Customers Caught In Lies

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

Some theater chains won’t allow unaccompanied kids under 13 to see PG-13 movies. It may not be the law, but it’s that chain’s policy. Kids under 13 are notorious for acting up when they’re not supervised, and sometimes when they are supervised, too. The chain that I worked for prefered to have the parents in the same complex, at least, so they could be called upon to put the fear of Og into their little brats/errrr, darlings.

When I worked at a dress shop, we used to have a monthly drawing. We’d have the first customer of the month draw the winning ticket. One of our regular browsers (she’d put a $200 dress on layaway, pay $2 a week for a couple of weeks, and then want a refund) would come in, and be ready to draw the winner. She had her own entry concealed in her hand. She tried this for three months in a row.

22

They’re all guidelines. Enforcement policies are up to the exhibitors, and vary considerably.

As for my story, when briefly working a fast-food job in college, I once had somebody try to cheat me out of fifteen cents on a $0.99 hamburger by saying I gave her the wrong change.

So I took her out back to the “complaint department” and shot her.

[sub]Not really but it would have been fun.[/sub]

23

Ring ring…

Caerie: [Name of pizza place I was working at.] How can I help you?
Old Guy: I just picked up a large deluxe and dropped it right when I got to my house, so I need another one. [laughs]
Caerie: Oh no! That’s awful. Were you able to save any of it?
Old Guy: Well, my arms were full so the whole box slipped, but upside down, so most of the toppings got stuck to the cardboard. I don’t have a problem with it, but the kids won’t eat it, so I’ll need another one.

Okay, so I make him his pizza. No problem! Then, due to a coworker getting busy with another task, I move from the kitchen to the register and that’s where I am when Old Guy comes in for his pizza.

Caerie: Okay, that’ll be $16.29.
Old Guy: You know, I should really get this for free. I’d gotten one earlier and it fell on the ground.
Caerie: Oh, yeah. [I’m about to tell him I was the one he spoke to on the phone, I don’t have the authority to give him a comp, apologies, etc, when he interrupts me.]
Old Guy: Your boxes are cheap crap! The pizza fell right through it, and when I called to complain whoever you have in the kitchen was rude to me and refused to give me another for free.
Caerie: :confused: :eek: :rolleyes:

24

When I was in High School, I worked at Dunkin’ Donuts.

Customer: Decaf Coffee, please
My boss: Here’s a decaf coffee
Customer: Are you sure it’s decaf, because I’m allergic to caffeine
My boss: No coffee for you then. We don’t want to be responsible if you have an allergy to one of our products. We can’t guarantee that there is absolutely no caffeine in the coffee, after all.
Customer: Gimme anyways
My Boss: No.
Customer: :mad:
Me: :slight_smile:
I have, of course, since found out that decaf contains a small but significant amount of caffeine, so she was definitely lying.

25

We had to refund a customer recently.
They didn’t like the product, it wasn’t the colour they expected it to be (it was, however, the colour shown in the ad). That’s fine, we refund the purchase price less postage without question once the product is returned.
She wanted us to arrange a courier pick the parcel up and refund the original postage as well. I apologised and pointed out that this situation was covered in her contract. We do not refund postage, only the purchase price once the product is returned.
She had the contract in front of her and, after 30 seconds reading, came back with; “But it says here that you’ll pick it up under warranty if it’s damaged, right? It’s damaged.”

When we got it back, the boot print was *beneath *the packaging. Almost as if someone had opened it, jumped on it, and then repackaged it. Funny that.

To save herself $1.95 in postage.

26

In high school I sold concessions at a local theatre in the summer. This was an outdoors under-the-stars type theatre, and the management had been on excellent terms with the town for the last half-century, so we’d long since gotten permission to block off the street next to the theatre before the performance started so that local yahoos didn’t drag race their souped-up pickups sans mufflers through the street right in the middle of a sword fight. Breaks the bubble, you know?

