When Threat Makes You Fret

(I work on the homeless team for the local council dealing with temporary accommodation. These are very basic properties that we place homeless families in if they meet certain criteria, and I am then responsible for keeping an eye on them and helping them find permanent accommodation. This customer is placed in one of our units, and then causes us nothing but trouble for over six months, including threatening to stab one of my colleagues and to shoot me. As a result, I can only visit if the police come with me. I have to go and change the locks at the property, after a report that the door is wide open and no one is there. Four days later, after a report that the customer has now broken a window to get into the property, I receive a phone call…)

Client: “WHERE ARE MY KEYS?!”

Me: “They are at the area office. I did put a note through the door and on the window to tell you.”

Client: “That’s too far!” *It’s literally a five minute walk, if that.* “Can’t you deliver them?”

Me: “I’m sorry, but I can only visit if the police come with me, so you will need to go to the office.”

Client: “Yeah, why do you always have to bring them with you? I don’t like police.”

Me: “I have to bring them with me because you threatened to shoot me when I visited before.”

Client: “Yeah, I know, I know I did, but I threatened to shoot the police, too!”

(I struggled to see the logic to that one! He then went on to complain I hadn’t fixed his broken window… the one he had broken and was using as a front door…)