Amusing experiences with employees

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

My ex, a friend, and I went to a cinema to catch the same movie. We stood single-file in the line waiting to have our tickets ripped. The friend gives her ticket to the elderly gentleman, who tells her, “Down the hall, 2nd to last on the right.” My ex repeats the process, and the ticket-taker repeats himself, “Down the hall, 2nd to last on the right.” I approach, hand over my ticket and am barely registering the same spiel when it dawns on me that he has in fact told me, “Up the (non-existant) stairs, last door on the left.”

We grinned at each other, and I went off to see my flick. This made an otherwise mundane experience memorable.

Now the ticket guy in this risked very little, being a mild joke, but sometimes people who are working for you in some aspect as a customer take slightly larger risks to tell jokes. These are becoming fewer and fewer, as the penalties for misreading a customer who might take offense are becoming harsher in the modern retail world. Still, we sometimes encounter these things that change otherwise banal tasks into something we remember. And they’re memorable I think because they’re unexpected, and to a certain extent taboo. The employee isn’t meant to break the 4th wall. Had a friend made the same joke I doubt that I would remember it.

Anyway, just some pointless thoughts. Anyone else have experiences, possibly of the retail persuasion that changed something dull unexpectedly?

2

Many years ago, when I worked at the drive thru for McBurgerWorld, I had a few favorites that I would insert as needed. The one I used to do most often would occur when I customer would arrive at the speaker and say that they needed a minute to decide. The person would come back on and say they were ready to order. I would stay silent. The customer would usuallly say something like, “hello, are you there?”

Me: Yes ma’am, I’m here until nine. Thank you.
My favorite bit that I allowed as a manger was the “stuttering cashier.” Had this guy who cooked the burgers, but sometimes when the mood struck, he would take the order and stutter for a good minute or two in order to greet the drive thru customer, and then have to repeat everything the customer said back to him, stuttering through the whole thing. I have never laughed harder than when he did that.

SSG Schwartz

3

Went skiing on a day trip a couple of winters back. We had to cross the international border to get to the ski hill.

The US Customs office was a tiny little shack that probably didn’t see more than a few dozen vehicles cross in a day.

The conversation went as follows:

Where do you live?

Winnipeg

Nationality?

Canadian

Purpose of visit?

Skiing for the day

Any fruits or vegetables?

No

Any live chickens in the back of the truck?

I was so totally caught off guard by this question, but didn’t break stride. I turned to look in the backseat of the Pathfinder for a second and then turned back to answer that we did not have any live chickens.

He chuckled and told us to have a good day.

4

I work in a bookstore and I sometimes have a little fun with this joke.

Customer comes up to the counter, “I’m looking for a book.”

Me, “I’m sorry we only sell shoes.”

I’m still waiting for someone to come back with “I’d like a pair of size 6 pumps, please.”

5

When I was stationed aboard the USS Nimitz we had thousands of workcenters, spaces and compartments each with its own phone. The ship’s phonebook was costly to produce so each workcenter only received one. Somehow or another it was assumed that I knew each and every number on the ship.

“JO3, what’s the number to CATCC?”
“JO3, what’s the number to the aft mess decks galley?”
“JO3, what’s the number to compartment 5-172-4-Q?”

If I knew the number, I sang out the answer. If I didn’t, I looked it up and then gave it to them.
This got old really fast. So what I did was punch a hole in the upper corner of the book and strung it up above the phone so everybody would have access to the book. This didn’t work. I was still asked to look up numbers by my first class, chief and lieutenant.

Until one day when I had a brilliant solution.

“JO3, what’s the number to Reactor Control?”
Without hesitation I respond “Extension 7211, chief.”
He dials the number without hesitation and a gruff sounding voice answers “XO here.”
He freaks and slams down the phone without saying a word. I flipped out on me, but it was worth it just to see the panic in his eyes!

For the first two or three times, I made my apologies… “Sorry, I thought you said you wanted the XO” or “Sorry, I musta given you the wrong number.”

This went on for a few weeks. By the end I was telling them “If you ask me for a number when you can look it up yourself I am always going to give you either the XO’s number or the Skipper’s number.” But the procedure was so ingrained they usually forgot.

I finally learned my lesson when my first class dialed the skipper’s stateroom at about 2230 after asking for the number to the Training Office.

“Skipper here.”
“Uh, yes sir. This is ChiefScott and I’m just checking to see if your phone’s working.”

A very dull routine became very exciting (and funny in hindsight) very fast!

6

I once had to call a client to clarify what they had written on their medical conditions questionnaire.

Me: “Under the ‘mobility’ section, did you mean ‘haemorrhage’ instead of ‘haemorrhoid’?”
Client: “Oh yes, that’s right - haemorrhoids wouldn’t really cause loss of balance!”
Me (deadpan): “Not unless they were very large ones.”

Sadly, I don’t think he got the joke. But he didn’t complain either. There have been others, but I can’t remember them right now.

7

I work in a call center. Occasionally, I will throw in things just for my own giggles.

Me: Would you like us to ship this out right away?**
Idiot customer: Yes. I really needed it shipped yesterday…
Me: Oh, I’m sorry, but they don’t allow me to time travel after that incident last week…we can discuss expedited shipping at the end of the call if we need to, ok?

The customer usually laughs, and we finish the order, I have yet to have one ask me about “the incident” – donno what I will say if anyone ever does. Alternatively, I like to say “Oh, darn, and I left the Tardis at home this morning!” I have only had one customer get that one.

Many times, customers won’t know their ID numbers, generally I respond with “that’s ok, I don’t mind assisting you anyway” or “well, I will let it slide this one time, but don’t let it happen again.” My boss hasn’t monitored any of those calls yet. Since she tends to be a nitpicker, I almost can’t wait for her to monitor one in which I say something silly, just to find out how she will react.