So I’m out there setting up the barricade and a woman comes up to my co-worker and me:

Self-Aggrandized Patron: You can’t block off the street! You’re restricting me from driving up the street!
Self: No, ma’am, we’ve got permission from the city to do this. We’ve been doing this for a long time.
SAP: No, you haven’t, I’ve been coming here for twenty years and I’ve never seen this before, this is an outrage!
Self: Well, we’ve been doing it for three years that I know of for certain, and it certainly wasn’t a new policy when I started.
SAP: You’re lying! I’ve been coming here for …I zoned out here. Nothing is more infuriating than feeling like you aren’t been listened to. Except, maybe, interrupting someone so they can’t finish their incoherent rant dog is in a full-body cast-
Self: Would you like to speak to my manager?

I lead her inside and my manager, who explains that she’s worked her way up from my position and has either been placing the barricade or hiring people to do so since the early eighties. SAP storms away and my co-worker calls back “Thank you for your concern!”

Ah, customers!

27

Although I’m not familiar with anyone with an actual immune-mediated allergy to caffeine, people certainly do have varying responses to caffeine or medical conditions which would make it unadvisable to imbibe large amounts of caffeine, although smaller amounts are either okay or a risk they are willing to take. None the less, lay-people often use the phrase, “allergy” to mean an intollerance rather than an allergy in the strictest sense.

Adults are adults, and if someone decides for themselves that a decaf coffee is safe and tolerable for them (even though it may contain slight amoulnts of caffeine), I think they ought to be able to purchase some decaf coffee, and it isn’t unreasonable that they take some modicum of effort to ensure that they actually have received decaf. I’m no expert in tort-law, but I’m not aware of any coffee shops being successfully sued for the ill-effects of caffeine when they provided the appropriate product, caf or decaf.

So, ummm, congratulations to you and your Dunkin’ Donuts coworkers for being irascible pedants or petty tyrants or something.

28

I work in a liquor store.

Me: Can I see I.D.?
Customer shows I.D.
Me: When is your birthday?
Customer: I don’t know.
Me: :rolleyes:

The boss never gives anyone no tax. He tells me this all the time.
Customer: The boss always gives me no tax.
Me: :rolleyes:

Customer comes in with a bottle we don’t sell, inside of a bag we don’t use.
Customer: I bought this here today and want to return it.
Me: :rolleyes:

Customer comes in with a broken bottle inside of a gift box. The box is dry.
Customer: Your bag ripped and the bottle dropped and broke.
Me: :rolleyes:

Customer shows I.D. that gives his birthday as 1963.
Me. :smiley:

29

1973?

30

There are two friewd chicken places near to me, KFC and Olivers.

Customer walks into KFC with a carrier bag and says that the box inside only has 3 pieces and not the 5 she paid for.

Clerk says he’ll give her the other 2, she opens bag, pulls out box…which is marked “Olivers”

31

I bartend. For some reason, perhaps because I’m busy and appear to be distracted, people think that I am not aware of the money I’m handling. I’ve had people insist they gave me a $100 bill even though I don’t even have one in my register.

I’ve had people tell me they didn’t like their drink and want another one, but then expect that they can keep the original drink. Um…if you don’t like it, why would you want to drink it?

I’ve also had the usual number of “I didn’t drink this much! My tab shouldn’t be this high!” customers…most recently a guy who came in with his wife and drank twelve beers with her. He’s like, “There’s no way we drank this much!”

I said, “You’ve been here for over three hours. That works out to two beers an hour for the two of you. That’s pretty normal.”

He was outraged anyway and stiffed me.

At least that guy was coherent, though; I’ve had people who are obviously drunk try to tell me that there’s just no way they had as much as they’ve had. I’m sorry, how else did you get that drunk? It isn’t my fault you felt you had to buy your friends three rounds of shots, either. $5.25 a shot adds up pretty damn quickly; I don’t make a habit of asking people “Can you afford this?” when they order shots for their friends.

When I waited tables I had a customer (similar to Jamaika a jamaikaiaké’s) who went on and on and on about how she was severely allergic to caffeine and we had to make her a fresh pot of decaf just so she’d be sure it was really decaf.

The stupid woman was drinking Diet freakin’ Coke with her meal.

