Reading is fundamental

In my store, we have an "Under $10" section for the Xbox 360 games. Unfortunately, we have too many busted old 360 games, so the wall section filled up and overflowed into what we in the biz refer to as a "dump bin."

A guy was standing in the middle of the Under $10 section, right in between the dump bin and the wall.

"Hey," he yelled. "Do you have an "Under $10" section?"

"You're standing on top of it," I said. "You're literally surrounded by it."

"Oh." He looked down, and immediately grabbed Defiance, of all things. "Is this game any good?"

"....no."

No receipt, no refund... an ongoing saga

My store doesn't do cash refunds without a receipt. Period. If you cannot prove that you bought the item with cash, then you don't get cash back. I really don't understand how this is so difficult for everyone, especially since many of these people buy things with THE FULL INTENTION of returning them a few days later, so why wouldn't you keep the damn receipt!? But I digress.

Some lady came in a couple days after Christmas trying to get cash back for a game. We gave her the usual spiel about how we can't do cash refunds without a receipt, but she was welcome to exchange it for another game. Things escalated quickly.

"WELL, THIS IS SOME GREAT FUCKING CUSTOMER SERVICE," she screamed as she flounced to the door.

"I'M GOING TO TEAR APART MY HOUSE AND FIND THAT RECEIPT AND MAKE YOU GIVE ME MY MONEY BACK."

"Please do," said the Veteran. "If you have the receipt, there's no problem."

"MERRY CHRISTMAS," she yelled, and then- wait for it- she broke the door.

She slammed the door so hard that it broke.

Fortunately, the glass wasn't broken, just the pump that stops it from slamming shut. We only had to suffer through one or two days of the door slamming every time someone used it before it was fixed.

Unfortunately, she never did show up with the receipt, so we never got to go all "Oh heeey, we have you on camera breaking our door! This is me calling the cops! MERRY CHRISTMAS LOL!"

And really, since when does "customer service" entail giving free cash to random members of the public? Need I remind everybody, again, that Buying Stuff is not the same as Putting Your Money In The Bank? And that you don't get to withdraw Money from your Stuff whenever you want?

WHY.

Lies and the lying liars who lie

I don't believe a single customer has ever told me the truth. I've collected four particularly egregious examples from the past month, and combined them into one sexy mega-post, with a numbered list.

I'm basically amazing.

There's a website called Black Friday Death Count

Black Friday Death Count

Good thing someone's counting, I guess? My job as a cashier should not be hazardous to my bodily safety, but it often is. Register jockeys get threatened with violence all the time.

And someone actually punched bossbro in the face once, but that deserves its own post.

Apparently the new Batman game is too hard for the bros

FULL DISCLOSURE: I have not played Batman: Arkham Origins, nor have I played Arkham Asylum or Arkham City (even though I know the ending.) I can't personally attest to the difficulty level. Ladyboss has been playing the game like a maniac, though, and she commented on how hard some of the boss fights were- there were a few she had to do twice. So, you know, there's some level of skill involved.

Because it's a game that requires some level of skill, everybro has been bringing it back to the store to complain about how terrible it is.

One particular repeat-offense bro who also traded in Assassin's Creed IV because he got stuck somewhere came in today to also trade in Arkham Origins. 

"This game is terrible!" he complained, tossing it on the counter.

"Why is it terrible?"

"It's too hard! Why is it so hard? Kids can't play that!"

"Well, most games aren't really designed with kids in mind," I said. "The average gamer is in their 30s."

"It's too hard! I got stuck in Assassin's Creed, and now I'm stuck in Arkham!"

"So, you're trading in the new Batman game because it was too hard for you?" I asked.

Pause.

"Well, you know, it's not that it was hard," he said. "It was just difficult."

Well, that clears that up.

Solidarity, bro

We've recently acquired a gaggle of teenage boys from a nearby high school who come in and heckle the employees by asking a lot of questions about games that don't exist. Grand Theft Auto VI is their favorite- I pointed out that they wouldn't be allowed to buy it even if it existed- but they just cycle through fake sequel titles until they get bored and leave. Today, while they were doing their thing, a Real Customer came in and was shopping around.

"THIS IS TERRIBLE CUSTOMER SERVICE," one of the teenage bros shouted.

"You're not customers," I said.

"WE ARE TOO CUSTOMERS!"

"Customers buy things."

"WELL, I WAS GOING TO BUY SOMETHING, BUT NOW I'M OFFENDED SO I WON'T."

As they were huffing about in fake offense, the Real Customer picked out a game and came up to the register. He spoke quietly so the bros wouldn't hear him.

"I'm a high school teacher," he said sympathetically. "I know what it's like to get harassed on the job."

