Retail Hell Underground

Every Store Should Have One

Sent in with love from, Carolanne.

The Least Stressful Job

From Jaimee:

I work part-time in a clothing store in the middle of a mall, but I am also a student at 2 local universities (long story) full time, working towards my Bachelor's degree in social work. 

As part of my Sociology of Crime class, I had the opportunity to tour our lovely city's correctional center. It was pretty decent. My class got a chance to visit just about every unit, from admittance to high security. 

This little anecdote happened while we were in the high security unit. 

It really looked like a jail over there--steel bars, boarded over windows, lots of concrete, and burly-looking guys in orange jumpsuits. 

Our group was in the office, speaking with the correctional officers, asking questions and such. The one officer spoke about how he had to "make sure they didn't wreck the place....fun times!" 

Someone in our group asked if he was stressed at work (after all, it's a high-security unit.  And those guys looked scary). 

The officer replied, "Actually, this is the least stressful job I've ever had.  I used to work in retail."

So there you have it!  Working in prison is more relaxing than retail!

 

Keep standing up for us retail slaves,

Mannequin Serial Killer Spotted in Seattle

You just know her torso and head are in the suitcase.

-- From Beach

Dumbass Theater Custys

From Kat:

I am concerned for the future of humanity.

Our theater has a long ramp that leads from the doors along the front of the lobby and right up to the box office. It keeps long lines inside and makes getting into the theater a lot easier on the seniors (and we have a lot of those.)

There are also stairs that go straight up into the lobby, and spit you out facing concession's blind spot rather than the box office.

We recognize this is a design flaw, and so use red rope 'fences' to make a line, so that the stairs lead to the exit doors and the entrance feeds strait to the ramp. You can not get in the exit doors.

I can't tell you how many times we here *bang thunk* as some numb-nuts yanks the exit door with all their might instead of reading the flipping words on the door and trying the entrance doors instead.

Today, I watched a couple walk in the entrance doors, STEP OVER THE ROPES without apparently even thinking it was somehow wrong, reach the top of the stairs, and then look around in confusion wondering where the box office was.

And then they nearly cut in line because they wanted to stand at the funny angle from which they approached the box instead of head-on like all the people who walked up the right bloody way!

Ropes? They are there for a reason! You don't walk around the ropes in a museum so you can play with the exhibits! You don't step over the ropes in the bank blocking the wide-open vault, or to get into a club! Why would you walk over our ropes???

And I'm pretty sure they still don't know how to read.

~Kat

(as in why do they add an invisible E to my name and call me kate all the time? wtf?! LEARN TO READ!)

Custys Freaking Out Over Asking For ID

From The Loser:

With my first day back from a forced five day holiday, I came in expecting a nice day doing mark downs or at the jewelry counter.

Well boys and girls, that was a dream unworthy of me. Seems they saw fit to put me into Customer Service for returns, despite being only verbally trained. Thanks for being such Winners.

Now, I've done returns for the Jewelry counter before, but that is a completely different ball park.

Anyhow, this story does not concern management. It concerns a return on a credit card. I am very thorough. I check every signature. I check the card before I even swipe it for a signature. If there is none, I ask for PHOTO ID, and look at the photo and compare. I don`t swipe it if the person doesn`t look a reasonable amount like their photo. If signatures don`t match, I do the same thing.

I have had people compliment me on such a good job I do. When people complain, I lie and say that I've had my identity stolen because people don`t bother to check and that my credit rating is in the shitter. While I sometimes feel bad for the fib, it makes them shut up and think that I`m an angel.

Well, today a man returns something on a credit card. While I don`t really need to check the signature, I do anyhow, just to make sure I stay in the habit, you know? Anyhow, he scribbles, which looks nothing like the signature on his card.

I ask for some ID in the sweetest voice I have.

He starts to yell at me, about how it's discrimination.

This is the first time I've looked at the customer. I then notice that he is black. Now this may sound racist, but he was the darkest man I've ever seen, he was nearly literally black.

I myself am about as white as you can get, practically translucent (insert horrible Twilight vampire jokes here - HarHar).