**Our policy is to ship within 24 hours, but we can hold an order if the customer wants us to – many will order all of their Xmas stuff in July, but have us hold it until November for them.

8

For several years I owned and ran a shop that specialized in parts for classic 1965-1973 Ford Mustangs. At least once a week somebody would come in the store to get something for their Mustang and start telling us all about their car, how long they had it, etc. It was usually interesting to hear each customers story about their car and what they were doing with it.

At some point they would tell you that they occasionally drive it around in the weekends, or take it out on cruise night. They would say,“Maybe you have seen it. It’s a red Mustang.”

I always acted shocked and surprised and told the customer, “YOU’RE the guy with the RED MUSTANG! People are always coming into the store and asking me,‘Who is the guy that owns the Red Mustang?’”.

Yes, indeed, it is amazing how many people with red Mustangs think that theirs is the only red one. They never seem to grasp the concept that there are more red classic Mustangs around now than Ford ever built.

9

Just thought I’d bump this to see if anyone else had some stories. You post a thread about shitty things happening in retail and it goes for pages. Please tell me this isn’t as rare as I think it is.

Also, has anyone ever witnessed an employee cracking a joke and a customer taking it badly? Perhaps even becoming so indignant to call for a manager or something?

10

Once, when I was a waiter, a couple (whom I had established a rapport with by speaking their native language, german) asked for an ashtray.

“No, you may not have an ashtray” Mock authoritarian, heavy german accent.

“But have you not heard ‘the customer is king?’”

“No, you may not have an ashtray, your majesty.”

Then, I went to fetch the ashtray, with a smile and a bow.

11

I have one thing from each side of the scenario. Starting with a mini-rant about waitrons (or employees of some other kinds of places), I hate it when I ask for something, and get a joking “Nope!” A recent time this happened to me, I was in a restaurant with the then-bf involved the waitress coming over to take our drink order, starting with me. I asked for a whatever (probably diet coke), and she gave me a “No!” and then I made this face :rolleyes: :dubious:, and she said “Well someone doesn’t have a sense of humor today!”, to which I replied “I have a great sense of humor, I laugh when things are funny.” The BF was mortified.

My story from the other side (someone requested stories where the other person got peeved) involved someone paying with a $100 bill. Since I don’t really believe in the counterfeit-checker pens (since I think you can get linen paper at WAL-MART), I always hold to the light to verify strip, and then check casually for either a watermark or color-changing ink or red and blue fibers or whatever I feel like looking for.

Well 1 out of every 3 people or so will make the “Should be good, I just made it!” joke, so once I handed the bill back to the gentleman and said “I’m sorry, I can’t take this bill, because I believe it’s counterfeit.”
“Well what makes you think that?!”
“You just told me you made it, sir.”
“I was just joking!”
“Counterfeiting is no joking matter, sir.”

He went and told my supervisor who got a chuckle out of it.

12

Sorry, but I don’t find this part funny (speaking as a potential customer).

This, I find freaking hysterical as I used to work at a family of car dealerships for many years.

I’d want to crack up when they’d say ‘Hi I’m calling about my car, the red Saturn…’ Because, you know, this is a Saturn dealership and with the hundreds of cars that we service each week, I’m sure that yours is the *only * red one here right now. :rolleyes: (No, I didn’t say it… At least not out loud.)

13

I used to work in a music store that sold really expensive guitars. One particular guy would come in every week lusting after a $2000 beauty. One day, his wife came in early in the day and told me that her husband (the guy), was planning to come in later and put the guitar on lay-away, but that she wanted to pay for it right then and just have us give it to him.

A couple of hours later he comes in, and asks about the lay-away plan. Just to make it more interesting, I said “Tell you what - this is your lucky day. If you buy this $50 leather guitar strap, I’ll throw the guitar in free”. The guy’s jaw dropped of course, and he thought I had to be joking with him. But we played it through to the end and the guy walked out of the store with a $2000 guitar, a $50 strap, and a totally puzzled look on his face. Then when he got home his wife tells him the real story… priceless!

14

I work in a call center. So far there’s only a couple things I joke about.

  1. If the client can’t find their pen, I offer to let them use mine.

  2. If the closest office is in some other state relative to their location, I give them the option of a) Driving 960 miles, or b) scheduling a phone appt. I should start saying something like, ‘‘With the price of gas these days, I really do recommend we schedule a phone appt.’’

My favorite ‘‘mundane moment in customer service’’ was on an airline, in which the captain said, ‘‘If you’re traveling with children… I’m sorry. In the event of an emergency, always remember to put your oxygen mask on yourself first, and then your child. If you have more than one child, start with the kid who has the most potential.’’

15

I used to joke around with people all the time when I worked at Baskin Robbins. It was a pretty good environment for this kind of thing, because usually people are in a pretty good mood when they’re out for ice cream.

Most commonly, I’d give people their total in pennies. (As in… “Lets see, two scoops and a sundae makes that seven hundred and fifty pennies.”) It was usually good for a laugh.

16

Either you had the same pilot my sister did, or that’s not an unusual gag for them. I think my sister said their pilot made the announcement as “…if you’re travelling with more than one child, decide now which one you love more.”

17 
When I worked in a pet store, I had a customer come in asking for a "Norwegian Blue" parrot. Without missing a beat, I told her that I still had to nail it to the perch.

Then I looked at her face, the woman was appalled. Apparently she had somehow managed to hear of a Norwegian Blue, without knowing that the species doesn’t exist outside the the Monty Python dead parrot sketch.