Thanks, guy! It's always good to have a reminder that the public isn't all bad.

"Your world is cutthroat!"

Words typed to me by my BFF She-Ra, Princess of Power as she forwarded me a link to this story, about a guy in London who was stabbed and robbed right after buying Grand Theft Auto V. 

I personally prefer this one, about some dudes in NYC who impersonated police officers to cut the line. 

This kind of thing happens at every release for every Hot New Item (just think of the moms mauling each other for Tickle Me Elmos and Zhu Zhu pets!), and probably wouldn't be national newsworthy if the title of the game weren't a felony. Nintendo actively discouraged retailers from having midnight release parties for the Wii U for this very reason.

But yes, working in a video game store is preeeetty hardcore.

September 17 can't come soon enough

"WHAT DAY DOES GRAND THEFT AUTO COME OUT?"

"September 17."

"WHAT DAY IS IT NOW?"

"...August 30."

"THAT'S TOO LONG."

And then he left without buying anything.

Just another day in my shopping center

I just got to work, and our parking lot is full of police cars. This sort of thing happens here a lot.

"Why are the cops here?" I asked. "Did we get robbed again?"

"Nah," said bossbro. "They were arresting someone at [restaurant next door]."

"Oh, ok."

Retail!

Place your bets

Just watched a guy steal a bunch of points cards. You know, the kind that have no value until activated at the register.

Currently taking bets on whether he comes back to the store to complain that they're not working.

Go Team Bossbro

I just watched one of our regulars openly plan to commit insurance fraud.

"You should've filmed it and blackmailed him," my brother told me.

"Which is also a crime," I said.

"Yep."

News from the Blogger mobile app

A guy just came in with a busted old Motorola smart phone.

"Can I sell this here?" he asked. "I found it on the bus."

I must have given him my Skeptical Retail Look.

"I've had it for a couple weeks and no one's called or anything."

I'm sure that has nothing to do with the fact that the battery died a couple weeks ago, sir.

In any case, we can't take an electronic device in if we aren't able to turn it on, so I sent him on his merry way.

BAM. Bloggin' on the clock, bitches.

Your criminal enterprise is bad and you should feel bad

PRO TIP: No one who isn't a shoplifter ever comes into any resale store to sell six of the same thing. FYI.

Team Awesome

My boss (henceforth "ladyboss") had an unusual habit. Whenever she had to deal with someone especially irritating, she would turn to the nearest employee and say:

"They're on your team."

Eventually, we decided these willy-nilly team accusations were a little disorganized, and so we delineated the teams for easy reference. Each employee is assigned a team, and we now had an effective shorthand code for referring to our problem customers. "That guy's on bossbro's team" is much less suspicious than "I just watched that guy try to shove an entire controller in his pants."

Ok, that'll make more sense when you read a little further.

For your reading pleasure, here are our teams:

1. People who are jerks for no reason.

[IMAGE DESCRIPTION: A Condescending Wonka meme. "Oh, you're a customer? Please enlighten me on how to do my job correctly."]

Some people are just huge jerks. For example, we have this one regular customer I'm gonna call Michael Bolton, because he shares his name with a celebrity. He's also a huge jerk. It's kind of a chicken-and-egg situation. Was he always a huge jerk? Or did he become a huge jerk because his name is Michael Bolton? We may never know.

Common subtypes: People who demand to speak to a manager just to try to get something for free, people who shout "NOTHING IS FREE!" when offered our free rewards card.

2. People who can't function in public.

[A Basement Dweller meme. "Real life? Never heard of that server."]

These are the people who refuse to ask for help, but just wander aimlessly through the store muttering under their breath about how they can't find what they're looking for. These are the people who ask questions about "FPSes" out loud. The guy who asked his mom to go ask me if I was single? This team. The guy who came into the store in sweatpants, then revealed he wasn't wearing underwear when he bent over to pick something up, thus exposing his enormous, pasty, pock-marked ass? This team.

Lest you think only men can make it onto this illustrious team, don't worry- women are just as bad. Let's talk about the lady who told me she had explosive diarrhea, ran out of the store, then came back half an hour later to shop some more.

Common subtypes: Neckbeards, bronies, anyone who asks you to repeat yourself more than once, people who still write checks.

3. Bros and criminals.

[A photo of a print-out sign from a store. "Shoplifters: Will be thrown into the pit of Carkoon to be digested over 1000 years by the almighty Sarlacc." That's a Star Wars joke. Old school.]

This team combo is efficient, because it covers everyone who hides their weed in their game cases. Seriously, a lot of people do that. After an ordinary day of work, I smell like an ass and I probably have enough of a contact high to get arrested for driving under the influence.

(Psst! This one is bossbro's team.)