I don't even start for a moment, turn the receipt and the card so he can see, and look him right in the eye and say, "Do those look the same?"

He looks for a second, "No, but who ever signs the same way twice? You're discriminating because I'm a ******" (I don't feel comfortable even repeating it here in text!).

I took a piece of paper and signed twice, quickly.

It wasn't exact, but it was clearly the same. I pulled out my ID, it was the same. I held out my hand for the ID, looked at the picture, then at him for a moment, giving him a good looking over, and said "Here you go, handsome."

And smiled, thanking him for his time and for being cooperative.

I'm not sure why people think that we're racist the moment we ask for ID. It pisses me off, because when I'm asked for ID, I just pull it out. It makes things smoother, but I will ask why. Often it's because things don't look right, or it's company policy.

Thanks for reading.

The Loser.

Custy's ID Name Missing Some Letters

From Arcade Anarchist:

This is a story My brother told me who is also a Retail Slave.

My brother works as a cashier at one of the big name hardware stores. They also have various appliances which is what I assume was being bought.

Some stores have policies that if possible, you are required to refer to a customer by name. If they give you a credit card take a quick glance and find their name blah blah blah.

Well on this particular day he had a visit from a very ghetto-fab woman. Lots of gold and unable to control the volume of her voice, or just incapable of speaking at a non obnoxious level.

She gabbed on her cell phone so that everyone in the store could hear her side of the conversation (I like to call these people mad-lib custys cause I like to fill in the blanks). Annoying behavior aside, most of her transaction went off without a hitch, and when it came time to pay she was off her phone.

His store doesn't have the pin-pads for customers to do all their credit stuff, so she had to hand him her card. 

He looked at the card and immediately noticed there was no full name on it.

Only a few letters and a dash.

I'd imagine anyone having trouble deciphering this name:

"Le-a"

No last name on the card and no signature. So he asked for an ID. She hands it to him and it matches. The name "Le-a" is on the ID.

So out of curiosity and to keep to his stores policy, he asked her how to pronounce her name while he was running the card.

She said: "Ledasha. The 'dash' Aint no silent."

A grand laugh to be had.

Arcade Anarchist

Shopping Cart Has Big Mac Craving

Horrifying Encounter at Dog Grooming Store

FUCK NEGLIGENT PARENTS AND PET OWNERS.

This is Ana. Again.  

I am writing this from home. It is the first thing I did when I got home, oh, twenty minutes ago.

I work at ten thirty today, I went in early because the other office lady had something wrong and I needed to get some more training.

11:09 or so, this woman came in with her child, a dirty little thing with the wide glossy eyes of a war victim.

She sets down this filthy, sickly looking little dog on my counter.

I was horrified.

I thought she had found it outside or something.

She just looks at it with disdain.

It was wrapped in a rag that looked like they cleaned the floor of their garage with it.

“Here!”

She looks like the dog is some sort of dangerous criminal. The rag moves a little, but for the most part the puppy is just laying there with dead eyes.

“Oh my god, is it dead?”

She just turns around and leaves.

I run into the back of the store with the dog, trying to find Jim or Alexis.

“I think this dog is going to die!”

Jim and Alexis (our vet student) runs into the room. Jim takes one look at the dog in my hands and says, “This is the fourth one this month.” Alexis is in horror and takes the dog into the back to clean it up and look at it.

We have to remove all the other dogs out of the room because the dog looks sick and that is policy.

I go in the front after washing my hands with hot water and changing into a spare shirt so mine could be washed in the washing machine (Idk why he has one.)

I hear this little noise and there is the woman’s child. Eating dog treats that look like cupcakes from the stand.

DOG TREATS!

She ate almost all of them.

I ask the little girl if she is okay.

She blinks up at me. She is filthy, really skinny, and kind of smells. She backs into a corner and just, sits, there.

I have to pry the dog food from her hand.. Worried, and appalled, I watch her sit there and not make a noise.

She looked all of five. I end up picking her up and taking her into the back.

