From u/sn0tface Tales From Retail:

I live in a place where plastic bags have been banned, and we have to charge 10 cents for paper bags. If a customer brings their own bag we give 5 cents back to them.

I don't normally work the registers, but I happened to be when Angry Customer (AC) walks up.

AC: Do you guys give bag refunds for people who bring in their own bags?

Me: yes we do!

AC slams receipt on the counter: well COWORKER over there didn't give me my bag refund.

I look a little bewildered because this is a 5 cent mistake, and this lady is trying to make a big scene. I didn't even look at the receipt, but just pulled some change out of my own pocket and handed her 5 cents.

AC: this is really about the principal!

And off she goes, now that that wrong has been righted.

--u/sn0tface

From u/PrincessKitsuna Tales From Retail:

So, I work for a grocery store that used to have a key for a rewards card. Let's call it....Hooveys.

Now then, today was gonna be a good day. Went in at 11 AM, and got off at 7 PM (a whole hour AFTER I was supposed to get off), be a good little cashier, got a hug from a small child ((and as an Early Childhood major that made me hella happy.))

Well, around halfway through my shift an older couple comes through my line, and I start with the usual schpeal.

"Hiya! Welcome to Hooveys! Do you have your Hooveys Rewards Card with you?"

The older guy hands it to me, and I start scanning their groceries. Mind you, the hand scanner at my register is fucking broken, and out of the six registers we have (only 5 actually can be used, and they have no hurry to fox anything in my store), one has a working hand scanner. So, I have to ask this older gentleman to put his case of water on my register, since he was holding it up for me to scan.

Oh my God, the world has ended!

He huffingly puts the water up, and I scan it. I tell him I'd bring it back around and sit it in his cart. And immediately he gets huffy, but doesn't do anything.

We keep going and no problem....Until we get to his total. He comes up about 81$ and I tell him his total. He immediately takes issue, and demands I check if everything comes up right, which it did. And I tell him it did. He then begins mumbling to his wife about how I messed something up for him spending 81$, and how I must be new, and on my second day because things rang up wrong (again, they're right.) And I look up at him,

"Sir. I've been here three months, almost four."

And he is still insisting that I fucked up his transaction, and at this point I offer to call a manager to void his transaction, if he isn't happy!

Nope. Bitch paid, snatched his receipt from me, and left.

--u/PrincessKitsuna

From u/kmg1500 Tales From Retail:

So I work in internet pick up at my store. I had only been here for about an hour when this happened. I was pulling an order for a customer in our plumbing area, when some guy came up to me holding a plumbing product in his hands. Never mind the fact that I couldn’t understand him (his accent was very strong), I told him that I didn’t work in this area and could get someone for him.

He didn’t like that, he started getting mad and yelling at me “HOW DO YOU WORK IN THIS AREA AND NOT KNOW THIS PRODUCT?!?!?”

I literally had to spell it out for him like a child, “I. Do not. Work. In. This. Department.”

He didn’t like that either and after walking away, I could still hear him complaining and another employee looked at me in utter confusion. I don’t know what he wanted from me, I offered to get him someone who knows what they’re talking about.

--u/kmg1500

From u/bunnyfrog_1st Tales From Retail

I worked for Furniture Clearance Shop back in the day, and on one particular day we got one of our regulars in; harmless enough, reasonable balance of sense and money, because hey, she is coming to Furniture Clearance Shop every week for the last two months to presumably deck out her whole house on the cheap.

However.

This day she choose to deal with Balding Colleague and has hubby in tow. Start perusing the ovens and kitchen gubbage, no problems. I'm doing a few other jobs, putting up displays and fielding other customers.

Balding Colleague goes to check something on computer for her. She decides he is taking too long and I am passing, so she asks me same (complicated) question. I politely enough say that I'm just fetching something from the back and Balding Colleague will sort her out soon enough.

I go into the back and start sorting boxes. She suddenly appears in the arch like some kind of pantomime villain rising from the stage in a cloud of smoke.

What did you say to me??

I'm just sorting out another order, we'll get back to you in a tick.

How dare you?? I've never been so insulted!

...what?

Do you know how much money I've spent in here?

Uh, I mean (I say while holding large and heavy box), if you just wait we would be happy to...

Of all the nerve!

She then storms right the way down the length of the shop, loudly exclaiming how she has never been treated like that, people are looking, hubby is turning red, the whole firework scene.

Balding Colleague looks over at me standing in the door to the back, box in hand, perplexed expression on face. Customer practically rams the (sliding) doors open in her attempt to leave quickly and 'never come back'.

tl:dr - Customer is asked for a tiny bit of patience, shouts the shop down.