If you want fresh coffee, fine. If you want decaf, fine. But don’t make up a nonexistent allergy just to emphasize your point.

FTR, I’ve given people decaf when they haven’t asked for it–if we were out of regular and I was in a hurry–but I’ve never given anybody regular who asked for decaf.

32

Two from McDonald’s:

The manager had a customer bring back a bite of Quarter Pounder, saying it was undercooked and he wanted a new one. The manager cooked him a new sandwich, then carefully cut out one bite, boxed it up and gave it to the customer. :slight_smile:

I had an irate customer tell me that she was a close personal friend of Mr. R., the store owner, and she was going to tell him all about her bad experience. I had to break the news to her that her “close personal friend” had died a few years ago.

33

Girlfriend’s second daughter buys a dress for her school formal (prom I suppose). Intends to leave it back the next day for a refund, claiming she hadn’t used it. Returns it the next day, plastered in fake tan, hung overs, saying that she hadn’t worn it, then leaves again with dress :slight_smile:

34

I worked at a Japanese company for three years, primarily as a receptionist. About once a month, I’d get a call asking for “Mr. Benimaru” [the name of the company]. My response was always a polite but confused, “Excuse me? Who would you like to speak with?”

“Mr. Benimaru. I met him at a trade show and he gave me his card.”
“Sorry sir, you must be mistaken.”
“WHAT? I have his card right here.”
“Sir, Mr. Benimaru founded our parent company in Japan in 1873.”
" … " click.

35

ducking back in Sorry!

What Lynn says is my theatre’s policy. My next question to the Munchkins was along the lines of “Okay, do you have someone who’s over thirteen going in with you?”

36

Audrey Levins - I know you’re trying to serve the customer when you give them decaf instead of regular coffee, but there are people like my mother who are terribly allergic to decaf. She’s landed in the hospital for a couple days from migraines she gets as a reaction to decaf coffee. Something about the chemical process they use to decaffinate it. Even mixing decaf in with regular will give har horrible migraines. She’s always careful to specify regular coffee, and we always look at the band around the pot when servers come around with refills.

Last week I called a customer about an error on their payment to us. I asked for Accounts Payable, and the woman on the other end assured me she could help. 25 minutes later and she still hadn’t been able to pull up the payment either by vendor number or check number, and seemed to think this was a check sent by us to them. finally I got off the phone and called back the next day. I got another person (who actually appeared to work in A/P) and had the problem resolved in 3 minutes.

StG

37

If I recall correctly, the customer said that it had to be decaf since even a little caffeine was bad. I just remember that she was so dramatic about it that my manager reasoned that either

  1. She’s lying and just wanted us to make sure it was decaf (maybe she wanted a fresh pot?), or
  2. If the allergy is as dramatically bad as the customer was making it out to be, then my manager did not want to be personally responsible in case a few drops of regular coffee splashed into the decaf, or a few of the regular beans got into the decaf ones(this possibility surprisingly likely). We couldn’t be 100% sure, after all.

Furthermore, the 2 of us were not well versed with the nature of caffeine allergies. Better safe than sorry and all that. We also were not well versed in the tort law concerning coffee allergies. See, we were working minimum wage jobs at a Dunkin’ Donuts…

I’m sorry if I didn’t tell that story well; the memory is 10 years old…

This is irrelevant. If a customer wants to buy poison to drink, I am not going to sell it. Just because something is legal does not mean it is ethical.

:dubious:

38

Like I said, this was years ago when I waited tables, but if anybody has that kind of serious reaction to decaf vs. regular, I would assume they would inform their server. As your mother does. I would never knowingly serve anybody anything that would make them ill, but it’s up to them to let me know.

39

The worst I was off by was this one woman who was born in 1978. I checked her twice. :smack:

40

Some people don’t even try that hard. When I worked retail, I had a woman complain when a $50 sweater didn’t ring up at 75% off. She claimed it should, since she found it on the clearance rack, and that I should over-ride the register or it would be “false advertising”. Nevermind that there was an entire rack of the full price sweater a few racks over. She sulked off after I pointed out that she could claim anything came from the clearance rack.