Jim arranges for a cleaning lady to scour the back and front office so nothing contagious is passed on from the puppy.

Alexis had the dog in a kennel and says she is taking it to her father, a local vet.

After the woman is no show for (at this point thirty minutes) Jim calls the local police, who pick up the child at around twelve.

They are gone for ten minutes before the woman comes barging in accusing us of kidnapping her child.

Jim is furious at this point and tells her to fuck herself.

“You’re daughter is down at the **** station. They are going to question her and then you’re ass if going away for a long time. That child is almost as bad as that dog.”

She demands the dog back.

Says she is going to drown it.

Jim demands to know where she is getting these puppies.

It is not until Marty, our resident cuddly “body builder” comes out that she hightails it out of there, saying WE WILL HEAR from her lawyer.

Marty then goes back to grooming the dogs.

Then the cleaning lady came and I went home.

-Ana

P.S. Alexis took Ratdog to the vet.  She is still there right now but will call when something is found out. They are running all the tests on her. Jim says, if the dog lives, she is going to be the store dog and live with him. He said he won’t trust the poor thing to anyone else. If the dog dies then he is going to track down that woman and have her arrested. If she isn’t already. Jim thinks that “woman” owns a puppy mill. I hope not.

Bloodsucking Picky Bitch Attacks Store Bakery

From Cake Bitch:

Let me set the scene a bit first... I work in a bakery that is inside of a grocery store. There are two of us cake decorators, but I usually work the bulk of the hours. We take pride in making our cakes as nice as we can, and not just some shitty decorations slapped on a frozen-ass-pre-baked-pre-iced cake... so anyways....

This guy comes in and walks up to the counter, he wants to order a cake. Great. Fantastic. Sure I'd love to help you with that!! /huge grin...

This guy was probably from some country over in the middle east, because his poor excuse for English was more or less going straight over my head leaving me tilting my head to the side like a confused puppy... think Apu from Simpsons... only thicker accent.

Ok so he begins to attempt to order this cake...

Quarter sheet? (8" x 12") fine. It's after this we start running into problems... 

He proceeds to whip out a picture of some double layer 14" round cake w/ cream cheese icing, metallic purple grapes and a wine glass and bottle, and blah blah blah whatever.

For one, the ONLY double layer cakes we make are 8" double layer rounds... that's it.

We don't even do wedding cakes at my store for lack of a delivery van... sorry guy, you're out of luck there. Still want the quarter sheet then? Ok good.

So I originally thought he wanted a photocake, you know one of those cakes you get with a picture on it... since he brought in the picture and all.

Turns out he wanted the cake to look EXACTLY like the one in the picture... um... right well, a quarter sheet is a rectangle and that's a round so... it won't really look like that. What? You want buttercream icing? Oh well, that's fine but that's cream cheese icing in the picture so... it's going to be white and not off-white yellowish... (so far you can probably guess where this is going to go...)

He then proceeds to tell me that he wants the wine glass and the bottle on there too, Ummmmm ooookay well, this is only a quarter sheet, there's not really a ton of space to put that kind of thing on there.

Not ONLY that but this fucker wants the glass AND the bottle out of CAKE... on TOP of the other cake...

I don't fucking think so. We don't do sculpture cakes at my store, we may take pride in our cakes but we have a limit.

He started to get pissy w/ me after this... because I was having a hard time understanding what it was he wanted.. ENGLISH MOTHER FUCKER DO YOU SPEAK IT!?

So after I had the order form filled out to the BEST of my abilities... I repeat it back to him to make sure it's right.

Me: Okay so we have a quarter sheet marble cake, with buttercream icing, you want a wine glass and a bottle out of purple icing (omg gross... nasty ass shit.... purple icing takes like what i would guess battery acid would taste like b/c of all the food coloring... and he's going to have HUGE mounds of it on his cake... oh well not my problem...) airbrushed lightly with silver... some grapes and vines also airbrushed lightly with silver, and Writing Happy Birthday on the cake in script in purple, and your <impossible to pronounce Indian name here> on the bottle and the year you were born .... your total will be <Price>. Is that correct? (this asshole better be glad I'm not charging him extra for the time it's going to take me to make this thing...)

