The joys of working retail
Yesterday was Mothers Day here and Saturday was prom. It would have been a madhouse without employees calling in (what are the chances one person would know two old woman who died in exactly the same way two weeks apart? [one day off to see her before surgery, one for surgery, and one to take her off life support] If it's true, that's sad, but we're thinking she needs to come up with better lies) or not showing up (having a test the next day is no excuse for not going to work), since we were down one employee anyway. I was scheduled Friday 10-7, Saturday 9-6 and Sunday 7-4, but ended up working 7:30a-8:15p, 7:30-6:30, and then 7-4:30, the last with no lunch.
The "fun" started Friday with the last minute prom moms. One of which talked to me for almost an hour trying to get things precisely "right". Halfway through our talk on the corsage (she wanted bling, but we just have ribbon, greens, and flowers), she stopped to look at our ribbon (not the corsage kind) and I dug through the stacks with her to find something just the right shade of gold. We didn't have it. We only had tan, raw silk and old gold. The first two weren't yellow enough and that last was too dark. But she had to google the color (at my request) to find out what it looked like and she was looking at her phone and anyone who's heard the controversy over the color of that one dress knows that individual screens, lighting, and even background colors make a difference. But I put the rolls of ribbon back on the shelf when she didn't find the precise color.
Saturday she returned at her appointed time and the band color was wrong and the ribbon color was wrong, etc., etc. (all this after my floral manager spent extra time, attention, and expense getting everything perfect. It was beautiful, just not exactly how the customer imagined it) The customer complained loud and long. We weren't the first people to mess up today. And my manager was rude. I apologized over and over and made excuses. Then I offered to refund almost half the price. She took it. The assistant store manager had overheard her complain to the woman giving her the refund and gave me a $5 gift card to give to her. The customer was in a much better mood after this. But I still couldn't get her to go sit in the seating area - across the store from us.
But she was happy when she left and maybe that's all the counts. (I would so hate to be the person her son marries. It would be Mother-of-the-Groom-zilla.)
This follows another incident. Friday night a customer came and asked if her bout was done. We were doing $5 to bump you higher in the line, so I said it could be done by 9 Saturday if she was willing to pay. Originally she asked to get it at 3, and the two people doing corsages and bouts had started with everyone who wanted one before noon. The girl said she'd call her mother and walked away. She didn't come back.
The next morning at 9, the mom showed up. I went in to ask the corsage makers in the off chance it was done. It was, but they weren't going to let me give it to her because she and her husband had screwed out department out of more than $50 at Valentines. So I had to go back out and say it wasn't ready yet. It would be done by 11. (I added or maybe before, they might be working on it right now. I shouldn't have said this because it only made things worse as my manager was determined not to let her have the bout.)
So she hung out as time ticked by. She was supposed to be 50 miles away by now. She paid for it, got upset, started calling all the stores along her route to see if they'd make her one, and demanded a refund (and declared she would never be back) before getting a conformation that anyone else would make it (which was crazy as she could have come back anytime and got a refund). Then she finally left the store long about 10. About a half hour later, she calls back. She wants that bout again. I hand the phone to someone to ring her up while I get a tag for the register to scan, only she hangs up. She calls the store manager. She's decided she doesn't want to pay. He calls and says just to give it to her. I'm more than willing. The bout gets put in the back cooler with her name on it.
But a while later she calls back. She's not a charity. She demands to pay. I attempt to ring her up, but I think the phone's on speaker (which gives a weird echo) in the moving vehicle and someone reads off numbers one at a time and someone else repeats them. How many zeros was that? one? two? or four?
I mess up and ask for it again, but this time I do what I don't like to and write it down. Then type it in, getting something wrong the first time, but the second works fine. Somehow the customer realizes I've written it down (I just realized that since didn't write down the expiration date that set of numbers was worthless). I tell her I'm shredding them (while I do it), but that's not enough for her. She wants the paper bits in with the bout. OK, I understand. Then she demands to talk to the store manager. I guess she kept him on the line for 45 minutes. He called me again and said to do a refund. We weren't taking her money. I brought the money and the paper slips to him (at his request) and he was going to hand them over personally.
But when the customer arrived at 3 (like she said she do originally, then decided that was too late for the 7pm dance. There was also something about her pretending this bout was for a friend and that's why she needed it early. I think she did this last prom too.), she refused to wait for the manager. She also learned that the floral manager was around. Over and over again this customer had said (sometimes while pointing at me) "[Floral manager] would never treat me this way." and" if [floral manager] knew this was me, it would be done by now."
She had no idea.
(Then she came shopping on Sunday as if none of this had happened)
All this happened before the prom-mom-zilla arrived, so by this point I was pretty ok with throwing my floral manager under the bus and blaming the entire screw up on her. Although once I thought about it, I might not have made things clear enough on the order slip. (And I was so happy that she finally left, I didn't go over everything with the corsage makers like I normally do for complicated orders.)
