There’s a reason why so many people hate working in retail. Some customers have no home training, or they do, but they see customer service representatives as easy targets for taking out all of their frustrations. It’s unfortunate, but once the moment is gone, these retail workers have no problem sharing their laughable stories about customers throwing the worst temper tantrums.
All content has been edited for clarity.
Who’s Yelling?
“I used to work at Petsmart.
I was a petcare specialist that made minimum wage with ten minutes of training that specialized in cleaning up animal poop. I was working in the fish and aquarium section before a customer approached me for help.
I followed them to a fish tank that had black goldfish and gold goldfish in it. The gold goldfish were on sale for ninety-nine cents. The black goldfish were being sold at six dollars each. The tags were prominently displayed with a picture and the price.
Customer: ‘I want one of the black goldfish for ninety-nine cents.’
Me: ‘I’m sorry. The gold goldfish are ninety-nine cents the black ones are six dollars each.’
Customer: ‘But this tag (pointing to the one with the gold goldfish on it) says ninety-nine cents.’
Me: ‘Yes and it clearly shows the gold goldfish. I’m sorry for the confusion.’
Customer: (raising her voice) ‘But this tag is on this tank so all these fish are ninety-nine cents!’
If only I had known what I was getting myself into.
Me: ‘I’m sorry ma’am, but that’s not the way it works. You see, this tag with the black goldfish is also on the tank and it clearly says the black goldfish are six dollars.’
The customer then smugly smacked the sign displaying the sign for black goldfish and then looked at me expectantly.
Customer: ‘Well now all I see is the tag that says all these fish are ninety-nine cents!’
I resisted the urge to walk away. Smiling woefully, I retrieved the sign and placed it back in its proper place.
Me: ‘I’m sorry ma’am, but once again, that’s not the way it works. Even if I agreed with you the price would come up six bucks at the register.’
The customer smacked her lips before placing a hand on her hip. Her next words stunned me so badly, I had to ask her to repeat herself. Once she did, it took all my might not to go off right then and there.
Customer: (angrily) ‘Oh, I see how it is, you arrogant piece of trash! I know the exact reason why you’re being rude to me and making me pay full price!’
Me: ‘What are you talking about?’
Customer: ‘You guys want me to pay full price because of the way I look?! Is that it?!’
I forcefully pointed to the picture.
Me: ‘Look at this picture right here! What color is that fish?!?’
Customer: (still angry but confused too now) ‘It’s gold, but…’
Me: (still forcefully and quietly pointing to the price) ‘And how much does the tag say it costs?’
Customer: (bashfully) ‘Ninety-nine cents. But…’
Me: ( moving on to the other tag) ‘And how much does this tag say?!?’
Customer: (still quiet) ‘Six dollars.’
Me: ‘That’s right, six dollars, and what color is that fish?’ (Pointing to the picture on the tag.)
Customer: (pouting at this point) ‘Black.’
Me: ‘I’m sorry, how much are the Black Goldfish?’
Customer: (still pouting) ‘Six dollars.’
Me: (completely reversing to my previous cheerful demeanor) ‘Well I’m glad we figured that out! Is there anything else I can help you with?’
The customer looked like she was about to explode at that point. But instead of saying anything she turned on her heel and left, only to return a moment later with my manager.
Manager: (Speaking almost in a monotone) ‘Lawrence, this customer says you yelled at her. Did you yell at her?’
Me: (Looking innocently bewildered) ‘What? Me? Would I do something like that?’
Manager: (Milling it over for a second then turned to the customer) ‘Ma’am I’m going to have to ask you to leave.’
Customer: (Shouting) ‘What?!? What the absolute HECK? I tell you ONE thing, I’m never shopping here again!’
Manager: (Still monotone) ‘That’s probably for the best. Have a nice day.’
The woman stormed out. My manager shook his head before taking a quick glance at me and then returning to his office.
In the manager’s defense, it was perfectly reasonable to assume the customer was unfairly targeting me. Also, I never yelled, though she had. Even if they looked at the video it would only look like I was helping a confused customer.
I was rude though, I’ll own that.”
Show Me Some ID
“I was working at GameStop, right after Grand Theft Auto IV came out. Now I’m a very firm believer in the idea of parents being involved in their children’s lives, so if someone came in and looked like they were under eighteen and asked to buy an M-rated game, I asked to see their ID. Call me stubborn if you want to, but I’ve been yelled at by too many parents for the garbage they let their children buy. Something like GTA IV falls very squarely in the category of, ‘Parents should know what their children are getting,’ for me.
