customer stories

ohh mine was at a damn restaurant. some old fucking whoor waitress (theres one at every restaurant. theres always one really old waitress who thinks of herself as the boss) started calling me a fat ass and too slow at clearing tables behind my back. so gradually i started doing less and less work and began sociallising in the kitchen more and more, or wonderring off to talk to the drunks untilt he point where she threatenned to fire me, "go ahead ha ha, you think i fucking care, go ahead and try it" replied i. after that i started showing up later and later and stopped being more sanitary and sanitary to the point where: i would handle blood and raw meat, then would make salads without washing my hands, or i owuld pick out some nice goobers without washing, or would make salads after cleaning windows that were coverred in dust. the lateness led to more absenteeism without notification to the point where i called in sick one day and said "yeah im not coming in today, got some friends coming over. actually i wont be comign in anymore, i think im gonna quit" and that was that. as for the bitch old waitress? well come summer and the patio is re-openned, i will be paying many visits with my paintball gun as we drive by

guy at the movie theater walks up to me at the box office ten minutes late on a friday night for the 7:30 show of a new hit action thriller blockbuster. needless to say there are no tickets left for him.

me: "sorry, sir, that show is sold out."
guy: "YOU GOTTA BE SHITTING ME!!"
me: "i shit you not, sir."

guy goes and gets my manager, guy yells about me to my manager, manager asks my side of the story, manager turns to the guy:

manager: "did you swear at her?"
guy: "well, yeah, but..."
manager:"did you swear at her?"
guy: "well...yeah..."
manager: "next time you want something, don't be swearing at my staff." ::walks off::

that was the one time, the ONE TIME, the management ever backed me up to a customer in that godawful hole.

haha, I love that. "I shit you not, sir." I picture it deadpan a beat after he yells. The 'sir' was the best part. I'm gonna have to remember that one.

I actually don't have many customer stories because I worked in the kitchen of a pizzeria mostly. Not too much interaction with the peanut gallery. We had a blast in the kitchen though. Some memorable moments:
-Towel snapping battles with clear plastic buckets over our heads for helmets. It was just me and one other guy. We had rules and everything. It was kinda like fencing with wet towels and when anyone would bitch at us, we'd turn on 'em.
-Attempting Pizza Hut specials. I don't know if any of you remember this, but a few years ago and maybe since then, Pizza Hut had this pizza that had crust, cheese, crust, sauce and toppings. Well, we tried to make this and failed miserably. We knew there were special temperatures and times, but didn't bother dealing with them, so the outer ring was cooked decently, but the middle was so gooey we had difficulty telling the melted cheese and runny dough apart.
-The day one of the senior members of the squad broke up with his girlfriend, he brought in 4 six packs of various Henry Weinhard's Soda, which is top o' the line shit. We filled one of the sauce buckets (the ones we used for helmets) with ice and pop. Perfection on a hot summer day in an even hotter kitchen.

Kitty! You work in a movie theatre too!

I'm a concessionist so you can imagine the complaints I get about the prices on the food.

"OH MY GOD. WHAT IS THIS, LIKE A 500% MARKUP?"

Yeah, and it's my fault. I priced the food. Pay me and shut the fuck up.

OK, i don't even know where to start. i've had a series of joe-jobs, nothing you'd call a career, in my lifetime, but the best stories come from the video store. i was just talking about this incident with an ex-coworker the other day, so it's fresh in my memory:
*cue flashback music* (this post has officially become a wayne's world tribute)

the store i worked at had also has tanning booths. at first, i thought this was a crazy idea until the idea blew up, and i saw how much $ tanning was bringing in. anyway, we had those stand-up booths, were there's little to no human contact with the actual equipment. so, when a person came out, we just swiffered the floor and the door handles, etc. very low-maintainance. anyway, i walked into one of the booths after a lady came out, ready to swiffer away, and i see a huge puddle of yellow liquid in one of the outer groove things. yes, i said yellow. after flipping my shit, retching, running around telling other employees about what happened, i cleaned it up (somebody had to do it). i called the owner to tell him what happened, and he told me to call the woman to tell her "you can't piss in our booths, don't come back." i was a little concerned about the legalities of accusing someone of pissing in the booth, because really, i didn't do a urine analysis; it could have technically been anything. so, i called her and said, "we have some question about the cleanliness of the booth after you were finished tanning - we can't allow you to leave the booth in that condition anymore" the woman had the nerve to say "what do you mean?" i went into further detail, and she was like, "oh." now, a normal person would never come back, right?? not this woman! the next time she came back, she tells me (in front of other employees and customers) "i think i know what that yellow liquid was - i had just worked out, and i was really sweating that day!" f'n disgusting.