Him: Wait... no double?

Me: Excuse me?

Him: I want double...

Me: I'm sorry but we don't make double layer quarter sheets, only 8" rounds. You said you wanted a quarter sheet , if you would like to change it that's fine but I can't fit all those decorations on a tiny 8" round.

Him: Oh... well... ok then.

Thank fucking god.

Okay so, I start working on this guy's cake... not EVEN 5 minutes later I get a phone call.. I immediately recognize the voice on the other end... FUCK. now what?!?!? ///Sigh.. he wanted to make sure I had the order correct... whatever dude, let me do my damn job kthx.

I spent an HOUR and a FUCKING HALF doing this asshole's cake... that's like 5-6 times longer than it usually takes me for an intricate order... I made SURE it was as perfect as I could POSSIBLY get it. So that asshole wouldn't complain.

A few hours later.. he comes into the store again.

Me: Oh did you want to pick up your cake early? (it was for tomorrow pick up...)

Him: No, I want to see it to see how it's coming...

Me: Oh, okay well, (resisting huge urge to just stab this guy in the face w/ my huge ass cake knife...)

This is where I learned from my co-worker that he's been a problem before and has been known to come in and "look at his cake" and then leave it if he doesn't like what he sees.

Me: Are you going to -take- your cake?

Him: Well... I wasn't going to right now but....

Me: Well... SIR... if you want to see your cake you need to take it. This is not food network. I am not Duffy. This is not a "specialty" cake shop. If you would like your cake now that's perfectly fine, however, I don't have time to be running back and forth to get your approval.

Him: Ok.... well, I take now.

I run to the cooler and grab his cake. I show it to him and he has the FUCKING nerve to complain about it right off the bat.... the urge to stab is getting higher...

Him: The side, it is too white. Can you put more silver on?

Me: Sure.... /Grit my teeth while I get airbrush and put a light coating of silver on the side.... hows that?

Him: Still too white a bit more...

//applies a bit more... eyes going red....

Him: //scrutinizing look... but now... now it's too dirty looking. Can you take some off?

This is where I just blew my top.. I was so pissed, but while STILL being somewhat polite as I POSSIBLY could manage and not look like a COMPLETE bitch... as I would get written up...

Me: Look. you TOLD me to put more silver on there because YOU thought it was too white. I can't just "take it off" it's airbrush!! That would require stripping the ENTIRE cake and starting all over. If you don't want your cake, pick something out of the case and I'll write on it for you, but I am not adding anything to it, and I am NOT remaking your cake simply because I did exactly what YOU told me to do.

Needless to say he took the cake and paid full price. I haven't seen him back since. A

nd I hope, for his own safety, that he doesn't show his face again or I will downright refuse to make another cake for that picky-ass douchebag...¬.¬

Not to mention that knife I spoke about eariler....

~ Cake Bitch

Impatient Custy Gets Told

Retail Balls Award for Charissa:

We've been understaffed lately due to the store cutting hours post holidays.

Lines can get long, and I'll often check people with one or two items out at service desk.

Most people thank me, and go merrily along their way, but not this dude.

He marched over to the service desk and was wildly waving about with his arms, waving some merch in my face saying "The lines, zey be too looong. You check me out here!"

The pleasant guest I'd been chatting before with excused himself, and I checked the guy out.

I said to him, as polite as possible "I don't mind helping you, I don't like long lines either. But next time, take care that you don't wave things in my face. Have a NICE DAY (I snarled a bit here)".

He said: "Oh, you needs better sense of humor."

To which I shot back: "Sorry, that's not allowed, I am in retail after all."

This, combined with poo footprints in the ladies room the other night makes me wonder why I'm not an alcoholic.

Piggy Shopper Leftovers

In all fairness, this Target was getting ready to remodel the grocery section so the shelves were not being re-stocked, but the broken eggs and random soy milk (which does not belong in that case) were definitely Piggy Shopper moves.

