Dealerships are franchises, meaning Bob’s Ford dealership in [Town #1] and John’s Ford dealership in [Town #2] are not connected. People sometimes are confused, though, and think that all dealerships in a brand are connected. For instance, customers might get the promise of a free oil change at one dealership and then come to our dealership and get upset when we know nothing about the free oil change.

One evening, I am the closing cashier. Parts and Service have been closed for about half an hour now. A man comes up to me and puts a part and the receipt on the counter. I can immediately tell there’s going to be a problem because the receipt looks nothing like our receipts.

Customer: “I bought this from [Other Dealership] in [Other Town], and I want to return it.”

Me: “Parts is closed now, but we can’t take that here anyway. You have to go to [Other Dealership].”

Customer: “But [Brand] is [Brand].”

Me: “No, we’re franchises. We’re not associated with [Other Dealership] at all.”

Customer: “But [Brand] is [Brand].”

Me: “No. We are our own thing, and they are their own thing. You have to go there to return the part.”

Customer: “But… But [Brand] is [Brand]. I don’t know why you can’t return it. It’s like if I go to [Big Box Store] and go to another [Big Box Store] and return something. It’s the same thing.”

Me: “No. Parts is closed now, so you couldn’t even return that today. You can come back tomorrow and talk to the parts manager if you want, but he’s probably going to tell you the same thing.”

I know for a fact that the parts manager will not accept the return because he has a spine and is not afraid of offending customers when they’re clearly wrong.

Customer: “You’re making me drive all the way to [Other Town] thirty minutes away for a $20 part?

Me: “You can come back and talk to the parts manager at that counter.”

I point to the Parts counter, which has a giant metal curtain pulled down. The customer seems to notice this for the first time.

Customer: “They’re closed now?”

Me: “Yes.” 

The guy came back the next day and talked to the parts manager, who was not as nice as I was by the end. The guy stormed off, saying something about “wasting his time” on his way out.

I worked for a fairly popular amusement park. The restaurant I worked in served personal pizzas, as well as Mediterranean salads, carved turkey sandwiches, club wraps, and a variety of sides and desserts, including side salads.

A man came up and I greeted him with a smile. He nodded and then read the sign above the counter with the menu and prices. He looked at the frost top — specifically, the salads lined up on it — looked at me, looked back at the frost top, looked back at me, looked back at the frost top, looked up at me, pointed DIRECTLY to the salads, and spoke.

Guest: “Do you sell salads?”

It took every ounce of willpower I had not to reply with, “No, sir, those are small ornamental shrubbery!”

We have this customer who always pays for parts over the phone. He’s the owner of a used car dealership in another town, and he is always nothing but rude. These are just some of the interactions I’ve had with this guy.

The first time:

The customer reads his card number off like an auctioneer.

Me: “Could you please repeat that a little bit slower?”

Customer: “Ugh. Ooonnnnnneeeee, twwwwwwoooooo, thrrrrrreeeeeeeee, foooooouuuuurrrrr…” *Continues for all of the numbers*

The second time:

The customer reads his card number.

My machine says it’s an invalid number. Our machine is finicky and sometimes won’t recognize when you hit a button, so I assume that’s what happened.

Me: “Could I get that number again, please? The machine didn’t like it the first time.”

Customer: “You have to pay attention! I can’t be telling you my card number all day. If you do it wrong too many times, it’ll lock me out!”

Me: “Can you please tell me the number again?”

He reads the card number, but two numbers are switched around this time, so instead of “1234“, he reads “1243” the second time. It goes through.

The third time:

The parts guys always tell the customer the total before they transfer calls to us for payment. This time, the total is $6.70.

Me: “Your total is six-seventy.”

Customer: “Six hundred and seventy dollars?!”

Me: “No. Six-seventy. Six dollars and seventy cents.”

Customer: “You need to say six dollars and seventy cents because the customer will automatically assume you mean six hundred and seventy dollars.”

Me: “I can take that credit card whenever you are ready.”