anyway, i have so many other stories involving questionable stains and hair on the "adult films," creepy customer propositions, asshole customer complaints... i should actually write a book.

how does one recieve a death threat while working in a library?
i don't know exactly how i managed it, but yes, i have recieved a death threat from a patron (not exactly a customer, but same idea).
and there was the time a video was returned to us with a live cockroach [I]inside[/I] the videocassette.
or good old Marshall Forte, announcing to the library "My name is Marshall Forte, and i used to practice homosexuality" (say with the stereotypical homosexual lisp, and you got his voice down just right)
i could keep going, but most of it's usually just white-trash crap that we get here.

hooray! i am glad this thread is working out!
moe.ron knows that video stores are the absolute worst. i have worked in the service industry since i turned 15, but nothing (not even getting drunk at wendy's at 16 and pouring tequila into the frosty machine) holds a candle to the ppl who come into a video store.
with that said...*ARE YOU CALLING ME A PLAYER?* story...
his name, is timothy thompson. and this is our first run in with him.
timothy thompson rents porn. a lot. regular porn renter. one sunday morning he comes in with his 5 year old daughter. he brings "ass masters 7" or whatever the title was, up to the counter and tells me that it was defective. i pull up his account and see that "ass masters 7" is two days overdue. i tell him that we can either clear the late fee, or give him an exchange, but not do both.
he becomes completely irate, screaming in front of his daughter about how he should get the late fee cleared and be able to get another porn. i firmly held my ground and said that it was one or the other, and he angrily stormed off saying he was never coming back.
"heh-heh" i chuckled to myself. see, this happens all the time at video stores, so i put a cocky note on his account that said "we'll see about that!" or something to that effect...
5 minutes later he comes storming back into the store. this time i decided to let my manager deal with it. she looks at the situation and tells him the same thing. once again, he threatens to "never come back again" and she says (and i quote) "if that's the way you want to play it"
timothy thompson's face completely changes, it goes from rage to something beyond rage...like you've just seen your prey running across the field and you know its supper time. "what did you say?" he asks.
"I said, if that's the way you want to play it" she replies.
"are you calling me a player?" timothy thompson asks.
"...no..., that's not what i said"
"you called me a player! i demand an apology!" and he just starts going on and on and on, extremely irate (all of this STILL in front of his kid) this continues for another 5 minutes, when the manager finally breaks down and clears his late fee and gives him the exchange because she is now frightened for her life.
he walks out the door, staring her down the whole time, grumbling about how he's never coming back, and looking at her like "and if i come back, it will only be to kill you"
we've had many run ins w/ timothy thompson since that. he's a regular porn scammer...this just happens to be the most memorable one.

moe, i'll co-write that book with you.

trypdwyre, it seems like you have many stories to tell...

meat-pie man story is coming up! i think this might be the best video store story ever.

I work in a restaurant, and I once had a very old guy order one pancake and one piece of cheese. And not good cheese either, the Kraft single serving individually wrapped kind.

Then he yelled at me when I didn't bring him butter and syrup and jam. I thought the cheese would be sufficient, you know? then he wrapped it all up together and ate it.

Cool stories, hurry up with the meat-pie man story small_fire, your stories are cracking me up!

I used to work at Taco Bell way back in the day, when I still went to highschool. So you can imagine all the shit I've been through, working in the fast food industry, dealing with the scum of society at the tender age of 16.

Well anyway, I usually worked the drive through and when it got late and slow, I'd have to go clean the bathrooms since I wasn't dealing with the food. We had two bathrooms of course, one for guys and one for gals, but they were only one toilet to each, so you'd have to lock the door once you were inside.

So one night, I go to clean the men's bathroom, and I notice that door lock is closed, but its not closed properly, so I barge in anyway. I end up running into this old man who's wiping his ass standing up near the sink. Apparently, he didn't even sit down on the toilet and shit all over the floor. The most repugnant shit I'd ever seen in my life.

So I go and tell my manager and he tells me to wait till he's done and go in there and clean it. That was not fun.

Did you ever figure out why he did this? What would possess him to do such a thing?! Ahhgg.

ah ha ha ha my buddy who worked with me at the restaurant once had to clean the bathrooms. he went in and right beside the toilet. there was a sheet of newspaper layed on the ground, and a huge fukcing shit on it lol

at least they had the decency to crap on a paper so it could be removed more sanitarily, eh?