Common subtypes: Potheads, drunkards, shoplifters, people who are openly selling their games for beer and/or drug money. People on this team usually travel in packs of three or more.

4. Unattended children and deadbeat parents.

[A tin sign that says "Unattended children will be given espresso and a free kitten." Darn skippy!]

If your kids are being annoying, what better place to take them than the Free Arcade? At least once a day we have some unleash their spawn on the store for the purpose of "keeping them entertained."

"Can I leave my kid here while I shop elsewhere?"

"Well, we close in five minutes, so as soon as we lock the doors we'll have to call the police to come pick up an abandoned child."

"Can't I just leave him here?"

Common subtypes: All of Deadbeat Dadurday.

5. The Wiiple.

[Some Wiiple. From a collection of hilariously awkward Wii marketing photos posted by Game Informer.]

Now, I get it. People shopping for Wii games are often shopping for little kids, which means they're not the ones using the Wii, so it's understandable that they might be a little clueless. I can deal with the fact that when someone says, "I need to buy a Wii game," there's a 50% chance they're talking about the actual console. But there's something about being out of their element that causes the Wiiple to freak out and have no idea what's going on. It always starts out pretty normal:

"Is this game appropriate for a 6-year-old? Will my daughter be able to play with her friends? What's it called? How much does it cost? Wait, how much does it cost again? What's a Wii game? Who are you? Where am I? What year is it?"

Common subtypes: People who only want bowling games, people who ask for Mario on the Xbox 360.

6. Team High Maintenance.

[An Annoying Customer meme. "Oh, you close in 5 minutes? I'm just going to browse."]

Salespeople exist to help you make purchases.

Salespeople do not exist for you to corner them like an animal and ask a million questions that no normal person would ever memorize the answer to. If you want ridiculously detailed system specs, guess what? We have Google for that. For the love of God, we have Google for that. See, look: I can Google that for you! Otherwise, I'll just read the text on the box that you apparently can't read, and I will judge you so hard.

Salespeople are not personal shoppers. Modern stores are designed specifically for independent browsing. If you're like "Hey, I came here to buy Hyperdimension Neptunia and I can't find it," I will happily find that shit for you. If you're like "Hey, I'm interested in one of these games but I want to know which one is the best game," I will happily give you my opinion. If you're like "Hey, I really like Hyperdimension Neptunia, what other games are like that?" I will offer suggestions. If you're like "Hey, I need you to stand right next to me and give me a full synopsis of every game I touch and haphazardly guess what my 8-year-old son would like the most even though you know nothing about him because I don't know how to Google (Hyperdimension Neptunia) and I have no independent thoughts also could you carry my stuff and hold my hand and stay late," then fuck you.

Common subtypes: People who interrupt you when you're helping someone else, people who freak out when they can't use our bathroom. (We're in between three restaurants and a huge grocery store, all of which have public restrooms.)

Well, those are the teams. More to be added later? Most likely.

"But blog writer lady," you might be saying. "If people figure out they can do all of this on their own, won't you be out of a job?" To which I say:

Whatever. My job is piss. 

Speaking of public intoxication

Today, we had to kick a man out because he had not one but two open alcoholic beverages in his hands. Double fisting in the video game store at 4:15 P.M.? Way to go, dude.

If you're too high to count, you shouldn't be shopping in a store

Today, a man came in to buy a couple video games, like people usually do at my job. He picked out two things that cost a total of $80, stumbled up to the counter, and pulled out a fistful of singles. I was getting his games ready, and he was not having any luck with his cash money. He said:

"I can't count. I smoked too much."

Really, bro? I offered to count his singles for him.

Bastard only had 70 of them.

"You don't have enough for both games," I said. "Want me to take out the cheaper one, and just get Black Ops 2?" I mean, of course he wanted to get Black Ops 2, he was publicly intoxicated. After some incoherent mumbling, I managed to get something that seemed like assent.

Black Ops 2 is $55, plus tax, bringing his total to- wait for it- $58-something. I gave him back $11-something and was fully ready to send him on his pot-soaked way.

"Um," he said. "I gave you $70."

YOU HIGH MOTHERFUCKER. WHY THE HELL DID YOU KNOWINGLY GIVE ME $70 FOR AN $80 PURCHASE, AND THEN MAKE ME COUNT IT FOR YOU. I HATE YOU ALWAYS.

"Yeah. Black Ops 2 was $58-something, so I gave you back $11-something." He made me re-count his change in front of him. Then he told me he'd be back for the second game, presumably after he sold some more weed.

He didn't come back.

Lest you think that this incredibly high non-counting man is exceptional in any way, allow me to provide you with some more drug-use highlights from my job:

The dealer who'd been given a PS3 in exchange for drugs instead of money, who then freaked out when we told him we wouldn't buy it without the cords.

