What are some of your guys' worst customer experiences? This has to be mine...
one night I had this guy who's a regular in my store and he's always an ******* about something. So tonight I got the message about "Get customer ok, RX redemption coupon," and I forgot to ask him before I accidentally applied it. Turns out he was saving it for a Christmas tree (keep in mind this happened in July). I didn't finish the transaction yet so the whole thing was reversible. He looked me right in the eye and said "You really screwed up tonight didn't you?" But he was very serious about it and had an extremely condescending tone.
one of my supervisors was trying to help me out and while that was going on the customer kept going on about how I screwed up. He said "I bet [my name] is gonna ask from now on right? Oh [my name] is like nope, customer's wrong, I'm right!" Basically putting words in my mouth.
All that we needed to do, as it turns out, is suspend the transaction, then retrieve it and it asks about the pharmacy coupon again. My supervisor had taken the suspend receipt over to the service desk though so I had to tell the guy to go over there. He looked at me again and said one more time "You really screwed up tonight." Then lets out this exaggerated sigh like the world is ending, and turned to the customer behind him and said something like "You came at a bad time."
So yeah. I know that story pales in comparison to some others, but that was my worst experience. I almost never get problematic customers especially like that, so it really caught me off guard and I just froze up and wasn't really sure what to do. Thank god my supervisor was there because they're extremely laid back and helped the process go much more smoothly.
This guy is a regular at my store too, so if he's never satisfied I don't know why he keeps coming back. Every time he comes through my line and I say "how are you sir?" he just says "something like that."
One time I was standing in line to get food on my break. I was already clocked out and it was a busy day, right before Christmas, so I had been standing in line for a while and the line had gotten bigger behind me. Some lady came over to me and asked me to help her find something! I told her I was on break and I was in line to check out so I could eat on my break and she got all huffy about it. How selfish do you have to be to expect someone to get out of line to go help you?
I had one time this one customer tried to rub my belly. I'm not a small guy, but I'm not huge either. I jump back and say "woah! No touch." This customer FLIPS OUT! And I mean the "you are a rude ******* employee, I'm gonna call corporate" flip out. Guess what? The customer gets a $10.00 gift card because the way I responded "offended them"
Old dudes touching me. I'm a guy. And I'm gay. Sorry. Hands off. Oh and there's a few customers that will make everything about race just to provide cover for whatever scam they're trying to pull.
I walk into the store about 20 minutes before closing. I get a cake, with the help of a friendly Kroger employee. I now need some stuffing, so I walked up and down 4 isles. I then asked a group of 3 employees within talking distance. Where can I find the stuffing? They told me isle 3, halfway down on right. No escort at all. They had nothing going on. So I went down to see if I could find it. I didn't. So I pulled 3-containers from lower self and placed them on the floor. I went to a standing employee doing nothing, and said you have some containers out in the middle of your floor in isle 3, and I was unable to find the stuffing. His reply was; if it isnt there I don't know where it is. So I walked two steps up isle 3 and shoved the 1/4 sheet cake about 12-feet on the floor, and said you have a cake in the floor in isle 3. Then I left.
(I was not employed at this time by Kroger)
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Mine was at 11pm on a Friday night. It was the usual trailer-trash family who forgot how to walk and the whole family was on the electric scooters. I finished bagging their order and asked if they need help out. The mother says in a snobby tone "I suppose so". As we got outside, she asked me if I smoked. I said no and then she started yelling at me because she needed a light. "You have to be f*#!in' kidding me! Why don't you smoke. Every one smokes!" I really wanted to tell her that even if I did, I wouldn't let her use my lighter. I will remember this as long as I live. Not to mention I thought that I was going to loose my fingers when I touched their vans carpet.
Mine was at 11pm on a Friday night. It was the usual trailer-trash family who forgot how to walk and the whole family was on the electric scooters. I finished bagging their order and asked if they need help out. The mother says in a snobby tone "I suppose so". As we got outside, she asked me if I smoked. I said no and then she started yelling at me because she needed a light. "You have to be f*#!in' kidding me! Why don't you smoke. Every one smokes!" I really wanted to tell her that even if I did, I wouldn't let her use my lighter. I will remember this as long as I live. Not to mention I thought that I was going to loose my fingers when I touched their vans carpet.
To think that we have to fund the lifestyles of these kinds of degenerates...
There are so many, but one that stands out to me is when I was working night shift a few years ago as the overnight cashier, I had a couple come in right after midnight early Sunday morning. Well In WV alcohol sales are illegal on Sunday until 1p.m., and no liquor sales at all. Anyways this couple comes up with a couple case of beer and I told them they couldn't buy it until 1. They seemed bummed but they left.
The following Sunday right after midnight, the same couple come up to the register with several cases of beer. I had to tell them that you can't buy any alcohol until 1p.m. on Sunday. Well the man get pissed and says "well you can go to the bar that time of night and get beer!" So I told him "at the bar you can't take your drinks out of the building, and at Kroger you can't drink it here and can't buy it that early on Sunday!"
Then the wife yells " this is bull**** you are full of **** and you can buy it this time of night at the gas station where I work and you can buy it at Wal-Mart!"