Customer: “What’s the total?”

Me: *Sighs* “Six dollars and seventy cents.”

Customer: “Good, you said it correctly this time. You don’t want to mislead your customers.”

The fourth time:

The customer reads his card number.

Me: “Okay, that went through.” *Click*

I hang up before he has a chance to be a jerk.

The fifth time:

I come into work one afternoon, and the morning cashier is on the phone and shaking. I look at the ticket and see that it’s this guy. I take the phone from her.

Me: “Your total is [whatever]. Can I please get the card number?”

Customer: “Oh, my God, are you people all incompetent? I’ve already told you my card number three times! You’re going to lock me out!”

Me: “I can take that credit card whenever you are ready.”

Customer: “Get it right this time!”

He reads me the credit card number and it goes through.

Me: “All right, that went through.” *Click*

It turns out that this guy yelling at the morning cashier made her forget the first zero in the expiration date; instead of typing in 01/23, she typed in 1/23, which the machine didn’t recognize. She asked if she could go for a smoke break. 

I don’t know why this guy has to wake up and be awful. The parts guys have grumbled about him before, so it’s not just me.

I work the evening shift (4:00 pm to midnight) at a smaller chain hotel in our town in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. I have a lot of interesting interactions with guests, but this recent one sticks out.

We had an older couple that checked in later in my shift. Soon afterward, the woman called down to the front desk to complain.

Guest: “We reserved a mountain view suite!”

She went on and on and on. When I can finally get a word in, it was awkward trying to explain it to them.

Me: “It’s currently night, and you will be able to see them tomorrow morning when the sun comes back up.”

Did they expect us to have spotlights on the mountains to see them at night?

The first apartment I lived in away from my parents was a two-bedroom one that I rented with one of my coworkers/friends. It was a three-story building with four apartments per floor, all connected by a central stairway; in the US, this is called a garden-style apartment. The flooring was wooden parquet tiles — and very cheap ones at that. The management had a rule that a certain percentage of the floor space had to have rugs covering it so that footfalls wouldn’t be heard by downstairs neighbors. Note: it didn’t work, because we were occasionally cited for being noisy when we were simply walking around our apartment on our rugs.

Soon after we moved in, a couple moved into the apartment above. The first night at 2:00 am, my roommate and I were awakened by the sounds of intense love-making from the bedroom above my roommate’s. I first thought it was coming from his room, but his girlfriend was not over that night. I left my bedroom only to be met by him coming out of his room. We both stared incredulously at the ceiling.

Besides their vocalizations, there was also the squeaking of their bed and the banging of the headboard against the wall. It was comically loud, like they were intentionally trying to be heard. I went back to bed, while my roommate went back in his room and pounded on the ceiling until the couple quieted down. This happened one to three times a week; these two were shameless.

One day, my roommate and I were home during the day because it was a federal holiday. We were watching TV in our living room when our neighbors started another round of coupling in THEIR living room, which was just as loud as their bedroom sessions. I was going to go upstairs and tell them about our unintentional eavesdropping. But when I left our apartment into the stairwell, I could hear the couple’s vocalizations echoing up and down the stairs. Our floor neighbors were also at their doors, looking up in amazement at the noises coming down. I looked at them and said, “Try sleeping under that multiple times a week.”

Their passions slowed after that. But then, the woman decided to set up their second bedroom (the one above mine) as an exercise room. I found this out again in the middle of the night. Though her workout music was muted, this was the era of Jane Fonda Aerobics, with lots of high-stepping and jumping. This was all amplified by the not-so-thick floor. I had finally had enough. I went upstairs and pounded on their door until she answered.

I looked flustered and sounded as annoyed as possible.

Me: “I don’t know about you, but I have to get up in four hours for work. I would appreciate it if you could hold off on your dance aerobics until after we go to work. And by the way, everyone else in this building can hear you and your partner f******* like you’re making porno movies. Can you please muffle yourselves?!”

After that, we didn’t hear a peep from them.