Want To Challenge Me In My Own Business? It’s Showtime

A customer and her husband come in right around 10:00 pm.

Customer: “We’ll have two tickets to [Movie] at 10:00 pm.”

Me: “I apologize, but our last showing of [Movie] was at 9:30. I can still sell you tickets to it, but it’s probably about five minutes in at this point.”

Customer: “No, it says right on your website that it’s at 10:00 pm.”

I always cringe when I hear this because it usually means they’ve gotten the times for the other local theater, which is run by a different company and has different showtimes. And unfortunately, when people are informed of this, they get super defensive, aggressive, and rude, and try to blame it on us even though it was their mistake.

Me: “Unfortunately, our last showtime for [Movie] was at 9:30. It’s entirely possible that you looked up the wrong theater. Sometimes when you Google movie showtimes, it’ll display the showtimes for [Competing Theater] that’s about ten minutes down the road.”

Customer: *Becoming irate* “No, I looked it up on your website.”

Customer’s Husband: “It’s not a big deal. Even if the website was wrong, it’s not like the theater can change their showtimes on a whim. Let’s just get tickets since it’s only a few minutes in.”

Customer: *Pulling out her phone* “I’m gonna show you, and you’re gonna sell me tickets to the 10:00 pm showing!”

Me: “Again, ma’am, I apologize, but there is no 10:00 pm showing that I can sell you tickets to.”

She turns her phone and shows it to me. It is indeed our website. At first, I’m shocked… but then I notice the issue right away.

Me: “Ma’am… you have the wrong day pulled up.”

Customer: *Not even listening* “No! It’s your website. I want tickets to the 10:00 pm showing!”

Me: “Yes, that is our website…”

Customer: *Triumphant* “Ha!”

Me: “…but you have it on the wrong day. You have it on Friday’s showtimes. And today is Wednesday. Our showtimes change on Thursdays and Fridays because that’s when we get new movies.”

She turns and stares at her phone.

Customer: “No, it’s your… Oh.”

She then tries to argue a little more, including claiming that “the website changed the days,” and that “she knows it said we had a 10:00 pm showtime today,” before finally relenting and buying the tickets. She also tried to get out of paying since, by the time she bought them, she had wasted almost five minutes arguing, but of course, I denied this.

Her husband later came up and apologized for her. He knew it was total bullcrap and said she probably wasn’t paying attention and just picked a random day on the website.