I work in a video game store. I take a customer call.

Me: “Thanks for calling [Video Game Store]. How can I help you?”

Customer: “I have a really… really stupid question. Umm, yeah, have you played Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2… for PS3?”

Me: “Yes, sir, I have.”

Customer: “Okay, well… is there a part of the game where… everything goes black, and the Nation Alert System comes up saying the Russians are attacking?”

Me: “Uh… yeah, after the EMP goes off, yeah.”

Customer: *Massive breath of relief* “Oh, thank God. Okay… okay, thanks.” *Click*

His first thought when faced with a Russian invasion? “S***… I’d better call [Video Game Store].”

A man in his forties comes in and spends at least three hours browsing every single title on the wall. He refuses my help several times, and eventually, he comes up to the counter with five brand-new games on almost every system we carry. After I ring in his selection of “Cabela’s Hunting”, “Nascar Racing”, and “UFC Fighting”, he pays and leaves.

Several hours later, he returns by throwing open the front door and yelling:

Customer: “What kind of s***-show are you running here?!”

He is red in the face as he stomps toward me and throws his bag of games onto the counter.

Customer: “None of these work! This is a s*** store! What kind of business…”

He rants and yells at me for a minute or so before he decides to take a breath.

Me: “You tried the games on your Xbox, PC, and PlayStation, and none of them worked?”

Customer: “I just got that new player from [Major Retailer] this afternoon, and none of these games work!“

Of course, he doesn’t know the name of “the disc player” that he bought. After several painful minutes, he shows me the [Major Retailer] receipt out of his pocket.

Me: “These games are not going to work, sir. You bought a DVD player.”

He did not understand why this was a problem. I refunded him out of pity.

Related:
DVDim

I used to manage an electronics and gaming store in the late 1980s and early 1990s. It was a store like today’s GameStop video game stores, but we sold mostly computer software with a small amount of NES and Sega Genesis cartridges.

You have to remember that computers in this time period were early PCs, and people weren’t as used to them.

A woman came in and threw a box on the counter of “The Hunt for Red October” video game on a 3.5″ floppy. She was livid.

Customer #1: “This movie wouldn’t play in my VCR! And it took me nearly an hour to get it back out of the VCR slot!”

But that’s nothing, really. We had a guy come in and buy a PC game, knowing it was a PC game. I’ll admit that the name of the game is lost in the mists of my elderly brain.

This guy was also livid. He kept shouting and gesturing wildly.

Customer #2: “You ruined my computer! There’s gonna be h*** to pay!”

He was agitated enough that I called mall security to come by and mediate.

We had ruined his computer, and he was demanding that we buy him a new one. With the help of mall security, I managed to get the story.

This guy had bought the game on a 5.25″ floppy (go ahead, Google it) but owned a computer with only a 3.5″ drive, so he did what one does, I assume.

He folded the disk in half and jammed it in the drive.

This managed to hook the drive head somehow, knocking it off alignment, and now it wouldn’t read any disks at all.

Even the security guard, who was probably close to seventy years old, looked at me wide-eyed. I returned the game, even though the disk was now ruined, and gave him the business card of our regional manager to discuss anything else.

I called the regional manager and told him the guy was going to call and why. I also gave him the name of the security guard as a witness in case the guy changed his story.

The regional manager laughed and said:

Regional Manager: “F*** this guy. He’s not getting another dime, and I’m going to make him feel sorry for wasting our time.”

I work at an independent shop in the middle of the city. We sell games and game accessories, as well as anime and manga memorabilia. It’s a very small store and doesn’t really merit having more than one worker in the shop at a time; however, my boss calls me in one day early in my career because he noticed that I’ve left my bag in the back room.

I come in and grab it, finding everything accounted for. While I’m checking everything, a customer comes into the store. Because most of the stock is behind the counter (and thus is not exactly easy to peruse), the policy is that, if the customer doesn’t approach us directly for something, we give them about a minute minimum to browse if we’re not busy with someone else, and then we approach the customer and offer to help them find what they’re looking for.

Thus, this exchange happens as I’m emerging.

Boss: “Can I help you find anything today?”

Customer: “Go f*** yourself.”

Boss: “I can’t. I’ve tried.”

I give my boss the most confounded look. So does the customer.

Boss: “And I’m refusing you service for abusive behaviour. Get out of my store.”

Customer: “You can’t do that! I’m a paying customer. I—”

Boss: “Paying for what?”

The customer stutters for a moment and then storms out of the store.

Me: “Was that you doing things as a boss that your workers aren’t allowed to do?”

Boss: “No, that was me setting an example for my workers about what they’re allowed to do.”

Best boss I’ve ever worked for.

I work at a second-hand movie and video game store. A guy comes in trying to sell us his DVD copy of “Resident Evil: Apocalypse”.

Me: “Sir, because this is a DVD we have a ton of, we can only offer you $1.50.”

Customer: *Angry* “Why so little?!”

Me: “We can only offer that much because the store sells it for $3.00.”

Customer: *Looking me dead in the eyes* “Then why can’t you give me $3.00?”

Me: “…Would you like me to explain to you how a business operates?”