Have you ever ordered something online but when it arrives you realize you don’t want it? There can be various reasons for this, like the item not being as described or simply changing your mind.

In this story, one customer insists that she was sent the wrong item, but the employee looks closer and decides to educate the customer.

Let’s see how the story plays out.

Red wine glasses and water goblets and a crazy lady, oh my!

This happened to me during my shift tonight. I had a woman come into my department with her husband holding a box.

I let them know that this department doesn’t have registers but I will be happy to bring them to a register to do the return.

Understanding me, they followed me to the register and the woman requested me to stay with them as the sales associate did the return.

The customer explained why she was doing a return.

She tells me that she ordered red wine glasses and received “water goblets.”

Me: Oh they’ve sent you the wrong item? Let me take a look!

Sometimes the warehouse employees screw up online orders and send the wrong item. Totally understandable.

So I go through the boxes by first checking the SKU. The SKU is coded for “red wine/goblet” glass and it also says it on the box. Confused, I opened the box and it was a red wine glass with the same SKU on the box.

She points out the obvious.

Me: Ma’m, this is a red wine glass.

Customer: No those are not red wine glasses. Those are water goblets!!!

Me: Ma’m these are red wine glasses. They are written as “red wine/goblets.” The word “goblet” could be confusing but it is definitely a red wine glass.

Customer: No they’re not! These are too big to be a red wine glass!

She probably didn’t know better.

So we’ve now established she is not a big wine drinker, otherwise she’d understand the different shapes of the glasses. Which is fine because I know not everyone is a big wine drinker that cares about the proper glass to drink in.

Anyway, at this moment her husband walked away with this look of, “she’s at it again.” I felt it in my retail-poisoned heart that I knew where this was going.

But I gave her the benefit of the doubt and concluded she probably had no idea what a red wine glass and water goblet is.

She showed her what the red wine glass and the water glass looked like.

I brought her back over to my department (crystal stemware and Fine China) to show her the pattern she had purchased and the 4 different glass types it came in; red wine/goblet, white wine, iced beverage (the “water goblet”) and flute.

So I showed her the iced beverage, telling her it is labeled as a “iced beverage,” and the glass that she bought.

She looked at me as if I told her I slept with her husband and now I’m pregnant with his child and blew up on me and said I was wrong and don’t know what I’m doing.

This wasn’t going to go anywhere so I brought her back to the register and told the sales associate to do the return.

The customer wasn’t done yet.

Customer: I will do the return but I am going to educate you!

I don’t respond to her comment and take the glasses into the stockroom after the sales associate returns them.

As I am doing this, she is on her phone, trying to look for her online order. Once she found her order on the store’s website, she shoved her phone in my face when I walked out of the stockroom.

The customer thought she found what she needed to prove her point.

Customer: HERE! What does THAT say?! WELL?!

Me: “Red wine goblet.”

Customer: Right! That’s what I ordered and that’s what I wanted!

Me: Yes, and that is what you got. It says “red wine/goblet” on the box and your receipt.

The customer still wouldn’t believe her, so she tried explaining one more time.

Customer: I did not order that! You are so rude! You don’t know what you are talking about. It’s like trying to talk to one of my students! You’re giving me an attitude and rolling your eyes and not listening! I am done arguing with you! You don’t know what you’re talking about and I’m trying to educate you!!

Oh god. She’s a teacher? Those ill-fated students… I suppose I was so sick of her trying to make me look stupid, I felt I had to explain to her the names and shapes of the glasses one last time.

Stupid me, huh.

Me: OK, ma’m, this is what I do every day. I am required to know the differences between all drinking glasses because I have all types of people that come in and expect me to know the different types of glasses. You did receive red wine glasses, which are labeled as “red wine/goblets.” I agree they are pretty big and some people don’t like actual red wine glasses. If you like smaller wine glasses then you would like the white wine glasses, which tend to be narrower compared to red wine glasses. The iced beverage is the water goblet and is a completely different shape compared to the red and white wine glasses. Then we have the flutes for champagne.

The customer can’t even make up her mind about what to do.

Customer: Unbelievable! You are here arguing with me instead of apologizing that the store sent me water goblets when I asked for red wine glasses! I want to speak to your manager!

Me: Absolutely, I will go get one for you.

Customer: No! I am done arguing with the likes of you! I am leaving!

And with that she just stormed out, waving her arms, saying “[store name] has such rude and unintelligent employees!”

Needless to say, I had a good laugh with my supervisor about it.

It doesn’t matter if the customer is right or not. Sometimes, it’s not worth arguing about.

Let’s see what Reddit thought of this story.

This was the craziest part of the story, in my opinion.

Here’s another story about a customer who was looking for wine glasses.

Here’s a possible reason she’s shopping for wine glasses.

A person who knows wine weighs in.

Not all customers are willing to be educated.

If you liked that post, check out this story about a customer who insists that their credit card works, and finds out that isn’t the case.