Tales of Retail Hell

Tales of Retail Hell, Part 97:
Yesterday afternoon Lissa called me from the knitting shop to say that a customer wanted to exchange some knitting needles. Hmm. As you know, we don’t exchange on patterns or knitting needles. I’ve been known to bend the rules though, if the person has made a genuine mistake and doesn’t wait ages to let us know about it. “When did she buy them?” November. OY. So I shuffled out there. On my way, I basically decided that if the needles don’t look used and she wasn’t an obvious scammer, I’d let her do it. It was Friday afternoon, my leg was stiff, and my stomach was starting to hurt in a sadly familiar way. I wasn’t looking for a fight. “What seems to be the problem?” I said cheerily. The woman, who seemed friendly – AT FIRST – explained that she bought these 100cm bamboo circulars for a project in November, but then her friend pointed out that they were too long so she borrowed her friend’s needles instead. And then her friend told her she should bring them back, because “we’re really good about returns.” I started to nod. Usually in these cases, I go ahead and reiterate the store policy before telling them I’m making an exception, just so they know that I’m doing them a favour and they shouldn’t expect this in the future. “With yarn, we will absolutely do an exchange for you. But the store policy is not to exchange on pattern books or knitting needles, because they may have been used–” She cut me off by flinging the needles down on the counter. Yes, she FLUNG them. “But I haven’t used them! They’re perfectly saleable!” My hackles were up. She wasn’t playing to the script. “The problem is, we have no way of knowing if they were used. If we did needle returns, customers could use them to knit a whole garment and then try to return them.” (Translation: “I don’t know you from Adam and you want me to accept you at your word, when that’s exactly what a scammer would do, so you might try being a little nicer here, LADY.”) She was having none of it, and this is when she started to get seriously snotty. “But I didn’t use them,” she sneered. “And besides, she (meaning the shop assistant) gave them to me.” Ahh, blaming my staff. Now there’s a surefire way to get me on your side. Trust me, I know that none of my staff FORCED you to buy a meter-long circular needle you didn’t need. “It’s the store policy,” I said with a shrug. At this point, I decided she was a lost cause. Some customers are not worth the hassle of keeping. “I THINK THAT’S WRONG!” she announced. She turned her back. “I DON’T WANT THEM, AND I THINK THAT’S WRONG!” She stormed out of the store.

Whatever. I had gone out there with the fullest intentions of doing what she wanted, but because she was such a bitch from the absolute get-go, she got squat. Whiny customers of the world, TAKE NOTE.