(I work twelve-hour shifts in registration in a very busy emergency department. I’ve just walked into work and we are currently experiencing downtime with our system, so I have to manually enter patients in with the correct spelling and date of birth, or the system will reject them. A patient comes up to me to check in.)

Patient: “I need to be seen by the doctor.”

Me: “Okay, I just need your first and last name.”

Patient: *speaking extremely low* “Dara Smith.”

Me: “Okay, did you say Dara?”

Patient: “No, I said Da-ra-thy.”

Me: “So, is that Dorothy?”

Patient: “No, Dorothy has no syllables; my name has three.”

Me: “Okay, can you spell your first name for me?”

Patient: “I can’t believe you don’t know how to spell Do-ra-thy.”

Me: “Is it just the traditional spelling of Dorothy? D-O-R-O-T-H-Y?”

Patient: “Yes.” *shaking her head*

Me: “Okay, ma’am, the way you are saying it makes it sound like there is an A in there somewhere. But I have you checked in, so take a seat and they will call you up shortly.”

Coworker: “And we still have eleven hours to go with this s***.”

(I work at a well-known baby retailer. Guests can return items bought off of their registry. The item will come back at whatever price was paid for it by the gift giver. After returning a baby gate that was given to the customer at her baby shower, she walks over to me.)

Customer: “The price for the gate came back at $19.99; it’s a sixty-dollar gate. I don’t understand.”

(I know she returned it off of her baby registry, because I walked past as the transaction occurred.)

Me: “The prices come back at the price that was paid for it, not exactly the price that is listed. If you want, I can pull up an electronic receipt seeing why there is a huge price difference. Most likely, the gate was on sale or she had stackable coupons. Let me take a look.”

Customer: *looking very frustrated* “I don’t understand! It’s a sixty-dollar gate!”

(I pull up the receipt online, and it shows the gift giver purchased the gate not only on sale, but had multiple coupons that brought the gate down to the $19.99 price.)

Me: “Looks like she got a great deal here; she managed to use coupons and get a sale price. Were you looking to exchange the gate? Was something wrong with it?”

Customer: “I’m just going to purchase a new gate. I didn’t use the old one. Uh, thanks.”

(She walks off, seeming to understand how the system works. Thirty minutes later, she walks up to the service desk with an $89.99 gate.)

Customer: “This is ridiculous that I have to pay out of pocket for this gate. I should’ve gotten full price for the other one!”

(The cashier calls me over to see if I can fix the situation. At my store we have a “say yes to the guest” policy. No matter how wrong the guest is, or how outrageous the request, we’re obligated to make sure the guest leaves happy.)

Me: “I’m sorry this happened. Let me fix this in the computer so you can have an even exchange.”

(I then adjust the price so that even though there is a price difference, she will not pay out of pocket for anything.)

Customer: “You did not have to do that. That’s not what I wanted. It’s just ridiculous that I would’ve had to pay out of pocket. That doesn’t make sense; you should probably fix your system because I am not happy!” *storms out still mumbling*

(I later received an email from my district manager saying I had pissed off a guest enough to where she called customer service to file a complaint. She demanded compensation for her time and for dealing with “such stupidity.”)

(The police around where I am are pretty laid back, despite it being a bad area. I work in a hotel in the early morning at front desk. Our hotel offers free breakfast to customers. Sometimes, a non-customer will sneak in and help themselves, and they will be kicked out. One day, some cops come in and start helping themselves to breakfast. I don’t mind, since I like being on good terms with them; they’ve helped me MANY, MANY times with unruly customers. But then, they start coming in to eat EVERY DAY. I go to my supervisor.)

Me: *whispering* “Those cops… Is it okay if they eat here? Just making sure.”

Supervisor: “Yeah, sure. The GM loves them.”

(Months pass, and I hear rumors of some customers getting nervous for some reason, inquiring about the cops being allowed. My GM comes up to me.)

GM: “Are the cops eating here every day?”

Me: “Yes.”

GM: “They aren’t allowed to do that!”

Me: “Uh, but the supervisor said it was okay?”

GM: “Hmm!” *chews supervisor out*

(Then she went and told the cops that they weren’t allowed to eat the breakfast; a cup of coffee was okay, but no eating. They looked shocked, said okay, and left. I felt bad, since I was afraid they wouldn’t help me with dealing with violence-prone customers anymore. But it was the GM’s decision. After that, they only came in once a week or so… and I always played dumb! I do wonder, don’t the cops hate it when people do whatever they like? So, why do THEY do it?)

(I’m at a quick-service Mexican restaurant for dinner. I’m not able to finish my meal in one sitting, so I decide to go up to the counter to ask for a to-go container. I was told when I first ordered that some of the equipment used to prepare the food isn’t working properly; one of the stovetops won’t turn on, and as a result the employees are forced to do some of their cooking on the heated tortilla presser. Obviously this means that orders take considerably longer to make than usual. When I get up to the counter, there’s a couple — a man and a woman — ordering. The woman taking the order explains the situation to them, and they say:)

Male Customer: “That’s fine. We’ll have two burritos, please.”

(Because she can’t cook the tortillas on the stovetop like she normally would, she has to press each tortilla and wait for each one to heat up on the presser individually, which takes a little while. The woman behind the counter apologizes profusely for the wait throughout, and each time, both the man and the woman say:)

Male & Female Customer: “It’s fine; don’t worry about it.”

(Once the tortillas are both ready, she asks:)

Employee: “Do you want any rice or beans on your burritos?”

Male Customer: “I want rice and black beans.”

Female Customer: “I just want rice.”

(She puts the rice and beans on the tortillas, and asks:)

Employee: “What kind of meat do you want?

Male Customer: “I want steak.”

Female Customer: “I don’t want a burrito.”

Employee: “Oh, I’m sorry. I must have misheard you, ma’am. Did you want something else?”

Female Customer: “No, I just changed my mind. I don’t want anything anymore.”

(The woman behind the counter was forced to throw out the tortilla with the rice into the trash. Wasted ingredients, wasted time. And that’s the story of how it took me nearly ten minutes to get a to-go container.)

(I am a shift manager at a fast food restaurant. A new assistant store manager has just joined our team from another store, and it’s her first day here.)

Customer: “Any chance I can get some free tacos?”

Assistant: “Sorry, I can’t give away free food. I could be fired.”

Customer: “What?! You can’t give me two tacos?”

(This goes on, with the assistant manager reiterating that she can’t give away food, and the customer insisting she should.)

Customer: “You know what? Fine!” *throws a sign across the counter*

Me: “Hey! You need to leave now!”

Customer: “Jesus would have given me free tacos!”

(He then picks up the register and throw it towards me. Luckily, it’s still plugged in and doesn’t go far. He then storms out. For the rest of the day we have to take front-counter orders on the drive-thru register.)

Me: *to the assistant manager* “So… welcome to your new store!”