I just reread the OP, and nowhere in it does the author mention being rude to the asshole that criticized his bathroom habits. Lib, while I disagree with the resulting pileon you experienced, you DID start it off by some gratuitous and personal insults thrown toward the author of the OP, in which you assumed the worst about him.
However, folks, y’all are going way overboard on Lib here.
When I worked retail, I got this kind on nonsense all the time. An older woman demanded to speak to my manager because I told her we had no plastic soup spoons, but only plastic teaspoons. Someone ordered pancakes with blueberries on them and sent them back to the kitchen three times to get more blueberries. Someone complained to my manager because I, in a hippy bakery, was wearing a T-shirt that said, “Born Again Pagan.”
I’ll avoid retail for the rest of my life. Even though I was lucky enough to have sane managers who knew I was a good employee and blew off stupid complaints, I had more than enough of idiots treating me like their personal servant.
jlzania, you’re one of my favorite posters, but this:
I’ve got to vehemently disagree with. In every customer service job i’ve worked in, all those replies would’ve gotten you would be a remprimand from the manager (or since the OP was the manager, the owner) after the customer complained you “copped attitude.”
If someone is enough of an asshole to feel as if it’s proper to lecture a stranger on going to the bathroom before starting work (and how the hell would they know what time the employee started work? It could’ve been 8 hours prior for all they know!) they’re not going to think any of those comments are cute. Chances are, they’ll just piss 'em off more.
[QUOTE=Rysler]
I’m shocked that someone actually paid attention to anything I’ve posted. QUOTE]
I’d like to point out that I’ve noticed as well.
I also failed to notice any rudeness on the OP’s part in his account of the incident. No matter what I may say after a customer has left, I’m polite to him or her while they’re still around.
I agree. Generally when a customer or patron is being a git toward me, I don’t apologize to them, but I also don’t engage with them. I just go into cold professional mode, and absolutely ignore their insulting comments.
Customer: Where were you? I’ve been waiting out here!
Me: I had to go in back for a moment. Will that be all?
Customer: You shouldn’t leave the store unattended, you know.
Me: Mmm hmm. Would you like anything else?
Customer: grumble grumble No.
If someone has a legitimate complaint, of course, that’s entirely different; it’s also entirely different if they’re being aggressive or harrassing. But if they’re just being a rude git, then tefloning them out of the establishment is my modus operandi.
lezlers-thank you for the compliment as I never really feel I contribute enough to make it on most Dopers radar.
I’ve been a waitress and a bartender as well as a travel agent in the past and for the most part, I found that if you can gently force some one to recognize your humanity, they’ll normally back off and show you a little respect.
However, as I haven’t worked with the general public in a number of years, I’m more than willing to admit that people may be becoming even more self-absorbed and nasty over the years.
Which is why I usually prefer the company of my animals.
I should not have to apologize, he was rude and mean to me for taking care of natures call.
I does not matter if i am a manager or a cashier, i work at a store where the managers have to run the register for a full shift just like the cashiers do. That is they way of big business, less employees for more work and less pay. I think the customers should relize that we are by ourselves and that restroom breaks hardly ever happen so we go when we can get away for a minute…nuf said he was wrong and i was right for standing up to him and would expect my cashiers to do the same.
There is a level at which this customers action is justified (though not justified to be rude). Any open store should have at least one available register at all times. As a manger it would be your responsibility to assure this as far as possible. If as you say you are kept so under staffed that this is impossible, then the customer has a right to be annoyed with your company, and as the manager with you ‘the representative of your company’.
What are you doing as a manager to ensure this situation does not occur again? Are you recruiting more staff, are your hands tied by your upper management’s policies?
Our company just started hiring more help, but the district manager seems to think that we only need 2 people per shift. 1 cashier and 1 deli person. This creates a problem when you need to use the bathroom or put away truck orders or take out trash etc… There is no one else to do those things because we are that busy, the flow of customers never stop long enough to clean etc… We try to schedule extra help for some of the time but never more then half a shift and when they are gone there is noone else to take over to give someone a restroom break. They want to hire more people and then still not have them there to help wait on customers. This hurts the customers by not having product up or not having a clean stocked enviroment to shop in and it also hurts us because we never get a break to do the most basic things… They dont pay managers enough to take bullshit from people when we have no control over it to begin with. And i dont care what anyone has to say until you have to do the job everyday then you would understand.
I did say i was sorry that he had to wait that i was in the restroom, it was only after he got irrate with me that i told him to go to another store that had more staff to let people pee… i think well deserved for what he said to me.
BTW he did come back the next night and apologize to me for being such an ass (his words) and that he understood that he was wrong.
