I worked retail for a long time and people really do treat you like shit sometimes. But between selling sex toys, mattresses, and jewelry I can say definitively I got treated worst selling mattresses.

All three of my jobs were in sales but selling sex toys we were allowed to put people in their place, and in jewelry people didn’t want to misbehave in a fancy setting. But people at the mattress store had no problem yelling at me, hitting on me, or insulting me to my face.

For a while I was managing my own store for the company. I ran a small location and had struggling employees placed with me for rehabilitation. If their numbers improved they could go back to bigger stores. If not, they got fired.

So this meant I was the manager of problem employees. At one point both of my people had a foot out the door. The company was going downhill and changed computer systems and they were fed up. Consequently, they made a ton of mistakes, because they just didn’t care about the job or learning the new systems.

I strolled into work on what was essentially my Monday to a shit show. Deliveries scheduled without product, wrong things on orders, poor expectations of the process, you name it. I spent the entire morning getting yelled at for mistakes that weren’t mine.

The final straw came when a man called furious that his moms bed for her nursing home had a delivery window he couldn’t accommodate. This wasn’t a huge disaster since we still had time to deliver it before she moved. I ran him through the options and he just kept screaming at me. Not for a solution but because I was there and he was frustrated.

My heart filled with malice and a cold fury. A calculating part of my brain had a realization in that moment that I could stay a punching bag or I could strike back.

I quavered my voice delicately, taking in a shaky, warbling breath like I was trying not to cry. “Sir,” I quivered through fake tears, “I don’t know what you want from me! I told you what I can do, I didn’t make this mistake I’m just trying to fix it!” My voice broke pitifully on the last syllables, sounding in all ways like a sweet innocent person being yelled at who’s just trying her best, really!

It was like I’d doused him with cold water. My emotional act was the realization that he was screaming at someone who was just doing their damn job, and he was being an asshole. He hastily made an excuse and hung up.

I had a third employee covering with me from another store that day who heard everything. When I hung up, I looked over to see them watching me with an awed expression. “Did… did you just pretend to cry?”

“I absolutely fucking did,” I said with feeling, “and I’d do it a thousand more times. If that’s what it takes for someone to realize they’re behaving like a fucking prick, they deserve it.” The employee looked at me like I was their hero.

The man called back, apologizing profusely, having magically arranged his schedule to accommodate delivery. He came in later that week with an apology Starbucks gift card. I was gracious in my acceptance.

I pulled it a few more times before leaving the company. I felt no shame in the ruse. If someone behaves so poorly that it’s plausible their behavior would drive someone to tears they deserve to feel absolutely wretched about it.

What?

once when I worked at a grocery story, this woman came in and bought thirty four squash. so while im scanning all her fucking squash, she starts up a conversation. she asks if I'm in college despite the fact I was fifteen at the time and very much looked it. when i said no she nodded and said that was good because too many women were going to college these days. she told me her son was in law school and paused for a solid thirty seconds after, just staring at me, waiting for me to be impressed. again, I was fifteen. I wasn't impressed by anything but in ground pools and people who don't cough on a gravity bong. after I let out the world's most monotone "wow" (I'm mostly focused on counting these squash), she shows me a picture of her Fully Grown Adult son and asks me if I think he's cute. for the next minute, while I finish scanning all her fucking squash, she tries to set me up with her son. she left when I told her I couldn't date her son because I was an undercover CIA agent working in the store to catch the mafia ring that had taken over the town. my manager thought it was funny and gave me a free vitamin water.

Regular Customer Service Interaction.

Me: I've sent you an email to validate this order, please click on the link to confirm or deny. It will state what physical device the order is for, but not the specifics. I will be going over those with you verbally and sending a separate email summarizing them.

Customer: Okay..........I haven't gotten the text yet.

Me: No, it's an email.

Customer: Oh! Uhhhhhh right. Email. So I just reply to this?

Me: No. There's a link. Click on the link.

Customer: I don't see a link. Hey, your email is broken! What am I paying for here if this is the customer service I get?!

Me: There's going to be the words "Click here to validate" in size 14 font, in blue letters. That is a link. Please click on that link to confirm or deny.

Customer: Oh! Why didn't you just say that at the beginning, woulda saved a lot of time-oh. Huh. No, no. This doesn't mention my promotion. Deny.

Me: ...You've just canceled the order.

Customer: Well it was wrong!

Me: Again, sir, the link is just to confirm or deny the physical device, not the payment and promotions. We will be going over that separately.

Customer: You really should say shit like that at the beginning! Now I have to do this all over again! I want a manager!

voldemort is that guy who peaked in high school and can never let it go. that mf decided to go into retail bc he couldn’t get the defence job. and why were his horcruxes mostly the founder’s relics 😭

and not to mention! he brings the final battle to hogwarts! 💀 talk about childhood nostalgia LMFAOOO

Please please please be nice to your grocery store employees if you’re shopping for thanksgiving here in the states.

I don’t control the prices I think they are too high too.

I’m sorry if I don’t have something popular you are looking for I can’t make it appear.

We can’t do same day for most items like call ahead if you need something.

(I know this doesn’t really apply to like 99.999999% of people on here I don’t think but god I just needed to say it because the thanksgiving rush is not very nice this year.)

Nothing will dispel you of the illusion that maturity and aging are inherently related than working with the general public, where you'll spend much of your day working with 40+ year olds who make it abundantly clear that they have never had a single self-reflective thought in their life and never will.

I don't wanna be that person but pls teach your kids how to behave in stores. Us, retail workers, already suffer enough. And in the meantime teach yourself how to behave in stores.

I think the truest measure of how horrible people treat anyone who works in the service industry, or retail, is when something goes wrong -- like when the wait time for customer service quite long -- and the employee's first reaction is to profusely apologise.

Even if it's not their fault, they are trained to apologise for ANYTHING that might be perceived as inconvenience to the customer.

I have fifteen years of experience in these industries, so I will always reply with stuff like: "Hey, all good. Not your fault." or "I know what that's like, you're doing great." or "Hey, that person shouldn't have yelled at you. Just take your time, catch your breath. I'm not in a rush."

And you know what happens every time?

That person will look at me like I just gave them a winning lotto ticket. The smallest amount of understanding and human decency will make their entire day. The bar of how customer facing staff are treated is so low, it's on the fucking ground.

It's really not hard to be patient and kind to cashiers, or call center people, or anyone else for that matter.

Shoutout to everyone who's been treated by shit by a customer and yet, you still had to apologise to them for harassing you. Honestly, customer service and retail workers are the backbone of society.

Retail work is amazing. You ask customers how their day is going and they tell you “I killed my father when I was 10” and then give them change

I think I should get a little reward every time I tell a customer "have a nice day" when what I'm really feeling is "eat shit and die"

A pay raise isn't enough, I need to rail someone until they pass out.

I really fucking hate my job.

Today I got coached for leaving early the other day. My daughter got sick (on the first full day of school) and I had to leave and pick her up.

Apparently, I have now been warned that my attendance is unacceptable and given a guilt trip of "think of your coworkers, they had to pick up your slack"

I'm so done. I'm tired of this bullshit ass shit. They don't give a fuck about me, but I'm supposed to bleed for this company.

Fuck ALL THE WAY OFF.

that was a great story. shame that like at least three barnes and noble employees are getting fired over it