report. I can’t take it off at this point since you’ve refused to pay it once already, but paying today will make sure your credit doesn’t get even worse. How will you be paying today, [Card #1] or [Card #2]?”

Me: “As I said, my insurance is paying it. We just have to wait for the claim to go through.”

Caller: “But your credit–”

Me: “The billing department said they’d take it off my credit report completely, as they’re the ones who made the mistake.”

Caller: “I’m looking at your credit report right now, and it’s not looking good.”

Me: “The claim was only submitted a few days ago. It hasn’t gone through yet.”

Caller: “If you pay in full right now, this will go away immediately. No need to wait for the claim to go through.”

Me: “Hold on. You want me to pay for something that I never needed to pay for in the first place, just to speed things up? That’s ridiculous! And even if I was going to pay, it’s not like I have that kind of money just lying around.”

Caller: “Surely you have some jewelry or electronics you could sell. I can give you the address of a pawn shop nearby.”

Me: “What? No! I didn’t mean I intended to pay you. My insurance is paying it directly to the hospital. We all just have to be patient.”

(This went back and forth for a while. It became clear that he was working on commission and wouldn’t get any money if the bill was paid through the insurance company. Eventually, I just had to hang up on him again, since it was obvious he was not giving up. He continued to call me multiple times a day for weeks, sometimes during class. Finally, the claim went through, and the debt collector stopped calling.)

(I work as a lifeguard during the summer at the local park pool. Being an outdoor pool, it is hard to regulate the temp. The pool tends to be warmer in the afternoon when the sun is directly overhead. A lady comes up to me mid-morning:)

Customer: “The water is too cold!”

Me: “You will have to wait until the afternoon; then the water will be warmer.”

(To most, the reason would be obvious, but she blankly stares at me.)

Customer: “Why?”

(I’m not certain what comes over me, but I reply:)

Me: “Because the water is always warmer after the kiddie swim classes.”

(She contemplated my answer for a minute before it dawned on her and she walked away, disgusted.)

I work at a department store, and I am helping a teenage girl with her items. Suddenly, an old gentleman appears and snaps at me. I turn to him politely and say, “I’ll be right with you, sir; just a moment.”

He waits for about five seconds and then snaps at me again. I give him the same response. He waits about thirty seconds before snapping, and without seeing a reaction, does an ear-piercing taxi whistle. All the other people in the vicinity cringe except for the young girl I am helping.

Without missing a beat, she responds, “Sir, if you’re going to whistle at them like dogs, then you’d better be prepared to get b****y service.”

Everyone laughs, and the man slinks off, embarrassed.

(I am walking by the registers when I decide to cut through a closed register instead of continuing down the row. A woman in line must think I am opening a register because she follows me. When I keep walking, she drops her canned goods on the belt and clears her throat loudly. I turn, surprised.)

Me: “Hello.”

Customer: “Well?”

Me: “Uh…?”

Customer: “Are you going to check me out or just stand there?”

Me: *looking around* “I was just walking through.”

Customer: “Lazy! Ring me up right now!” *slaps the belt* “Now! Now!”

Me: “Okay!”

Customer: “I don’t want my receipt printed or emailed or anything. Waste of paper! Who returns food?”

Me: “Okay.”

(While I’m scanning her groceries, another customer approaches.)

Customer #2: “Uh, are you open? Your light isn’t on.”

Me: “No, sorry, I—”

Customer: “Yes, she is! She’s just lazy!”

(The other customer looks at me, I shake my head, and he goes to a register where the light is on.)

Customer: “Asking if you’re open. He’s gotta check out. Of course, you’re open!”

Me: *ignoring her ranting* “Okay, your total is—”

Customer: “You don’t have to treat me like a [ableist slur]!”

Me: “Yes, ma’am. Cash or card?”

Customer: “Card!”

(The transaction finishes and my register resets. Before the woman can say anything else, I walk away. The other customer who came up earlier stops me. Still, the woman calls after me.)

Customer: “Hey! Where’s my receipt? How am I gonna get out the door without a receipt? If they stop me, I’m telling on you!”

Customer #2: *to me* “What an incredible waste of oxygen that woman is.”

(A customer approaches my register, sets a single frozen meal down, and tells me she has six total. I hit the quantity button and scan it, and the transaction completes as normal. She stands aside and studies her receipt, and then approaches me again while I’m ringing out other customers.)

Customer: “Excuse me, how many did you ring me up for?”

Me: “Six.”

Customer: “I only have five here.”

Me: “Sorry, but you did tell me you had six.”

Customer: “I thought so, but I only have five now. Where did the other one go?”

Me: “I handed the one I scanned back to you.”

(She starts peering all around behind my counter as if I had hidden it back there, and then she goes back to her cart and I hear her slowly count her TV dinners, sorting them into stacks, turning them over and recounting them.)

Customer: “Two… and two… and one…” *looking back at me* “That’s five, isn’t it?”

Me: *internally face-palming* “It appears so. You can grab another one, since you paid for six, or we can refund you for the extra one you were charged.”

Customer: “Well, there were no more on the shelf.” *trails off and stares blankly at me*

Me: “Okay, then just hop back in my line and I’ll refund you.”

(I take one box to scan and issue the refund. I hold the item out and she starts to walk away with a dazed expression.)

Me: “Ma’am? You can take this back; I only needed it for a moment.”

Customer: “But, but, you just refunded me for… Wait, I didn’t want it, right?”

Me: “Okay, let’s go over this again.”

(She still didn’t quite understand, but I assured her that she had, indeed, paid for it and she accepted it reluctantly and left, still muttering to herself in confusion. I got distracted by a phone call and she was long gone by the time I realized she had also left her pocketbook tucked under the card reader.)