The guy who tried to sell a PS2 to us that had a hole melted in the top from where a lit bowl had been set on it.

The guy who came in on 4/20 so high that he stumbled through a transaction without understanding a word anyone said to him, then crashed into the door trying to leave. The game was Warhammer: Space Marine.

The guy who traded in a game that had a bag of marijuana tucked in the cover, then screamed at us when we wouldn't give it back. (Actually, for any law enforcement officials reading this, video game cases are apparently a very popular place to stash contraband!)

Did I mention the guy who tried to sell us a PS2 that had a hole melted in the top from where a lit bowl had been set on it?

I don't get paid enough for this shit.

10 things customers do that make me assume they're criminals

It’s easy when you work retail to assume that everyone ever is trying to scam you. After all, 1 in 11 people have shoplifted,* and the majority of them do it (or started doing it) just because they can. Add that to the not-quite-illegal-but-still-gross new consumer culture of throwing a fit in the store to get free stuff, and I find customers the least trustworthy people ever. Here are ten shady customer activities that make me cast a jaundiced eye on the public.

1. Waiting outside the store before it opens for no reason

Who gets out of bed early on their day off, goes to a store before it opens, waits in their car for half an hour, rushes in the minute you unlock the door, and then tells you they’re “just looking”? What is that? Stop stealing accessories! Stop it!

2. Touching everything

“I only want to buy this tablet if I can tug on the demo unit until it detaches from the security device,” said no one ever. I’ve watched people do a full run of the store and yank on everything. I really wish that the alarm system would just shout “NONE FOR YOU!” over and over instead of beeping.

3. Giving me your Concealed Carry license when I ask for I.D.

What am I supposed to say to that? “Is this a hold-up”? My understanding is that you’re only supposed to show that to cops who are in the middle of arresting you for having a concealed weapon. Once I had someone tell me that he left his driver’s license at home. Why would you have your gun license on you, but not your driver’s license? So you drove here illegally, and you have a firearm concealed on your person? Swell!

This happens to me way too often, and I always want to tell them that they’re making the world a more dangerous place. Fuck guns.

4. Staring at the wall

You’ve been staring at Disney Universe for an hour without moving. No, you are not going to buy anything. No, you are not part of the scenery. No, you are not interested in Disney Universe.

5. Paying for tiny purchases with enormous bills

No, I will not break your Benjamin for a $5 pair of headphones. Besides the fact that that's how counterfeiters get free real cash, we usually don't even have enough cash in the drawer to do it, because of the theft that this post is about. Stop printing fake money in your basement. 

6. Hiding things in the store to “come back for them later”

The best is when people do come back and say “Hey, where’s my stuff? I left it behind the Halo display.” Well, I put it all back where it belongs because that’s my job. You could have just asked me to hold it for you, but that would make it way harder for you to walk out with it later. A conundrum! 

7. People who go out of their way to complain about customer service

When people have a tiny, easy-to-resolve problem but go right into the (obviously rehearsed) “terrible customer service” rant, you know they’re the sort of people who hop from store to store causing ridiculous scenes so that they’ll get free shit. While this may not be strictly criminal, it is shady as fuck, and also pretty damn depressing. Anyone willing to trade their dignity for a free sandwich is fewer than the average number of steps away from being willing to trade not-being-a-felon for a free TV, is all I’m sayin’.

8. Buying something, then returning it at another location

Oh, so you just happened to be all the way over here today, ten miles from the store where you bought this, with your receipt and the product you wanted to return? These people invariably want cash back for their return, but GUESS WHAT! If you paid with a gift card at the location in Towntenmilesfromhere, I’m giving you a refund on a gift card now. MuahahahaHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

No, seriously, people try to get free cash that way. All the time. For real.

9. Writing a check to purchase something in a retail store

It’s a regular occurrence at my store to come in and see a bag full of expensive stuff put on hold for someone.

“What’s that bag from?” you ask. And the answer is invariably, “Rubber check.”     

I think I’ve seen my store accept one check ever. Pretty much all stores don’t take them anymore because they are ALWAYS FAKE. Years of people assuming that writing a check equals “hey, free money!” have led to the demise of checks. Besides, if you have a checking account to begin with, doesn’t the bank give you a free check card? It’s exactly like writing a check, minus the part where you’re a lying, thieving tool.

10. Anyone who ever asks for any discount ever

“Great! Then I can come to your job and get you fired!”

* Information and statistics provided by the National Association for Shoplifting Prevention (NASP) a nonprofit organization providing research-based shoplifting prevention initiatives including education, prevention, justice and rehabilitation programs. Contact NASP: Click here to email us