“It’s Illegal!”: Photo Lab Tech Denies Order, Triggering Furious Retail Meltdown
Shutterstock
Folks who work at photo labs don’t play around when it comes to dealing with copyrighted images.
They can get into hot water if they do something like that, and you can’t blame them for being sticklers for these rules.
In today’s story, a worker talked about an interaction they had with a customer who displayed from very bizarre behavior after she didn’t get what she wanted.
Take a look at what happened.
Customer tries to apologize for being a Karen but I refuse to accept it.
“This happened a few years ago.
At the time, my store offered One Hour photo processing, and I was the head photo tech in our lab. This did not make me a manager in any way, but I had just been in the position for years at this point.
If no one has ever worked in a photo lab, you should know that we have to deal with US Federal Copyright Law.
There are rules about this kind of stuff!
If someone tried to print a photo that they did not create themselves, or an image owned by someone else, we cannot legally print it without permission from the owners.
The customer that came in had several images of Disney characters that she claimed to have bought off of Etsy.
Regardless of where she bought them, Disney characters are a big “No-Go” on the copyright scale. We can’t even print those novelty photos you get taken at the park, without a release.
I tried to refuse her images, and she starts throwing a fit. I expected as much, most people have issues when I don’t let them have “their photos” without understanding the rules we have to follow.
This was getting a bit tense…
Normally just explaining it to them is enough to get them to calm down, but this customer was cussing and yelling at me and would not calm down, regardless of what I did.
So, eventually she said the magic words of “I want to talk to your manager!”
Fine by me.
I call my boss, tell him what is going on and he comes to talk to the customer. He explains everything I just explained to the customer again, and apologizes to the customer, “There is nothing we can do, sorry, it is the law.”
The customer leaves and I don’t think anything of it. Until she came back two days later.
At first she was okay. She came up to the lab, patiently waited her turn, and tried to print the photos again.
Wow…this is ridiculous.
We had the same run around, and after calling the same manager again, the customer tried to apologize to me saying she just really wanted the photos, and she was sorry for calling me every bad word you can think of.
Her: “I apologize, can we put this behind us?”
Me: “No. I do not accept your apology, there was no need for you to say any of what you just did.”
Her: (Looking very confused) “You can’t not accept an apology!”
Me: “Yes I can. I hold you responsible for what you said, and your words hurt.”
My Manager: (Trying not to laugh) “Ma’am, I think you should go now.””
Check out what readers had to say about this.
Sign up to get our BEST stories of the week straight to your inbox.
This person said they’re NTA.
Another individual had a lot to say.
This Reddit user spoke up.
If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a researcher who complained about being excluded from a trip only to watch the university cancel the whole thing.
And another person weighed in.
Was that weird, or what?
I sure think it was!
How annoying to have to deal with someone like that…
This customer was off her rocker!
Enjoyed this story?
Sign up to get our BEST stories of the week straight to your inbox.
