Fucking Borders.

So there I was, just innocently trying to buy two magazines - with cash - but couldn't get the fuck out of Borders without having fifteen minutes of my time wasted (three with me, the rest with the people in front of me) by the fucking clerks and their goddamned endless upsell spiels.

When I got to the register, it went like this:

Clerk: Did you find everything you wanted today?

Me: Yes. Please ring up the magazines.

Clerk: We're having a sale on...

Me: The magazines? You suppose you could ring them up now?

Clerk: You know, our gifts cards make a perfect...

Me: Just ring up the magazines, please.

Clerk: Would you be interested in our Book Club Card? You can save ten pecent...

Me: All I want is for you to ring up the magazines.

Clerk: Would you like to sign up for our e-mail notification, which...

Me: Just. Ring. Up. The. Fucking. MAGAZINES, would you?

I hate being rude to people in public, but God damn it, just ring the fucking magazines up, would you?

Jesus.

Redstone

Cause if not...then you may need some anger management classes....and some patience.
Duckie

He should have shut up the first time I asked him to ring up the magazines, and just done it.

I'm the customer. If I don't want to be held captive at the register to listen to all the upsells, I shouldn't have to.

I rarely lose my temper. And I growled it at him; I didn't shout.

I just wanted to pay for the damn magazines and get out of the store. Is that too much to ask?

Redstone

I guess I'm just one of those people who tries to be understanding. He's not saying that just to screw up your day, he's saying that so he can earn his 8-9.50 an hour, maybe buy his mom a Christmas present and then go home.
Duckie

just for the hell of it, and I make it a habit to be nice to store help; I know their job is not an easy one.

But I get the same when people get pushy about trying to sell me those worthless "extended warranties." OK, it's your job to ask me once, but after I say no, stop nagging me.

Same with this guy. One 'no' should have been enough.

Redstone

I can see both sides. :shrug:
Duckie

:hug: But they is desperate....

Borders doesn't have a Book Club Card that saves you ten percent. :)

very closely at that point.

Redstone

They should not have hit you over the head with all that crap. Especially with a long line behind you. I'm sorry.

with every customer. Christ, you'd think they'd get tired of hearing "no" a couple of thousand times a day.

Furthermore, I do NOT want to have even MORE of my times wasted if someone does say yes to the book club card or whatever; I can just imagine that it takes ten minutes for them to go through the rigamarole of signing up, while the rest of the people in line just have to wait some more.

You should have seen me a couple of years ago, when the supermarket in town actually INSISTED that I give them my phone number before they'd check me out! I can tell you that THAT stupid marketing idea didn't last too long (I think it was three days)

I told the clerk, "Fine. You won't ring me up without me giving you my phone number? I'll just stand here and let the line behind me back up. All day, if necessary. It'll be fun watching that ice cream melt all over your counter."

After the manager came over (it didn't take long), she did advise the clerk to just enter all zeroes if anyone refused to give their phone number. Why the hell couldn't the managers have told the clerks that BEFORE things got ugly?

My relationship with a retail store is simple. I give you money in return for stuff. That's all. Why is it so hard for the stores to understand that?

Redstone

I used to work at Walgreens, and there were items we had to offer as "suggestive sales." If we didn't do it, we could have our pay docked or be fired.

Retail clerks really aren't trying to be annoying. They have a degrading job where they see everyone at their worst and have to kiss ass all day long and put up with constant shit with a smile on their face for lousy wages and ever-increasingly-lousy hours. Trust me, if there wasn't some giant fucking managerial stick over their heads, they'd never bother asking you a billion questions about additional ways you could spend money.

Tucker

MALL, and those places give me the willies.

I do NOT like being in any place where I can't see the door that leads to the outside.

One of my hobbies is making jokes to store clerks to try to give them a bit of a chuckle; I know it's not a great job. But once I make it obvious that I'm not interested, they should stop. And I'll tell the managers too, I'm a master of the "Vertical Stroke."

Redstone

I think if enough pissed-off, hassled, hurried customers wrote to *upper* management to complain about the ludicrous sales scripts, stores would stop making their employees ask all that crap.

Or they might send you coupons.

Tucker

I have a headset on my office phone, so I can wait on hold ALL DAY, running up their 800-number bills, and still have both hands free to work while I'm waiting.

Redstone

I have the card in my wallet.

:blush:

....and you sign up for it online instead of in the store. That's why I thought maybe Redstone was confusing the two stores in his mind - people often do.

LOL

I know there is a discount card of some kind. But I also have teacher discount cards for both places. One of them lets me put anything I buy on my teacher discount card and the other store always hassles me about whether or not I am really using all these books in my classroom.