I had a kid come in. I would guess he was about fourteen or fifteen maybe. He asked if we had GTA IV in stock, and we did. He asked to buy it, but I asked him to show his ID. He then plainly told me I didn’t need to see his ID. I then told him that I refused the sell him GTA IV.
Then the kid said he left his ID in his car.
‘Well, bring it in and show me you are over seventeen and I will sell you GTA IV.’
‘Well, I don’t wanna go get it,’ he whined.
‘Well, then I’m not going to sell you GTA IV.’
‘I’m in a hurry. I’m riding with my mom and she’s gonna be leaving in a minute,” he said.
‘Well, have her come in real quick and she can buy the game. It would only take a minute, at most. I can even start the transaction and suspend it to shave more time off the process,’ I offered.
That’s when I realized how much of a brat that kid really was.
The kid spent the next five minutes whining after each rendition. Without warning, he threw himself on the ground, kicking and screaming that he wanted to buy GTA IV.
The only thought going through my mind at the time was, ‘Yeah, this is really helping support your case for being old enough to buy the game.’
Finally, he left the store empty-handed.
About twelve to fifteen minutes later, a woman stormed into the store and demanded to speak with the manager. I braced myself by taking a deep breath. Lo and behold, I was the only manager on duty. What fun.
‘What’s this I hear about my son being denied a game because he’s too old for it?’
I was rather surprised by that as I would never tell someone that they’re too old for video games and I knew no one else in the store would have said that. So I had to do some reverse digging to discover this was the mother of the boy who had wanted to buy GTA IV earlier.
Once we established I refused to sell the game to her son unless I saw his ID that showed he was seventeen or older, she wanted to know why he needed an ID to buy a ‘stupid kids’ game’.
I asked her if she knew what game her son had wanted to buy. She said it was some sort of racing game with cars.
‘Yes ma’am, it also involves adult situations and substances,’ I replied.
‘What?’ The woman gasped. She was visibly flat-footed by the statement. I proceeded to explain the premise of the Grand Theft Auto series and explained many of its mini-games and some of the controversy that had been raised about the series.
I then went on to explain that while many games do get rated M for mature needlessly, GTA is a series that I felt very securely rated an M rating for its content, depiction, and encouragement of violence and other such acts.
‘And you sell this game to children?!’ The woman demanded.
‘Only with their parent’s knowledge and consent. Hence why I asked to see your son’s ID or to have you come in to buy it,” I responded.
She left with a very angry look on her face. I suspected she and her son were about to have a… heart-to-heart conversation.”
You Can’t Say Anything You Want
“When I was working as a checkout clerk, I accidentally scanned the next woman’s deli meat because she hadn’t put a divider on the belt. The customer I was helping at that moment kindly informed me it wasn’t hers and I promptly voided it.
The next woman seemed agitated and complained. I joked, ‘I forgot my mind-reading glasses at home. Next time I guess you’ll have to use the divider.’ Other customers chuckled but the lady turned red and raised her voice, ‘WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY?’
I instantly regretted everything.
I said, ‘Don’t worry about it, it was just a silly joke.’ I started scanning her stuff before she called the customer service desk from her cell phone and started telling a very dramatic version of my scanning and joke.
The manager walked over after realizing the psycho was still in the store. The woman was complaining about me and looking over occasionally before saying, ‘Oh, double bag that one.’
I had zoned her out and looked up to see her and the manager looking at me expectantly.
‘Well?’ The manager had an eyebrow raised at me.
‘What’ I asked.
The manager then said the woman wanted an apology. I couldn’t help myself. In a super nonchalant, I said, ‘Sorry,’ and then asked her if she was ready to pay.
This ticked off the woman even more. She expected me to cry from embarrassment or fear. The woman finally paid and started yelling again as she was walking backward out of the store.
‘I hope whatever made you this way gets better!’
Yep! You’re leaving. That’s all I could ever ask for.
The manager pulled me aside and said, ‘What do you have to say for yourself?’
I said in the same calm tone, ‘I don’t need this in my life.’
My manager, completely dumbfounded, glared at me before she opened her mouth again.
‘Excuse me?’
I then explained to her that the customer was rude and unstable. She was drawing attention from other customers and detracting from their experience. She clearly was looking for an argument and nothing I could say would change that. The most I could do was ring her up and tell her to have a nice day.