Last night, I worked on a side story for In Trouble that includes both Mothers Day and baby's first spell. I'm going to try to type it in today and hopefully get it up soon.
The "fun" started Friday with the last minute prom moms. One of which talked to me for almost an hour trying to get things precisely "right". Halfway through our talk on the corsage (she wanted bling, but we just have ribbon, greens, and flowers), she stopped to look at our ribbon (not the corsage kind) and I dug through the stacks with her to find something just the right shade of gold. We didn't have it. We only had tan, raw silk and old gold. The first two weren't yellow enough and that last was too dark. But she had to google the color (at my request) to find out what it looked like and she was looking at her phone and anyone who's heard the controversy over the color of that one dress knows that individual screens, lighting, and even background colors make a difference. But I put the rolls of ribbon back on the shelf when she didn't find the precise color.
Saturday she returned at her appointed time and the band color was wrong and the ribbon color was wrong, etc., etc. (all this after my floral manager spent extra time, attention, and expense getting everything perfect. It was beautiful, just not exactly how the customer imagined it) The customer complained loud and long. We weren't the first people to mess up today. And my manager was rude. I apologized over and over and made excuses. Then I offered to refund almost half the price. She took it. The assistant store manager had overheard her complain to the woman giving her the refund and gave me a $5 gift card to give to her. The customer was in a much better mood after this. But I still couldn't get her to go sit in the seating area - across the store from us.
But she was happy when she left and maybe that's all the counts. (I would so hate to be the person her son marries. It would be Mother-of-the-Groom-zilla.)
This follows another incident. Friday night a customer came and asked if her bout was done. We were doing $5 to bump you higher in the line, so I said it could be done by 9 Saturday if she was willing to pay. Originally she asked to get it at 3, and the two people doing corsages and bouts had started with everyone who wanted one before noon. The girl said she'd call her mother and walked away. She didn't come back.
The next morning at 9, the mom showed up. I went in to ask the corsage makers in the off chance it was done. It was, but they weren't going to let me give it to her because she and her husband had screwed out department out of more than $50 at Valentines. So I had to go back out and say it wasn't ready yet. It would be done by 11. (I added or maybe before, they might be working on it right now. I shouldn't have said this because it only made things worse as my manager was determined not to let her have the bout.)
So she hung out as time ticked by. She was supposed to be 50 miles away by now. She paid for it, got upset, started calling all the stores along her route to see if they'd make her one, and demanded a refund (and declared she would never be back) before getting a conformation that anyone else would make it (which was crazy as she could have come back anytime and got a refund). Then she finally left the store long about 10. About a half hour later, she calls back. She wants that bout again. I hand the phone to someone to ring her up while I get a tag for the register to scan, only she hangs up. She calls the store manager. She's decided she doesn't want to pay. He calls and says just to give it to her. I'm more than willing. The bout gets put in the back cooler with her name on it.
But a while later she calls back. She's not a charity. She demands to pay. I attempt to ring her up, but I think the phone's on speaker (which gives a weird echo) in the moving vehicle and someone reads off numbers one at a time and someone else repeats them. How many zeros was that? one? two? or four?
I mess up and ask for it again, but this time I do what I don't like to and write it down. Then type it in, getting something wrong the first time, but the second works fine. Somehow the customer realizes I've written it down (I just realized that since didn't write down the expiration date that set of numbers was worthless). I tell her I'm shredding them (while I do it), but that's not enough for her. She wants the paper bits in with the bout. OK, I understand. Then she demands to talk to the store manager. I guess she kept him on the line for 45 minutes. He called me again and said to do a refund. We weren't taking her money. I brought the money and the paper slips to him (at his request) and he was going to hand them over personally.
But when the customer arrived at 3 (like she said she do originally, then decided that was too late for the 7pm dance. There was also something about her pretending this bout was for a friend and that's why she needed it early. I think she did this last prom too.), she refused to wait for the manager. She also learned that the floral manager was around. Over and over again this customer had said (sometimes while pointing at me) "[Floral manager] would never treat me this way." and" if [floral manager] knew this was me, it would be done by now."
She had no idea.
(Then she came shopping on Sunday as if none of this had happened)
All this happened before the prom-mom-zilla arrived, so by this point I was pretty ok with throwing my floral manager under the bus and blaming the entire screw up on her. Although once I thought about it, I might not have made things clear enough on the order slip. (And I was so happy that she finally left, I didn't go over everything with the corsage makers like I normally do for complicated orders.)
Last night, I worked on a side story for In Trouble that includes both Mothers Day and baby's first spell. I'm going to try to type it in today and hopefully get it up soon.