Custys Who Can't Read

From Pharmacy Psycho, commenting on Ditzy Customer Encounter :

I swear people are blind AND stupid!

I never seem to get the "do you work here?", but at least 3 times a night (I only work 5 hours) I get "Can I pet your dog?" even though she wears LARGE patches on her vest that say "DO NOT PET - SERVICE DOG".

What's worse is when they reach down to pet her when its OBVIOUS they can see her vest and patches!

I SO want to invent an invisible hat and coat that shocks people when they pet her while she is working.

I could sell it to every service dog owner I know.

A short time later the Law of Retail Hell Gravity reared its ugly head and Pharmacy Psycho left this message:

Well, it finally happened.

Someone asked me if I worked there.

Just so you know, I had my hands full of balloons that I had to inflate that had the store logo on them!

Yes, I was wearing the store uniform and yes, I wear a nametag with the name of the store on it.

*facepalm*

Super Creepy Window Display

From Erynne: We found this seriously disturbing window display in Castlebar, County Mayo, Ireland. This is a children's clothing shop - I'm guessing the sale was 100% off! How appropriate that this looks like crime-scene tape, too - six naked child mannequins, for f*ck's sake! While my husband was taking these shots someone driving past opened their door to shout 'stop that you, pervy feicers!' at us!

 

Bad Mother Gets Told

Kit gets a Retail Balls Award for not only comforting an abandon child (who was not part of the Hell Spawn Tribe), but for letting the shitty parent have it:

It's early autumn, about a year ago, and cold out, and about two hours from the end of my shift.  I'm cleaning up books off the floor as usual, wondering if you can buy new feet off the Black Market, when a concerned father walks up to me.

"Excuse me, ma'am," he said, "There's a little boy over by the train table and he's been by himself for over ten minutes."

Knowing people, I was pretty sure that he was exaggerating with the time, but also knowing people part of me told me that he was telling the truth. I have seen mothers leave their five year olds in my department to go check out a sale at Nordstrom or Macys, and I've seen fathers abandon their kids to get their caffeine at the cafe in the store.  But being the "good dutiful employee" I assured the father that I would go investigate.

What I found horrified me. 

The child in question was probably no more than two years old, a tiny little Indian boy with a bowl cut and big brown eyes. He was standing off by himself, looking a bit worried, tiny fists bunching up the tri-color striped sweater he was wearing. 

I hunkered down to get to eye-level with this little boy and very softly and kindly asked him who he was with. 

He responded with a very meek, "My mother." 

I asked where she was. He said he didn't know, he said that she had said that she would be back in a couple of minutes. 

I promptly went around the entire department trying to match up a mother to the boy, and when that didn't work, I resorted to shouting: "Is anyone with a little boy with black hair and a multi-colored sweater?" 

No answers and my stomach twisted even more. How could a parent leave a little boy who was seriously small enough to stuff into a backpack?

I returned to the little boy and asked him his name, thinking that I could page his mother in our store at least. 

His name was K***. 

I told him thank you and explained to him what I was going to do. 

He nodded his head, that little chin starting to tremble. 

I paged for the mother of K*** to come to the Childrens Department immediately. I added in the immediately just to add some shame to it all. 

There was no response. So I paged her two more times. By then, another fifteen minutes had passed and so I notified the Manager on Duty. 

By all rights, we could've called child services on this neglectful woman, though we had to find her first.

I talked to the little boy again, trying to get more out of him. He then shared with me that he knew his home phone number. 

That was good news. The plan would be to call home, tell who ever picked up to call the boy's mother and tell her to come get her kid, who was starting to tear up. 

Crying children wasn't quite my forte. But with the luck I was having that day, the plan failed.  No one picked up. The kid was still stuck to me.

The Manager on Duty said if we didn't locate the mother in the next five minutes they would call mall security. Already I was getting a lot of sympathy from the parents present. They offered suggestions and made comments on how could a mother abandon her toddler like that. I agreed with them, the anger boiling up dangerously.

And just as I was going to call the manager, guess who showed up. 