To this day, I have no idea why. The guy was pretty old, so maybe he was afraid of sitting down and not being able to get back up. I thought it was funny as hell at first, but when I had to clean it, it wasn't all that funny anymore.

fucking disgusting people!!

hey small_fire, ever wonder why the regular porn renters rent, like, 7 at a time? can you really watch 7 porn flix in 48 hours?

alright, i think the poop story finally inspired me to come out with the meat pie man story. although, the poop story is a tough act to follow.
meat-pie man is, by far, the most insane person in the world.
i forgot what his real name is, we just call him meat-pie man so much, it just kinda stuck.
meat-pie man has something seriously wrong with his mind, so i kinda feel bad for him, but he is one of those crazy people that is so crazy, it is hard not to make a spectacle of it (i already know i'm going to hell, okay.)
anyway, he comes in all the time to order movies. he always orders the same movie, takes it home and says it doesn't work, and we order it for him again. this has happened at least 7 times now. throughout this excursion, he has fallen in love with my manager, richard. richard is about 50 or so, and is quite frightened of meat-pie man.
meat-pie man gets so excited everytime he comes in and sees richard. he always extends his arms and lunges towards him yelling "RICHARD!". richard quickly extends his hand and gives him a handshake instead of a big, meatty hug.
but, back to the reason why we call him meat-pie man.
one day, richard goes on break to this little deli that is around the corner from the store. meat-pie man comes into the store looking for richard. another employee tells meat-pie man that richard is on break at the deli, not knowing who meat-pie man was at the time.
(this is where it gets tricky, because i can't do the voice over the internet. the voice is the key to the comic effect that goes with this story...i will try my best to describe it)
meat-pie man goes over to the deli and spots richard, reading a book. richard does not see him.
meat-pie man goes over, and slides, you guessed it...a HALF-EATEN MEAT PIE under richards face. then he says, in this low, raspy, drawn-out voice "HI RICHARD..."
richard is clearly freaked out by this, but gladly takes the half eaten meat pie and thanks meat pie man for his gift. then he comes back to work, throwing the meat pie away first, for fear of poison, or god knows what else may reside within that half eaten pie.
before this happened, i didn't even know that a meat-pie existed.
there are more tales of meat-pie man. maybe if my friend orange jews comes back on the board, he can tell you about his latest encounter with him (we work at the same store)
i hope this story was all that i worked it up to be

moe-ron,
sunday is the worst at our store!!! people rent all kinds of porn on the sabbath!
the worst, is when people rent 2 or more porns and return them all, not rewound so you can tell where the money shot was, in less than 2 hours from the time that they rented them.
yuck.

excellent. we never called it the money shot though...it was always "aaaannnnd...i'm spent" how 'bout the questionable stains and hairs in the cases? any of those??

ew. yes, those are also no fun. once i found a roach (not the bug) in a porn case. which is not nearly as bad as the stains and hairs, but still kinda funny.

the hell is this even about

in my town old people were the ones who rented the porn the most. one guy brought back a bag of porn tapes (guy 70 years old) and they were all cold, and moist. another funny story was on one night when i wasnt working, but still hanging out there with my good buddy and his friend too. so a couple peopl came in and then left, a couple hours go bye and the store is still completely empty and has been for the last ocuple hours. my buddy's friend decides he wants to go rent a porn flick, he opens up the door and there was a guy in there for the whole time the store was empty. our buddy goes in, looks at the guy and says "gettin some good porn are ya? ha ha" and the guy leaves really quickly, i ask what the prob was (becides the guy was in the adult room for like 3 hours lol) and my buddy tells me that they've had problems with guys who go in there, jerk off and leave. the next day at my shift, my buddy gives me the new honorary duty of: checking the adult room for any people who decide to go in for a lil fun and leave without renting anything. to make it worse, i got to clean up the mes they left. im glad a iquit before i actually got to carry out any of those duties

[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by The Gucci Ghost [/i]
[B]During the summer we host these sports camps. You know football, basketball, etc. But we got the math and science camp for two weeks. That means nerds, lots and lots of nerds. So, one day, this kid vomits all over the serving line, just walks up with his tray, and blows all over the food. I laughed harder that day then ever before. Vomit on the floor, vomit on the macaroni, vomit covering the kid, and there I was, standing over him dying.
Well, maybe that is an asshole employee story, if you're reading this, sorry kid.
[/B][/QUOTE]

LMFAO!!! Holy crap that's hilarious!

gucci ghost, that was awesome. i can't believe he threw a bucket of water on you!

