Customer Return Excuses and RHU Comebacks

We've all heard a gazillion reasons why Custy's want to return something.

Here are some of the more common return excuses along with answers you might be able to use!

Mocking the situation can be loads of fun and take the edge off! Custys with a sense of humor love it.

Just remember to make a joke out your comeback line and then toss your Custy a shit-eating retail smile and say, "I'm just foolin ya!"

Here's some of Freddy's favorite Return Comeback Lines:

Returner: "It didn't wear well."

RHU Comeback: "I can see that. The car must have been going pretty fast.

Returner: "My husband, (wife, daughter, son, friend), didn't like it."

RHU Comeback: "Maybe they need a pair of glasses?"

Returner: "It made me sick."

RHU: Combeback "It has that effect on people."

Returner: "It ruined my life and I'm getting a divorce.

RHU Comeback: "I hope you get the house and the dog."

Returner: "My boyfriend's mother blew her back out and can't use it anymore."

RHU Comeback: "Maybe your boyfriend could carry it for her."

Returner: "I already have this one."

RHU Comeback: "So do we and we don't need another one."

Returner: "I bought too much."

RHU Comeback: "So I heard, it was on CNN last night."

Returner: "It was gift. I don’t like it."

 RHU Comeback: "I think you just hurt its feelings."

Returner: "I'm not in love with it anymore."

RHU Comeback: "Maybe you just need couple's counseling. I hate to see it end like this."

Returner: "Yes, the bottle of face cream is empty. But it broke out my face. Someone said keep using it."

RHU Comeback: "Seriously, am I being punked?"

Returner: Can I return this?

RHU Comeback: "Can you not and say you did?"

Returner: I'd like to return this?

RHU Comeback:  "And I'd like to go to Hawaii!"

Returner: Can I make a return?

 RHU Comeback: "Sure, I'll have mine on the rocks with a double shot and twist of lime."

Returner: "I'm so sorry, I need to return."

 RHU Comeback: "I'm so sorry, we don't accept returns at our store."

Comments

[Kit]

I remember during my training days a couple years ago I was on a 5hr cash register stint on a fucking Monday morning. This woman comes up to the cash register with, lo and behold, our competitor's bag in her hand. She comes up to my register and declares that she wants to return the book.

Custy says, "I want to return this book, it's damaged." She pulls out the book. It is damaged, but it's more of the "I've read it and mistreated it and am done with it" damaged. I take the book and look, *gasp* there's our competitor's prices sticker on it.

I delicately tell her that we can't accept the book because we didn't sell it to her. The woman get's huffy and says that my store and the other store are one and the same and so she should be allowed to return a book to us. I told her that we weren't the same at all. That we were owned by two different people. She gets angry. She demands to see the manager. Our store manager was the Manager on Duty that day and when he came over, he laid on the sarcasm thick, causing the woman to stuff her battered book back into the bag and huff out, with the regular declaration of, "I'm never going to shop here again." Stupid bitch.

[Logan]

The threat of "I'm never going to shop here again." Seriously? She's never going to buy a book at another store, read it and return it to your store for a refund? However will your store stay open without her non-business?

[Michael]

"I'm never shopping here again!"

"Honey, for that to be true you'd have to shop here a FIRST time."

[mudflapgirl]

Why do people who return every thing they buy think they are customers?They actually COST the store money.The store has to pay someone to ring up the sale,return the sale and fool around with the paperwork associated with the return(sending product back to the vender or whatever).I think chronic returners should pay the store a service fee at least.At least we could get something for our trouble.I once had a woman return a sunscreen because,she said,it made bees chase her.Another woman dropped an eyeshadow from her second floor balconey and complained that it broke and demanded a replacement.Not to be outdone,one annoying skank returned a bodysuit because the snaps made her crotch break out in a rash.Yeah,like I really needed to hear that.I hate bullshit returns and the people who do them!

