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When customers come into a retail store asking for help, they often act like the workers should be able to read their minds.
That was the case in this story, where a customer came in and demanded to know where ‘the stuff’ is in the store. Naturally, the worker asked what stuff they were talking about, and the customer got really upset about it.
This must be one of the most frustrating things about working in retail. Read through the full story below and see what you think.
When a customer gets defensive when I ask for clarification
I just had a customer came up to me and said “Can you show me where the “stuff” is at?”
Exactly what stuff are they looking for?
(Does that sound vague to you?) and when I said “What “stuff”?”, he got extremely annoyed and said to me aggressively “I’LL TELL YOU IF YOU JUST WAIT A MINUTE!”
Like, wow dude, I wasn’t trying to be mean, but it’s not my fault that you failed to provide more info or specify a particular item, so I made my point in asking what stuff, as I was honest.
Employees are not mind readers.
There’s plenty of “stuff” we have here at the store, so no need to act like I wasted your time when I’m simply trying to help you avoid choosing the incorrect items.
That incident caught me off guard because they expect us retail workers to be mind readers. Doesn’t work that way. But thankfully most customers aren’t like that.
You have to wonder what is wrong with some people. Why did the shopper get so upset with someone who was trying to help them?
Let’s see what the people in the comments have to say.
Technically, this is true.
Yup, why can’t people just be specific?
This would be very frustrating.
If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about an accountant who sticks to 40-hour weeks after overtime guidance, and finds he likes it.
Now this is a great answer.
Customers rarely know what they are talking about.
There is no way to please everyone. Some customers you just have to tolerate until they go away.
In this case, hopefully they will go away sooner rather than later.