customers. clients. consumers. yeah, once i had a job in a wine store. this was the first real job i could find after graduating college. i had a degree, but wall street wasn't hiring. this was in '91. so, i went to work where daddy bought the wine. easy enough. i was hired on the spot, without a resume and without recommendations of any kind. what i had completely underestimated was my willingness to work directly with the public in a retail situation. this character building experience led to many discoveries: cash is king, for instance, if you have to charge your liquor, then you're in trouble. secondly, pregnant women will be offended if you don't recognize they're pregnant and offer to help them carry their bags out of the store. this does not apply anywhere else, btw. pregnant women in real life would rather have you believe they've put on some weight. anyway, i committed this error once. i thought the woman was overweight. boy, was i wrong and my manager had to talk to me about service and ethics. anyway, i digress. my customer story involves a woman i was attracted to almost immediately from the time i first laid eyes on her. i was enraptured. i mean i was riveted. eventually, i discovered her name (asked for id - it's a liquor store for crying out loud) and her age (i checked, see, and she was 7 years older). she kind of new what was going on. a week after i discovered her name i followed her to her car and i could tell she was interested, too. (learn to read body language, guys) i am not a stalker, by the way. i was smitten and she said hello first, i said hello, and looking into the car i saw a baby seat. i thought, my god, i am coming on to a married woman! she saw my reaction and said, "i'm a nanny" and laughed. i recovered and asked her out. we dated for six months. it was a lot of fun, with many ups and downs. it's that way when you date an alcoholic, unpublished writer who nannies for her sister. believe me.

grade_5, i worked in a movie theater, past tense. i don't anymore thank god.

[QUOTE]"you called me a player! i demand an apology!" and he just starts going on and on and on, extremely irate (all of this STILL in front of his kid) this continues for another 5 minutes, when the manager finally breaks down and clears his late fee and gives him the exchange because she is now frightened for her life.[/QUOTE]

this is why customers act like such total fuckheads. because some manager finally gives in to them, and they learn, just like little kids, that all they have to do to get whatever they want--free or at a discount, no less--is to act like a total fuckhead. it makes me so pissed off when a manager comes over when someone's heaping abuse on you, and is like, "oh, i'm sorry about that sir...here, have a free ticket/popcorn/drink/book/vacation for two on the house!! terribly sorry. yes, we'll beat our irresponsible employee here soundly later. can you watch? well, heh heh, i'll have to check with the boss on that one..." it's classical conditioning, people. classical conditioning.

anyway. now i work at a newspaper. much better job. when i have contact with the public it's via phone, which means i have lots of options when it comes to getting rid of them, including transferring to another line or just hanging up. we even have a handy "drop" button on the phones at our desk it'll just sound like you got disconnected.

the meat-pie man story reminded me of a regular caller to the newsroom here. we call him stoughton man because even though he never gives his name, he always tells us his address and that he lives in stoughton, mass. then he goes on rants like this:

[I]`I'm sick, and as sick as I am, I am going to go to Washington and hold up a sign and it's gonna say, `Bush, come out here.' and then he's gonna come out and I'm gonna hit him in the face, and when he gets up I'm gonna hit him again. this country is going down and I don't want to hear anymore from the asshole white house. and then I am going to come and hit you. So, watch out.'[/I]

hang 'em by the balls. this is why men have a tough time being credible with women. too many scars from experiences like that. jesus.

gucci, good for you. the very image of a gentleman. still, i think you ought to have clocked your freakish co-worker, or at least have sent everyone some haiku about her breath.

kitty, yeah, i get really frustrated when that happens too (customers get a break when they shouldn't just b/c they are being irate)...but this guy was fucking insane, if we didnt give him his porn, this small_fire might not be here right now to tell the tale.

oh, and let me know if that guy ever punches bush. if and when he comes back to punch you...duck.

This isn't something i've witnessed, but it happens ALL the time at where I work. I work at an Ace Hardware store/Lumber Yard, and currently our store and yard are split up by a couple of streets due to some road work. But this german guy always comes in and he's really annoying, and according to everyone at the lumber yard he always pisses on lumber piles when he goes over there. and I've even heard that one time he cut his finger and pissed on it claiming that urine was the best anti-biotic.

I have my fair share of amazingly stupid people, no real disgusting stories, just stupid people. So I can't really detail any specific personal stories. I don't really care though, I hold little to no regard for my job and if I was fired I would care less.

Oh man, these are great!