[Kit]

Yups. Some thing worse happened. A few weeks ago, some stupid girl wanted to return a sandwich she said was the wrong order. We would've done it EXCEPT for three things that had happened previously:

1. She had already returned a sandwich before for another.

2. She once again returned another sandwich.

3. The third time, she had already eaten half the damn sandwich.

Seriously ... and the girl that had come to us the first two times wasn't even the actual customer. The third time she came with the actual eater, in which the friend told the eater, "They won't take it because you ate half of it, bitch."

[Logan]

Gifts should not be returned, except in the case of exchanging it for a different size. It's a gift. It didn't cost you anything. Appreciate the person who gave it to you cared enough to buy you something, and it's the thought that counts. If you truely can not use it, donate it somewhere.

[Malmart Peon]

If half of the people who threatened never to return actually did the world would be a much happier place.

[atombomb1945]

My favorite response to the "I will never shop here again" was "You never shopped here in the first place.

I'll submit a story after I come out of my Emergency Holiday Shelter.

[Macy's Blows]

God, I can't count how many times people bring in empty jars of cream and want money back. Or even worse, filled up with something that is obviously not $135 moisturizer. Seriously, do people think I can't tell the difference between the stuff I've been selling for 4 years and Garnier Fructise Conditioner?

[Amber]

I don't know why custy's threaten me with "I will never shop here again" because
1. I don't want anyone that rude in my store anyway
2. Every single time somebody has told me that, I see them again

I loved this post because I have heard all of these excuses and more. My favorite though was "It doesn't fit anymore" Well duh you bought this for your child a year ago. So I had to return the item full price because she had the receipt and just Mark the item out of stock. (My store had a really lenient return policy.)

[Claire]

I had a guy return a new cd because he didn't like the mixing and he "had a recording studio in his basement and so knew sound quality," puffing himself up like a strutting rooster when he said it. He swore at me and I went all school marm "That language is not acceptable or appreciated." He apologized, but, as my grandmother always said, a good reputation is an easy thing to lose and a near impossible thing to replace. Another customer pointed out that if he had a recording studio he could have fixed the damned sound and felt not like a useless twat. It's a new cd, we can't predict if it's mixed up to your high standards. Write EMI.

[Magical Shrimp]

Logan: Right on. I would feel really bad about returning a gift, even if it was due to the product being defective. Otherwise, what's the point? You feel entitled? It didn't cost you anything and the person who gave it to you does have feelings.

I think I've returned one item in my entire life - it was a defective laptop that I really needed and couldn't use at all because it was overheating.

[Logan]

Oh yes, I should have included defective. Defective items can be returned. Anything where they are exchanging it for the same item. Either for a size that fits, or the same product that works right. You can't even exchange for a different color. Most returns are because they wanted something else. The response to that should be "well, they bought you this instead. If you wanted something else, buy it yourself."

[___]

I think the week after Christmas should be referred to as Return Hell. If it doesn't get better soon, I might just hurt someone. :-/

[Pharmacy_psycho]

I'm so glad I don't work the register anymore. All your stories pretty well match my experiences working at the pet stores. My daughter is now working at a pet store and she told me that one day she got to work and someone had returned a bag of cat litter claiming when she opened it, it was already full of used litter! Yeah, right! I would have thrown them right out of the store, but the manager actually exchanged it! *rolls eyes*

I just had to exchange 2 retractable leads I bought last fall. I hated to do it since I couldn't find my receipt, but they were $35 each and I need them for training my service dog. Fortunately, I buy my food from the same place every time, and the manager had been having other leashes returned/exchanged for the same defect so I didn't have any trouble.

[Kat]

The "I'm Never Shopping here again!!!" threat is total bull.

One customer is not going to hurt a company. Some stores, especially fast food places, will see hundreds if not thousands of people a day. Raaargh.

[Joe]

Before the advent of Big Box stores, the "I'm never shopping here again" threat was genuinely feared. BUT the Mom-and-Pop stores had the option of saying either "What can we do to make you happy?"
OR "Go shit in your hat! You won't be missed!"