The manager shrugged and told me to remember that sometimes we can’t say what we want to and then walked off.
For as long as I worked there, I never picked up a shift for her after that day. I didn’t care how much she complained.”
Total Makeover
“I worked at a cosmetics store where we provided complimentary makeovers to anyone who asked for one.
One day, a woman came in and sat down in an empty chair and gestured to her face, ‘I want to have a makeover.’
So, I went through the routine of questions. ‘What is your skin type? What consistency do you prefer? How much coverage?’
The woman promptly cut me off, and simply said, ‘Too many questions. I’ll give you five minutes to make me look good.’
I was getting slightly annoyed, but I figured she was maybe just trying to get some makeup done before meeting someone. So, I went with the safe bet: a popular foundation that was highly recommended for sensitive skin. I didn’t want to accidentally break her out. I started to apply the foundation lightly before she stopped me and began to raise her voice.
‘What are you doing?! I just want to cover this one spot.’ By the way, she didn’t mention this at all and if she had I would have applied concealer, which was what she was looking for. I was so stunned I couldn’t speak. Her attitude was ridiculous!
‘Take it off and do it over,’ she demanded.
That’s when I lost it.
I sat down all of my brushes and said, ‘You can say that nicely.’
She stared at me in disbelief, but after about ten seconds, began to stammer, ‘No… no… I just meant…’
My manager immediately ran over and asked if I wanted my break, and took over. I seldom lose my temper, and I guess she knew that so I never got ‘in trouble’ for it. I certainly was not paid enough or will ever be paid enough to be made to feel less of a person.”
Change Please
“I was working as a service clerk at Walgreens a few years back. It was really late one night and an hour was left before closing. I had just rung up a woman’s merchandise and then saw that I didn’t have enough cash to give her as the change that was displayed on my register.
So, I took out enough quarters to make up for the amount that I had to give to her. She immediately started fussing at me and stated that she did NOT want a bunch of quarters and ordered me to give her cash.
I told her I didn’t have the correct amount in my register. However, the woman rudely demanded I fetch my manager so he could bring out some.
There were several people lined up behind her. I thought it was rude to make them have to wait. Since it wasn’t long before we would be closing, the register I was working on was the only one open. Otherwise, I normally could have had another employee take over a different one and check out the other customers.
I paged the only assistant manager on duty and let him know I needed more cash brought up to the register. It was taking him entirely too long to come out. He was working in the office handling paperwork. I saw a wave of annoyance wash over the other customers. The worst part of it all was there wasn’t a single thing I could do. They were being held up all because of this entitled Karen who didn’t want less than five dollars in quarters.
My manager finally came walking up and gave the rude woman what she demanded. I was so glad when she walked out of the store and felt like apologizing to those other customers for being made to wait just because she thought that she was ‘so special’.
It was people like her who made me hate having to work in retail.”
The Price Is Not Right!
“I worked in a DIY store with a garden center attached.
I was serving what appeared to be a very nice man, dressed in a nice day suit, who probably had a fancy job to match. He was buying some weed control.
However, the thing he bought had two prices. There is one at five pounds and one at twelve pounds. They were both the same product so I don’t know why they gave two different prices. He was trying to buy the cheaper item but the one he picked up happened to be twelve pounds.
He brought this up with me when I told him the price on his demand. So, I asked my supervisor if she could check the price, considering the store wasn’t busy. So away she went to check the price. After a short while, she came back and confirmed the item in his possession was twelve pounds.
Boy, was this man ill-tempered.
‘This item says it is five pounds on the shelf! There is nothing stating that it is twelve pounds anywhere! I want you to swap it over!’
‘Sir, I can’t swap it over as I can’t leave the checkouts, but my supervisor can bring another down for you if you’d like?’
This offer was not good enough for Mr. Fancy suit. He wanted me with the large queue, the only person on a checkout lane at that moment, to leave my station, walk around a store that I barely knew how to navigate because I was new, just so I could get him the item at the price he assumed all of them were.
Nah, man. I’ll pass on that. I thought to myself.
It was so bad that he got half of the queue to side with him. It was like one of those moments where you’re supposedly giving ‘bad customer service’ when really you’re just doing your job and going by what you’ve been told and someone’s shoving a camera in your face and telling you how much of a horrible person you are and how you shouldn’t work in retail because of it.
All over the price of an item.
Things turned out fine in the end. My supervisor showed up at the right moment, and someone else from checkouts who was also relatively new saw what was happening. They ended up taking over and explained that it wasn’t my fault.”