If I had a job, i'll tell stories, but I don't.

im right along with ya mario those damn commies in my town like refuse to hire me

gucci ghost, i enjoyed the "panda" term...as well as "fattist." and that was nice of you to sit through the movie with the homely 15 yr. old.

re: framstedt's story about the customer he dated. i'm glad it worked out for you, but constantly getting hit on by the most disgusting human beings in the world has to be the worst part about working with the public. i told this one guy that i get paid to be nice to him when he said something along the lines of "you know you want me." *shudder*

yeah, i could see how that would really suck. btw, that's the only time i dated a customer. dated someone at work nearly two years ago and that was a disaster. do not, repeat, do not ever date someone you work with, even if they're in another department. unless you want to get married, these things fail miserably.

framstedt, i completely agree...this has always been my number one rule...never date a co-worker, unless you hate your job and wouldn't mind quitting instantly after the relationship is over.
i...despite all the crazy things listed in this thread, love my job...so that, and the fact that i have a boyfriend, prevents me from ever dating anyone at my work...EVER.

sometimes you just have to break those rules to remember the rules in the first place.

absolutely. In my case several times. Now I'm on to the next taboo relationship, housemates...lol

whoa. i'd have to be gay to go there. talk about taboos!

lol

ugh, make that 2 death threats working at a library. today i have broken my old record of one death threat.
you see, i get these because i ask people not to view pornography on our computers, in compliance with ohio law. damn me for doing my goddamned job.

trypdwyre, do they send the threats via e-mail? or do the come up to you and actually say, "i'm gonna git you sucka"

well the first one said in a letter addressed to me and my branch manager "One of you will die"
the second guy, actually said it to my face. after saying he's going to sue the library for kicking him out for looking at porn. he said "what's your name? you're going to die you stupid motherfucker"
and i laugh when people say "that sounds like a easy and quiet job"

The only quiet jobs are ones where there's no customers to interact with, like mine.

I usually leave each shift grinning.

Considering my previous jobs were in retail (sortof), this is heaven

what do you do rohan? i think i just picked the wrong library to work at, it's not quite in an area that is considered to be well kept up,
ok damnit, i work in the fucking ghetto. it's an old ghetto though, starts the kids off soft, one kid was carrying around a butter knife, he thought it was for protection, i thought he just didn't finish his dinner.

I'm a night operator at an IT place. You get to sit back in an empty office in the wee hours of the morning and watch movies. You're there just in case something goes wrong, making sure things that happen overnight in the server room (backups, for example) get completed without a problem.

So, essentially, I get paid to watch movies and post here

where do i apply? kiddin', i actually enjoy most of my job, i get along with the majority of people who come in, i know my job pretty well (it helps that i mainly deal with the young adult section, and the computer troubles), i get paid pretty well (i'm supporting myself and my wife and child on my income alone), and i'm in charge around here 90% of the time. i tend to enjoy making decisions for other people. and i have trouble being told what to do, so i dunno many other places i would be as confortable i suppose.

and like you, most of the time i get paid to post here.

Aint life grand?

how do you get a job at an IT place being your age (im assuming your in your teens due to your pic...i think) either way i ant a job doing nothing

tryperwyre, who are the kinds of people who threaten you? like "gangstas" or ol dirty farts or what

I'm 20.

I guess I just took a different route to most people. I knew that whether or not I ended up taking it up as a permanent career, that what would earn my my bread-and-butter money were computers. So instead of finishing high school, I dropped out, got a job, and started studying on my own to get commercial certificates rather than wasting years more at high school and after that at a university.

For my purposes, that worked well. It's certainly not for everyone, though, so I generally try to avoid attacking secondary schooling too much...

yeah dude you look 17ish, shyte you have a kick ass job. mine (for now until i go to college) is to either be a night security gaurd, or a school bus driver, where i would take the kids for beer runs before dropping them off at school

first person was an 18 year old kid who rode around everywhere on one of those dinky little dirt bikes like he was a gangsta. i didn't take his threat too seriously for me, i know i could handle that kid, but there are a lot of females who work here (one who's pregnant) who i am concerned for.
the second was a late 30's early 40's big guy, i'm 6'2", and i had to look [I]up[/I] at him, and i would say his chest was about twice as big as mine. but i stood my ground, i did get nervous when the other co-worker of mine who was supposed to come in and stand there with me when i talked to the guy stayed out of the room i talked to the guy in. but after his threats, i made like i was calling the police (he wasn't leaving the premises) so he left.

Yeah, but all I ever tell people is the glossy bits.

Believe me, I'm not employed for my attitude... when the shit hits the fan, it gets very stressful, very quickly.

Because unlike during the day, if something breaks, you're the ENTIRE IT stuff of the company until 8am in the morning