When you work in a customer-facing role, it’s surprising how many clueless customers think that you’re the one in the wrong.

Sure the saying goes ‘the customer is always right’, but really, that couldn’t be less true.

And when the front desk worker in this story gave a no-show customer some sage advice, he would’ve done well to listen.

However, predictably he chose not to – winding himself up in a whole lot of trouble in the end.

Read on to find out what happened to him.

I tried to warn someone not to dispute his no-show charge, but they never listen.

I work at a big brand name hotel in a beach town. In the summer, our rates skyrocket to almost $300 a night, and we are usually sold out.

Someone booked two rooms for a long weekend, and decided not to show or bother calling to cancel. Our no-show policy is pretty standard – one night’s cost for each room you booked.

This gentleman was charged over $500 total for his two no-show rooms. It sucks, and it’s a lot of money, but it’s 100% his fault.

The gentleman called me a couple weeks later when he got his credit card bill. I explained to him our policy, and that he wouldn’t be getting a refund.

Let’s see how the customer responded.

He went off, “you don’t know who you’re messing with”, “I’m not paying you idiot”, yada yada. Eventually he told me he was just going to dispute it with his credit card company.

This is basically what I said to him: “Sir, if you want to dispute the charge with your bank, you have every right to do that. I would not personally recommend it though.”

“If this was a case of a stolen credit card, I would agree with you, but we have documentation showing you were informed of the no-show policy. However, if you wish to pass this issue along to the bank, I will gladly deal with them.”

But this wasn’t the end of her dealings with the rude man.

When you dispute a charge, the bank will front you the money while they investigate. When he got money from the bank right after he filed a dispute, he called me to gloat. He told me how stupid I was, yada yada.

What I don’t think he understood, is that the money is pretty much a loan, under the assumption that his charges really were fraudulent. Which they weren’t.

I easily won the dispute, proving that he wilfully did purchase these rooms, and was informed of the no-show policy.

Then the bank billed him back for the money they fronted him.

Then, things took a turn.

He called me again. Lucky me. He told me that the bank was billing him, and that I had to pay it. He said because it all started with my hotel, it was our responsibility to pay his bank bill.

At this point I didn’t even know what more to say. I just said “no, have a good day”, and hung up.

Down the road, he called AGAIN, saying that his credit card company was threatening to turn over the bill to collections if he didn’t pay. Now he wanted us to pay $800 because of the interest.

I told him that his personal finances are his own business, and to stop calling. I tried to warn him in the beginning.

Wow.

If this guy had just admitted his mistake and paid, this whole sorry matter would have been dealt with.

But the fact that he disputed it, harassed a staff member – then had to pay significantly more than his original bill?

That’s priceless.

Let’s see what the Reddit community made of this.

This credit card company worker explained that situations like this are pretty common.

While others pointed out just how serious this could have been.

Meanwhile, this Redditor thought that if the guy had been nice, this might not have been an issue for him at all.

It’s great that credit cards have the facility to claim back fraudulent charges.

But it’s crazy that this guy thought that that kind of service was relevant to his situation.

It’s not insurance about your stupid decisions!

Luckily, he got what was coming to him.

If you liked that post, check out this post about a rude customer who got exactly what they wanted in their pizza.