"yes, ma'am, I am planning on reading that AL Franken book to my elementary students! What's it to ya?"

if I can make them laugh at how absurd their Discount Card offer is. I have to make $250 in purchases just to break even? LAME

Bonus points if the magazines in question were porn

Sorry to disappoint you.

Redstone

Hope you find a good deal on my Christmas present :D

You can't have mine. I'll let you touch it, though, if you ask real nice.

Redstone

x(

if I want that or the 1DS Mark II or whatever the $7K version is called.

Of course, my accountant wants me to buy the most expensive stuff...but won't let me use his money to do it.

I'd like the ruggedness of the MarkII, but it seem that the 5D has some useful features that the more expensive one doesn't.

And I WANT those interchangeable focusing screens! Macro work with the standard screen of the 10D is a real hernia.

Redstone

going to Best Buy. I had to play 20 questions just to get them to ring up my stuff.

I don't blame the clerk, they're just doing their job. But I don't have to support this kind of corporate inanity.

I just say "Declined" because that's what they type, they 'get it' after two or three questions

I fucking hate when the clerks do that. Just ring my shit up and get me the fuck out of there. :hi: :thumbsup:

If they keep it up, say it again. I have found that it does shut up pushy salesclerks.

One store I worked at, if a manager heard you ring someone up and not do the upsell spiel, you would get in trouble. Also, it's not good enough anymore as a retail clerk to just ring up the purchases, be polite to customers and have your drawer balance out at the end of the day. They now track how many 'services' you sell on your shift and if you don't sell shit, you get a talking to and possibly let go.

The next time, ask for the manager and tell the manager you just want your fucking magazines rung up and tell him how much you resent the waste of your time. Or better yet, email Borders and tell them of your frustration. It truly is not the clerk's fault. But I can understand that's the only person a customer has available to vent out sometimes.

I used to work in a large chain restaurant and they'd have anonymous "shoppers" come in to grade each restaurant to make sure that from when you entered the restaurant, the host or hostess welcomed you with a smile, your wait time (if needed) was quoted accurately, the server greeted you at your table within x seconds of being sat, rattled off the specials, etc, etc to when you leave and the host/hostess had to say with a smile, "thanks, come again"

And, if something came up as not satisfactory, there'd be hell to pay.

While I'm terribly impatient when waiting in line at a retail establishment, I usually keep my grumbling to myself, even if the person in front of me is paying by check in the Cash Only express line, or has 13 items in the 12 or less line.

We had to use the most idiotic phrases when I worked at Verizon. I don't know how many times I was written up because I failed to quote their line of BS ("But the customer went away happy!" "You're not saying what we're paying you to say!") I probably would have been fired before I hit one year there. Luckily I was laid off first :eyes:

You must have really wanted those magazines. I would have walked out after 5 minutes... and let them know why I was leaving, too.

so I figured what the hell. When I went back, the line was only six or seven people, so I thought it would be a breeze.

Redstone

PS: No, no, the fact that she was in the baby store does NOT mean, well, THAT! She was buying a Christmas present. I have all the kids I can stand already, plus we're way too old for such foolishness now.

My mind never even went there - honest!

I'm no longer a big fan of shopping. I also keep forgetting that people do that stuff together.

All I want to do is go in, get what I need, and leave as quickly as possible. (Am I turning into a guy? Or a guy's dream?)

before Christmas, go on a weekday morning, decide what we want, get it, and get the hell home.

Redstone

You shouldn't do it.

I've worked in stores where you HAVE to ask those things, or get fired. They send in secret shoppers. The management watch you.

From the sounds of that exchange you were pretty rude right off the bat, and with the wrong person.

customers don't want to listen to the rigamarole, they aren't very good managers.

And I would not have gotten so crampy, except I knew what was coming, remembering it from the last time I was in there. That's why I tried to save both myself AND the clerk some time and wasted breath by indicating right away that I wasn't interested.

Redstone

It isn't just managers, it's corporate. And if thats what YOU think, tell them that. The person who could get fired for not telling you can't change anything.

If you know it's coming, prepare yourself for it and don't take it out on the clerk who probably HAS to ask those things, or get fired from their job. Their job full of people who yell at them for trying not to get fired/reprimanded.

They always do when I get ticked off.

Redstone

but still take it out on clerks?

Sorry about that.

Redstone

it requires angelic restraint to deal with 15 minutes of lost time. But hey, that's just me.

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Be pleasant to me, don't drag out the transaction, and I'll be just as nice as pie.

Redstone

eom

20 questions, don't solicit my business.

Redstone

Didn't they teach you that in retail clerk school?

they're always the customer.

Redstone

there is no paycheck.

I worked in a Hallmark store that served the 'well to do'. I learned right quick to say "thank you and please come back" when I really wanted to say "fuck you and the horse you rode in on". LOL

And, don't get me wrong, I am NOT one of those prickish customers who bitch about everything and lord it over the help.

