I think that part is obvious but “interest” does not necessarily mean “I’m buying it/ordering it right now”.
Then you acknowledge that they’re lying to you about a “misunderstanding”. So the scam doesn’t work on you, but it might work on someone else with a stronger sense of guilt. Scams are all about emotional manipulation. The same pressure points don’t work on everyone. Others might be taken in by time-based tactics (“you’ll only get this deal if you buy NOW”), ones based on perceived exclusivity (“we’re only offering this to YOU”), or a million other things.
If I ask the waiter “Do you have lasagna?”, it might be because I want to order lasagna, if available. It might be because my dining companion would like to order it, if available, and I’m asking on behalf of them. It might be because I might want the lasagna, but have further questions, like “Does it contain meat?”, or “Is it a white sauce or red?”, or “Would you recommend that or the roast beef?”. It might, conceivably, even be that I’ve found that restaurants that make lasagna do a better job on spaghetti than restaurants that don’t make lasagna, and I’m trying to decide how good the spaghetti will be. All I’m doing at that point is asking a question, and so the appropriate response is an answer to the question. If the waiter is unsure about the full situation, then the waiter can volunteer further information or ask their own questions: “Yes, the lasagna here is excellent. Would you like to order that?”.
I sort of see what you mean, but I would ask different questions, depending on your reason for asking.
If either of you want lasagna, ask “Do you have lasagna?”
If you want to know about the type of lasagna, then ask “Do you have vegetarian lasagna?” or “What sauce comes with the lasagna?”
If you want advice on their specialities, then “Would you recommend lasagna or roast beef?”
The way I say that is: “Better questions yield better answers.”
Many folks have a hard time asking good questions because their question is totally embedded in a context within their head. A context the answerer has no idea about; their context is utterly different. As well, most English words have a half-dozen meanings, and people often don’t think of how the question can be utterly misunderstood if a different but still plausible meaning is dropped into one or several words.
We see that a lot here on the SDMB, where it takes 3 or 4 back-and-forth posts to get the OP to actually explain what they’re thinking about and which definitions they’re using. Then and only then do we have the context their question makes sense within.
Of course, when dealing with the ignorant or with someone like a salescritter who may be willfully substituting their own agenda for your own, it’s doubly hard to get the answer you seek even given ideal questioning.
The wording of @glee’s lasagna questions just above are much more specifically tied to the specific question to be answered. And so are much harder to misinterpret.
I’m not suggesting our OP failed; I think he was ambushed. I am suggesting the “better questions → better answers” paradigm takes work and practice to implement but is worth it.
Personally, if I want to order a product, I will convey this information by stating “I’d like to order this.”
If I ask “Is this product available?” the information I am asking for is whether or not this product is available.
When I ask “Is this product available?” and the seller thinks I’m saying “I’d like to order this.” I don’t feel it was what I said that was the problem.
That said, I’m aware there are situations in which an indirect communication has assumed an implied meaning. If we were dining together and you asked me “Would you mind handing me the salt?” I would not respond “No, if you were to request the salt it wouldn’t bother me at all.” So I wanted to ask the crowd here if I had accidentally stumbled upon some indirect convention like this that I was unaware of.
“Do you have X” is a clear enough question. It asks whether that person has X. Nothing more, nothing less.
Bull. A question like that in a store that’s selling stuff most definitely comes with the implication that there is an interest in purchasing. Just how much interest is unknown. Many salespeople, like the one in the OP, will automatically infer an intent to purchase imminently.
Well, yes, if you’re asking if a store has something, that almost always indicates at least some interest in a purchase. Heck, just being in the store at all indicates that. But it doesn’t indicate how much interest there is, and it certainly doesn’t indicate that the customer definitely intends to purchase it then and there. If nothing else, the customer almost certainly wants to see the price, and possibly the price for the same item sold by competitors, before making that decision.
shrug I deal with sales of services and products, as a small business owner. A question like that would never imply to me to place an order. Same with when I worked at a coffeeshop twenty plus years ago. A customer may ask if we serve a certain product that is not on the menu. That did not ever mean to put an order in unless they did decide upon that product. It’s happened more than once that they decided, in fact, to order something else.
Ding, ding, ding! In my work, that is exactly what it often is. They’re still shopping. Why would you put in an order without even giving a price first? “Do you have X” just does not mean “please order X for me” in any universe, except inside a pushy salesperson’s head, perhaps. I’ve been in stores where I ask “Do you have X” and they say “No, but we can order it for you, if you’d like.” That’s a normal response. And then I might ask “how much is it, and when do you think you can get it?” Then I decide if I’m interested and want to place the order. Why is this even debatable? I mean, isn’t it normal for a customer to inquire about an item, then look at it, then consider the price, and then even leave the store to think about whether they want to purchase it? I mean, it’s perfectly normal for me. “Hey, do you have the Roland TD-whatever electronic drum kit?” “Sure!” “Can I see it?” “Here’s some sticks, play around with it.” It’s not “Sure! Gimme your credit card and I’ll pack that up for you!” WTF? Even just today, I was at a sushi place, and I asked “do you guys have fresh wasabi?” And the server said: “Yes. Would you like me to get you some?” and didn’t just run off to the back and automatically get some (as it is an upcharge, not a free item.)
That “reel them in” approach has the opposite effect on me.
I was in a video store a couple on months back. They had a sign on the wall saying most of their used movies were available for ten dollars. It was posted in the new movie section.
I asked the employee which movies were available for ten dollars. I had several movies I intended to buy and that was a good price.
She would not tell me which specific movies the ten dollar offer covered. I specifically mentioned I would like to buy some of the recent MCU movies. She told me they might be covered but I had to pick out the movies I wanted to buy and then bring them up to her at the counter, where she would look up their prices. So I looked around for a few minutes and picked out six movies I was interested in; four recent MCU movies and two other recent movies.
I brought them to her and she spent about ten minutes looking them up. (I was the only customer in the store during the entire time I was there.) She then told me the two recent movies had just been released that week and weren’t for sale and the four MCU movies would cost fifteen dollars each.
So none of the six movies I picked out were covered by the ten dollar price they had posted in the new movie section. I bought no movies and left the store.
I feel that this was a ploy. I think they believed that if they got me on the hook with the promise of a ten dollar price and let things play out for a while, I would start thinking of the movies as mine and I would still pay for them even at the higher price. (I know car dealers talk about this effect when they’re selling cars.)
But their tactic had the opposite effect. If they had simply labelled the movies as fifteen dollars, I would have picked the movies I wanted off the shelf and bought them. I’d have been out of the store in a couple of minutes. But the whole routine of trying to lure me in to the sale turned me away. When a store acts like they have to trick me into buying their product, I usually walk away.