Check The Cameras!
“One time, a woman accused me of accusing her of stealing knives out of the department store I worked at.
Basically, she, her partner, and her dad, all came to my checkout line. They had a saw, a piece of timber, and some lining paper. They also had a knife with them, which I knew we sold, with the packaging still on. So I did my job by asking, ‘Are you buying this knife as well?’
The lady snapped back saying, ‘Yes we did. Go check the CCTV if you don’t believe us. The person at the front desk at the entrance even saw us.’ There was no one at the front desk at that time and there hadn’t been for a while because the lady who usually sits at the desk was on her break.
So I left the knife because I didn’t want to cause any trouble and that’s what I would have been told to do in the first place, the managers would check the CCTV later like they always would.
Fifteen minutes later, I was talking to someone from another department when all of a sudden I heard screaming and yelling. So me being as curious as I am, I peeked from behind the front desk. There she was, with her knife, screaming at the person who was at the front desk turning off the computers, accusing me of accusing her of stealing her knife.
Not even the managers could get her to stop yelling and explain normally what happened. No one could. She kept going and going before she was accompanied to the exit door. She passed my checkout line, stopped walking, and frantically pointed at me saying, ‘YOU! I want your name and the store number! Expect to lose your job tomorrow!’
In response, I shrugged my shoulders and said, ‘I’m just doing my job.’ Because I was. I did what I was trained to do.
I didn’t get into trouble or lose my job.”
Wrong Store, Sir!
“Eons ago, I was in retail management for a now-defunct hardware store. A customer came up to our checkout stand and wanted to return a ceiling fan. He hollered and screamed at the cashier telling her how bad our company and the fan was.
I was called and he did the same thing to me. At the beginning of his rant, I noticed that the box had a price sticker from our competitor on it so I let him carry on, resisting the urge to smile.
The irate man went on and on. The cashier knew my temper and began looking at me like I had lost my mind. There were no other folks in the store as we would soon be closing so I let the customer go on until he ran out of steam.
I then said ‘Sir, the sticker on the box is from _______ which means you didn’t buy it here.’
The gentleman said, ‘What,’ looked around, and then walked out of the store with the ceiling fan. We all waited until he got in his car and then we started laughing uncontrollably. The cashier told this story for many days afterward.”
This Is Not The Right Thing!
“I worked at a grocery store when I was younger. One day when I was working dairy, I had a lady come up to me looking for Nutriwhip (a non-dairy whipping cream kind of product).
She didn’t say she wanted Nutriwhip (she couldn’t remember the brand name) but she described it well enough that I told her the name, showed her where it was, and handed her one.
She insisted, however, that I brought her wasn’t it.
I put it back and asked if she was looking for Cool Whip (which is in frozen food) only to have her tell me she wasn’t. She wanted the ‘not-really-milk thing’ that was like whipping cream and that we kept in the dairy section.
I told her that the product I brought to her was the only’ not-really-milk’ whipping cream product from the dairy section that we have ever sold in all the years I had worked at the store. The woman, however, insisted I was wrong.
After trying to explain for a couple of minutes, I apologized and said I couldn’t help her find anything she was describing other than Nurtiwhip. I went back to restocking the products in the fridges.
She hung around for a few minutes, huffing and acting distressed while looking at the products in the milk section before she snapped at me and said, ‘HERE IT IS!’
I looked up and watched her grab a Nutriwhip, show it to me as if I was an imbecile, and storm off.”
It’s My Money And I Need It Now!
“I was at work, doing my shift at the entrance as a greeter. At the time, we had to stand outside to greet people. There were two vending machines outside the doors and both were broken.
A lady came up to the vending machines to buy something and I warned her, in plain English, ‘These are broken, they will take your money and not give you anything back.’
She gave me an annoyed look and proceeded to put her money in any way.
I continued greeting people because there was nothing else I could do. After a few minutes of angrily smashing the buttons on the vending machine, the same lady turned to me and started yelling at me for taking her money. I tried to explain to her that the money from the Coca-Cola vending machines did not go to Walmart. The vendors would come and take the money for their company.
After all of this, she just wouldn’t listen. So, I called a manager and let them know what was going on. They took the woman to customer service to give her the dollar back. I could tell the manager was annoyed but was trying to ignore it and be as nice to the irate lady as possible.
It was stressful at the time, but now I look back at it and laugh.”