When I confronted her, dropping the fact that we were going to call the police, she told me that she went out for a smoke and didn't want to expose her child. 

I lost it about then. As she sat down with her child, I let her have it.

It went something like this:

"Ma'am, you do not leave your child unattended ever in this store. We were going to call the police about this as well as child services. If you need to leave the department, you take your child; if you need to leave the store, you take your child; and especially if you need to leave the building, you take your child.  If you need your nicotine fix, you take your child. You don't want your child exposed, then quit."

All this while, I shook my finger at her as if scolding a puppy who piddled, and this happened in front of no less than six customers, all who had young children themselves. 

I shamed the mother big time and I saw it in her face. 

She stayed another ten minutes then left. The other parents commended me with smiles, and bought more stuff I recommended to them.

The End.

Hell Spawn Caught in The Act

Identity protected by Bat Boy, this Hell Spawn guards his mess while his Piggy Shopper parents make messes of their own.

 

Retail Hell Survival Tip: Comeback Line

 

From Brad:

Sadly I never had the chance to use this one while I still worked in Retail.

When the custy pulls the "I am better than you because I spend so much money here!" or some derivative, reply with:

"Yes sure. You spend money to have the privilege to be here, while I get paid to be here..."

I would love to see the reactions that little gem gets...

 

Law Abiding Shopping Cart

From Mick: "Cart waits patiently to safely cross the street, as officer friendly had instructed it to do."

But to reach that button for the signal may require popping a wheely.

More Retail Discrimination

While we are on the subject, here's another rant of gay discrimination in Retail Hell. This one comes from Mario Speedwagon in Australia:

Hi all,

I found this site a couple months back and have been reading through the whole site, with a lot of laughs, a whole lot more groans and quite a few "I've been there" moments.

But I have had something happen that hasn't been mentioned once on the site. It's not a custy story, it's a manager (actually owner) story.

Now, I like my manager and the team I work with, we are all good friends and we hang out together in our spare time.

But what happened to me made me see red, and too nearly two years to put behind me.

I had confided in my closest friend at work (who happened to be the manager's daughter) that I was gay.

She had realized it years earlier but I finally built up the guts to say it out loud to her. That kind of thing, you would expect you wouldn't even have to ask to keep it confidential.

But - 2 weeks later I get back from vacation and within 5 minutes I can feel that everyone is treating me differently, making little snide remarks, that sort of thing.

I asked my (un)trustworthy friend what was going on, and she let me know that she had told her father, and he had promptly announced it to everyone at a staff meeting while I was away!

I was so humiliated!

When I complained, I was told that I should see it as doing me a favor coz it saved me from having to tell everyone myself!

This led to a year of resentment from me towards work, which led to 3 written warnings and 2 demotions.

At least I have it over their heads that if I ever get fired I can make a harrassment or discrimination claim, as this kind of thing is frowned on here in Australia.

I don't know if this is worse or not than the work situation that led to an emotional breakdown, but that's a story for another day.

Cheers,

Mario Speedwagon.

 

Customer Reject

...or one expensive-ass can of Raid. Maybe it's for nuclear roaches.

 

Ditzy Custy Encounter

From Riferous:

There is one question that everybody hates above all others, you know the one:

Do you work here? 

Here's a new variation.

Let's say that my name is Steve. 

A customer that I don't remember ever seeing before stops me in the aisle and says, "Steve, do you work here?" 

Now, I am a manager, and therefore wear a shirt and tie, so I am not bedecked head to toe in the company uniform, so I probably get this question a lot more than other people do. 

However, for her to have called me Steve, that means one of two things. 

Either we know each other and I have forgotten her face, or, the more likely possibility, SHE JUST READ MY FUCKING NAMETAG. 

But it gets better!

After I said yes, she asked me if I knew where the Creamette (pasta) is. 

I told her aisle 8. 

She then says, "How did you know that?"

Honestly?

Was she really just asking a yes or no question, and would have been satisfied with one or the other? 

If she didn't think I knew where it was, why did she ask?

So what did I tell her?

"Because I work here."

-Riferous