--u/bunnyfrog_1st

From u/Moolte Tales From Retail:

Just to get it out of the way, I work in sales. I think their is some intrinsical link between working as a salesperson and being perceived as one of these so called leeches.

Anyway, I work as 1 person in a 2 person team that sells family photos to schools on weekends in a large city. We were on the outskirts of the city one day and we were up to our last client before lunch. The business essentially works by the photos being taken immediately afterwards they are sold to them for a relatively cheap price compared to industry standards, there is no obligation to buy.

So during the process of me showing this lady the photos she makes it abundantly clear to me multiple times that she "[has] no interest" in looking at any individual photos of her children (as there is one free photo given to each family with the booking and the rest are additional purchases) and because of this I decided not to try and upsell the hell out of her and just let her get the free photo.

She chooses the photo, I show her what it's going to look like cropped and edited, she leaves - as does my obligation to her and her appointment.

Just as my colleague and I were leaving the venue for lunch she rushes over in a crazed panic, "YOU DIDN'T SHOW ME MY KIDS PHOTOS, THIS IS F**KING RIDICULOUS".

Sigh

(At this point I know exactly what is going to happen if I don't give her exactly what she wants, she has the 'can I speak to the manager' hairstyle, you know the one)

"I understand your frustration but unfortunately we've turned off all the machines and are heading out for lunch. If you'd like I can try and be super quick and come back in about 20 minutes (we are meant to have an hour for lunch) and I can show you the photos again"

She begrudgingly agrees

20 minutes pass and I come back with my food and a 'can do' attitude

The lady then proceeds to take another 30 minutes looking at her photos, chooses to buy nothing, complains some more, makes empty threats about shutting us down because of our poor behaviour. At this point I'm just happy she's heading towards the door.

Tonight I just got an email from my boss saying how stupid the call she just had with this lady was where she claimed that I was a "blood sucking leech" who only wanted her money. My boss then said that she knows that we're much more upbeat and happy people than this lady said we were and apologised for having to put up with that.

In the end, people in sales aren't blood-sucking leeches and we'll actually go a long way to get you what you want, we are still people too.

--u/Moolte

From u/unfashionablylatte Tales From Retail:

This story is from when I used to work at a clothing store a few years ago. Here is some background: the store I worked at specialized in business attire. It was part of a larger chain that also has sister stores under the same umbrella company.

It was late fall and I was working the floor, folding clothing, helping customers, etc. An older woman riding an electric scooter drives in. I'll call her SL for scooter lady. I'll be me.

SL: drives up to me TANK TOPS.

Me: Hi there! You need help finding tank tops?

SL: TANK TOPS.

Me: Uh, okay. Of course! What kind of tank tops are you looking for?

SL: TANK TOPS.

Me: Okay.... lets see what I can find for you.

The store layout is in such a way that items are placed sporadically throughout the store (based on seasonal trends and colour, not by item style. Because of this I have to search every inch of the store to find different tank tops.

Me: Do you have a colour preference?

SL: I JUST WANT TANK TOPS.

Me: Okay, what about this one? holds up blue tank top.

SL: No, WHAT ELSE DO YOU HAVE?

I proceeded to take her around the store and show her all the various options we had. With each top I showed her she said no and got increasingly more irritated. Finally we seemed to have run out of options.

Me: Unfortunately Ma'am, those are all the tank top options.

SL: BUT YOU NEVER SHOWED ME THE TABLE! WHERE IS YOUR TANK TOP TABLE??

Me: extremely confused I'm sorry ma'am? What table?

SL: THE LAST TIME I WAS IN YOU HAD A TABLE OF TANK TOPS. I WANT YOU TO TAKE ME TO THAT TABLE!

I finally realized what she was talking about. THREE months before, in summer, we had a display table with all of our tank tops on it. We change the displays once a week.
I try to explain this to her as politely as possible but she isn't having it.

SL: WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU DON'T HAVE A TANK TOP TABLE. I SAW IT IN AUGUST. I WANT TANK TOPS.

Me: I'm sorry Ma'am, again, that was an old display. I showed you all the tank top options we had.

SL: WHAT ARE THEY EVEN PAYING YOU FOR???? THIS IS RIDICULOUS, I'M GOING TO Sister store's name_.

Me: Alright ma'am, have a wonderful day!

TLDR: Rude woman gets angry because we don't have the same tank top display that we did three months prior.

--u/unfashionablylatte