I generally go out of my way to be nice to them, joke with them, try to lighten up their day.

But everybody has a limit. And they found mine today.

Redstone

They're not trying to drag it out, they hate having to ask that shit as much as you hate hearing it. I've been on that end, I promise... I'm sorry it's so frustrating for you, but it's equally frustrating to have to keep up the mental tally of which questions you've asked and how many 'no's you've accepted, knowing that the customers hate you for it, just to keep your damn job or get your bonus. @#$@! upsells suck, dude.

When a customer makes it abundantly clear that he's not interested, they should stop.

Bonus or no bonus. The customer may not always be right, but they're always the customer.

Redstone

Tell them you only have cash and you only have enough for the magazines.


That's my tactic when I go to Sears. "Would you like to charge that on your Sears card?"

"No."

"Do you have a Sears card?"

(I don't.) "Yes."

but does that mean the customer must always tolerate it?

Some forms of solidarity are misplaced.

Certainly corporate and management must be targeted. But if we are a passive public that tolerats it to avoid conflict with clerks, then we set ourselves up for more abuse.

Don't take it out on the clerk

Still thinking about moving to NH? PM me if you are; I may be able to find you dome contacts there to make the transition smoother.

Redstone

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I think we should make a stint working in retail, and a stint living overseas, mandatory for all Americans.

Redstone

thereby supporting the up-selling policy while punishing its #1 victim.

Redstone

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JUST KIDDING!!!!

I worked for several years in Waldenbooks (which is owned by Borders). They had stupid discount cards we had to hawk, and other spiels we had to give the customers when they came to the cashwrap to check out. Every so often "secret shoppers" would visit the store to rate us on how good a job we were doing, and they would be checking to see if we offered the discount card and said all of the appropriate phrases. If the clerk who checked out the "secret shopper" failed to do so, s/he would get written up by the store manager, and it would be noted on their next performance review. Even if the employee doesn't get caught by the "secret shopper" s/he can always be caught by the store management.

So while it is a pain in the ass for the customer, the employee is merely trying to keep their job.

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The store I worked in had a cafe, and that's where I spent most of my time. I had one regular customer who got a bagel and tea every morning. Every. Single. Morning. A purchase that amounted to about $2.05 at the time I worked there.

This person had absolutely no interest in the store's bonus card or whatever the promotion was.

And yet, every single morning I was required to ask this person if they wanted to take part in the store program. Because I don't relish feeling like an idiot every day when it's clearly avoidable, after about 3 shifts there I figured out I could stop asking. Unless of course a manager or my boss was around. I made the mistake of remembering my customer was an individual and left my upselling line off during the transaction in front of my boss one day.

What a fun, enlightening conversation we had! See, it didn't matter that I was never going to get this person to enroll. It didn't matter that this person just wanted the damn bagel, the damn tea, and to be left alone. What mattered is that I asked every customer because that's what it says I'm for in the company handbook.

Now, I don't have a problem asking the question if that's part of the job. But if I ask and someone clearly wants nothing to do with it, then I'd like to be allowed to respect the customer and leave it at that instead of launching into some groveling script and get angry eyes rolled at me. Who does that benefit? Oh yeah--nobody.

I just can't stand cookie cutter commerce. It demeans us all.

As always, just my two cents.

type of behavior....

I have said.. Do you want me to find your manager and tell him you lost a sale....

I'm not asking you if you have a discount card because I fucking love them so much and can't wait to tell you about them. I'm asking you because if I don't sell a token number of member cards per week/month/year, my hours (and therefore pay) get docked. You really think the cashier was just bursting with enthusiasm to ask you those bullshit questions? Ask ANYONE who works at a bookstore like that or any retail store - it's the LEAST FAVORITE part of their job. Scratch that - least favorite second only to dealing with asshole customers.

I've been lectured to SO many times about not being "enthusiastic" enough about member cards you wouldn't believe it. You think I really like trying to convince someone who's buying two or three paperbacks to spend 25 bucks so he can save ten percent? Yet I have to anyway, if I want any hours, that is. I'm not going to quit because otherwise I like my job. I love books and I love helping people, it's an easy job for a decent paycheck for a kid in college like me.

If you have such a big problem with it, you need to email corporate. The store managers don't come up with these policies, and the peon cashiers and part-timers sure as shit don't. Thanks for making a stressed out retail workers day more miserable during a week when he probably already has to put up with 100 times more bullshit than usual.

How about if we all say together, customers and deliverers of customer service alike, "Kiss my grits!!!"

And then let's all have a good laugh together, and get on with the fun that usually pervades the Lounge, ok?!





Go ahead. I dare you. Say it. Just like she used to. If you don't smile, you have no soul!

;)