I'm back and I'm pissed off.

Apologies for the lack of posts recently, I'm a lazy bastard.

As I type this, our forgetful priest is in and asking my colleague whether she's going on holiday (his usual question to any of us except my Scottish colleague). My colleague has just (uncharacteristically cos she's usually very tolerant) asked whether there was a polite way of telling him to bugger off and mind his own business.

However, the priest is a mild irritation compared to the customer who I served first thing this morning. A regular customer sent a few items off and then tried to pay for them with his credit card. For some reason, my till told me that I had to retain his card. There was no question about it being a fraudulent or stolen card or anything but if I'm told to retain the card then I'm gonna do it (I was only following orders).

Naturally, you don't in this situation tell the customer that you need to keep his card and then ask him to pass it to you. For some reason, they tend to say no and take the card back. A little bit of subtlety is required. I asked him to pass me the card for a moment. He did and it was at this point that I told him that I had to retain the card. He wasn't best pleased. He asked why but I couldn't tell him cos I didn't know. He got more and more worked up and then demanded a receipt for it. I'd already passed him one and told him so (getting a bit worked up myself at this point). At this point a large number of toys were thrown out of the pram and he got the right arsehole that I'd dared to raise my voice. "There's no need to get ratty!" said the pretty angry customer hypocritically. By now I was pretty fuming cos I hate stroppy customers doing this sort of thing. It's fine for him to get pissed off and shouty but woe betide me if I show any signs of irritation. I've just got to stand there and take it and say thank-you for the privilege. YAY!!!

Sense prevailed cos I decided that and apology would be the best thing to offer even though an apology was what I was due from him. Apology uttered I was expecting things to calm down.

Nope.

"You can speak to me sensibly or not at all."

He said in an even more stroppy manner. Another apology and the old "I've had a stressful morning, I shouldn't take it out on you, sorry etc. etc."

"You and me are gonna have a falling out."

Another apology. He was wrong though. I've already "fallen out" with him. Stroppy cunt.

Then I had to bring up the subject of him paying the outstanding balance that he owed.

Oops.

This didn't go down well either. Eventually, I got the money and got rid of him.

However, it's soured my mood for the rest of the morning. I had to have a nice long rant to Mrs Popurnoinplz to try and get it out of my system. It mostly worked.

It really pisses me off that customers feel that they can lose their rags as much as hey want and we just have to stand here like punching bags and take it. If it weren't so bad for business, I'd be tempted to fight back (in fact I have once and that went rather badly, a future update will explain). Admittedly, some shop staff do deserve to have a rocket up there arses now and again but in the main there's usually no justification for customers having a major ep. In fact, it's usually counter-productive. A polite customer with a complaint will get much better treatment than a shouty one.