This Customer Is A Real Trip

I’m a front-end supervisor. It is nearing closing time and I am in the office counting the tills and starting other closing duties. I have one person working as a cashier. She calls me to open another till as the line is starting to get a bit long. I head out and call the next person in line.

A lady a few people back from being the next in line decides she needs to be first in my line. She picks up her basket and comes rushing over. In her rush, she trips over the basket of the shopper behind her. I don’t see this as I am quite short and there is a rack blocking my line of view.

After getting up, she comes to my lane and tells me what had happened. After making sure she is okay, I go to the office to grab an incident report sheet. It asks very basic questions, i.e. the weather, lighting conditions, etc., and a basic report of what happened. They have camera footage that they can look at, as well.

I basically put down that the customer tripped over another customer’s basket when proceeding to my till, floors are dry, weather is clear, etc. She’s not happy with this.

Customer: “You don’t care that I fell! How can you be so neutral about this?! I demand that you write a more detailed report. It’s your fault I fell. This wouldn’t have happened if you hadn’t been in your office instead of helping customers!”

I grab a piece of paper and write out something more detailed and give her a copy.

When I come into work for my next shift:

Manager: “What happened? This customer left me ten voicemails complaining about you.”

I explain what happened.

Fast forward a week; my manager approaches me again.

Manager: “The customer from the other day is demanding an apology from you. I have this generic one written out. Will you sign it?”

Me: “Sure, as long as she stops coming in and harassing all my coworkers, asking about my name, how to contact me, when I’m working next, and so on.”

My manager, who had no idea that this has been happening, crumples up the apology letter, stomps on it, and picks it up and mails it to the customer.

A few months later, a friend and I are shopping at the only other grocery store in our town. I am standing in line, and a cashier opens the lane next to the one I’m in and calls the next person over. Who should go running? The same lady that tripped in the store where I work.

Me: *Shouting over the counter* “You shouldn’t run in grocery stores; you could trip and get hurt!”