So I had enough of their crap so I told her "Then fuc***g go to Wal-Mart, I don't give a s**t!"
Then followed the usual I'm going to call your boss and corporate but they left and I was never spoken to about the incident. I assume they didn't call. Later that night I spoke to a lady who was a manager at gas station in town and asked her if she knew the woman in question. She recognized her and said yeah she worked there until they fired her for selling beer too early on a Sunday.
I was working the night shift two years ago. It was 11:50 pm and we close at midnight. This young blonde girl comes to the register with a case of beer. I ask for her id and she dumps her purse out, looks through everything while she is explaining that she has just been on a cruise, she can't find her id, she just got home from her cruise, blah blah blah. Who cares, millions of people go on cruises. You aren't special even though you think you are.
She tells me she lives right down the street and will run get her id. I told her no, we close in 7 minutes, you won't have time. She argued with me for another 3 or 4 minutes that she would have time and left. I checked the store, clocked out, got my coat and was walking back up the aisle from the back of the store and I heard her yelling "I want my beer, where are you? I want my beer! I told her we were closed and she said "I'm back, I have my id, I want my beer". I told her she had to leave the store, we were closed, no beer sale.
She followed me outside and started yelling about how she new the manager, shops at our store all the time, I'm in trouble blah blah blah. Then she gets right up in my face so I ran back in the store. She was pushing the door trying to get inside. I was pushing trying to keep the door closed. One of the night crew guys came up and ran her off. I told him my ride was outside, make sure to watch me until I got in the car.
This is the good part - she was waiting on me. I ran and jumped in the backseat of my daughters car, locked the door and this crazy ran through the parking lot after us yelling "I'm calling 911, I have your license plate number as she was waving her cell phone at us!!" I would have loved to have heard that 911 call. " The cashier said the store was closed and she left and they locked the doors and wouldn't sell me beer". And what time was that 911 call?
It was about 9:30 at the deli. We close at 9, and our last slicer gets shut down ~5 mins before if it's a particularly slow night. A couple, clearly high as hell, comes in.
"Hey can you cut us some deli meat?"
"Sorry, we close at 9pm."
"Aww, can you make an exception?"
"If we made an exception for everyone who came in looking for deli meat after 9pm, we'd never get done with our work, and we'd be here till the store closes!"
They were at it for a few minutes, we were sticking to our guns (we were already behind as it is), and they eventually left.
It's one thing to come in at 8:50 and expect some meat (which is okay), but another to come in well after closing time.
One night I was working a register and I was about to go on my lunch break, I had one customer left and I turned off my light so that no more customers would come to my checkout lane. Anyway, my last customer was this lady and she had a bunch of wine in her cart and a couple of flowers. I ring up her wine and get started on the groceries, at this point, she goes down and begins to bag her own groceries. As I'm scanning, she says "you're crushing everything can you stop?!" apparently I was scanning too fast for her, so I stopped scanning and began to help her bag her items. I asked her if she wanted her flowers in a bag and she gave me confusing instructions that were something like this "I want them in paper for now but plastic in paper in plastic afterwards" what the hell does that even mean?? So, I just put it in paper and she freaked out. She started yelling and got hysterical saying that wasn't right and she snatched the bag from me and took her flowers out and threw the paper bag at me.
I just lost it at this point. I grabbed the paper bag she threw at me and just curmpled it up and threw it in the trashcan and she goes "Oh no, I'm not gonna have this. I need a manager right now." so she tells a courtesy clerk to get a manager and I even offered to call the manager for her and she goes "no, she already got them." and our co-manager comes over as well as our front end supervisor and the lady begins to tell management this exaggerated version of the entire story saying how she felt intimidated by my behaviour and that she felt she deserved the world cause she was spending over $500 on wine alone at our store. Throughout the entire situation I kept my mouth closed and did not say a word to that lady because I knew I would have lost my job if I had spoken my mind then and there. So my supervisor told me to finally go on break while they tried to calm the lady down.
At this point, I felt shocked. I went over to the floral department and talked to one of the floral clerks and she said that she was helping the same customer earlier to pick out some flowers and that the customer got upset when the stems touched another flower and she freaked out and the floral clerk told me she had to walk away before she slapped her haha.
Anyway, after my break, I got called upstairs and got a "note to file" that said something like "(my name) upset a customer to the point where she requested management because (my name) could not understand how the customer wanted her groceries bagged and became frustrated and threw a bag on the floor." I just thought whatever and signed the note to file. I didn't even waste my breath trying to explain the actual story to management cause either way they'd still side with the customer. I bet that lady left with a gift card and an apology. I've been with the company for over a little over a year now and this was by far my worst customer experience and the only one that made me cry (not in front of the customer of course, but she was just so rude and nasty for no reason and I'm a total sweetheart to everyone.) but boy, do I have a bunch of other stories...
BoA at least you know you are not alone in how management sides with the customer.
This will always happen no matter what your seniority or who you are.
Kroger is not worth it.
I made a whopping $112 this week from last week's work as a courtesy clerk.
Because I have only 12 hours this week, next week I will be lucky to get $60.
This company is not worth it when it comes to the frustrations as you explained.
It is bullcrap.
