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Elder
Member Since Jun 2007
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Posts: 5,518
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#1
My son went to the AT&T store to upgrade his phone. There were quite a few people in the store at the time. A woman was yelling at the clerk over some problem with her bill, demanding that he fix something he didn't have the authority to fix. As she became more rude, she hesitated and asked about his race. She said "Are you Italian?" He said "No." She said "You're MEXICAN aren't you!! G**D****d Mexicans can't do ANYTHING right!" She then proceeded to really talk down to the clerk. The clerk remained calm through the entire ordeal, trying to focus her back onto her bill.
While the woman was verbally brutalizing the clerk, the people in the store just stood by and watched. My son finally walked up to the woman and said "Lady, the problem with your bill has NOTHING to do with him, the color of his skin, OR his nationality." After she left, my son told the clerk "Dude, that was an AMAZING display of composure." The clerk, also a college student, was very grateful to him. They both knew he would be fired if he dared to defend himself against her hateful attacks. I'm proud of my son for speaking up to the woman and consoling the clerk afterward. I'm disappointed in the other people present who thought it was funny and remained silent. I'm angry at the woman for her hateful rudeness. I HOPE we cross paths one day. If we do, what do you think I should say and/or do to teach her the basics of humanity? |
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Veteran Member
Member Since Aug 2009
Location: woodville, swadlincote, England
Posts: 450
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#2
OMG i can't believe people would actually do that! I mean, OMG
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KathyM
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Grand Member
Member Since Aug 2009
Posts: 537
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#3
Greetings,
When it comes to customer service, I always keep in my an old, yet still pretty famous saying: " The customer is always right. " Though, as a customer, I also keep in mind that abusing such a motto, is not right either. Therefore, I am always respectful at all times. Have a good one. |
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KathyM
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Member
Member Since Nov 2009
Location: NS, Canada
Posts: 114
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#4
"The customer is always right". My arch nemesis. :P
Really though, sometimes the customer is just plain out wrong. When I worked at a dollar store in the city, people would whip that phrase out for every old thing! Even if they could not possibly be more wrong. I love providing excellent customer service, but I can not bend the fabric of space and time in order to make some people correct. lol For example, I used to get people in the store and they would ask for a product that we have never sold. (Car tires, most notably. Who would buy car tires from a dollar store?!) I would tell them "I'm sorry, but we do not sell that product." If I could, I would recommend another store that carries what they are looking for or recommend a similar product that we do carry. Usually it was fine and it ended there. Every once and awhile, we'd get someone who insisted that we DO in fact sell that product and I should look for it "in the back". We did not have storage in the store. It was a very small store and all our purchases went directly out onto the shelves. Plus, all the stock was put out by me because I was the stock manager so I saw everything that store ever had. I would tell them that we don't have any storage and they would call me a liar and ask to speak to my boss. When confronted with the same answers from him, they would usually storm out of the store, cursing, swearing never to return again! Sometimes, there's really nothing we can do. I loved working at that store. It had such a great community feel and so many of the customers were little old ladies who were there several times a week. I always knew what they were there for and when the salespeople came in to get us to sell their wares, it made me so happy to find items that I knew the customers were asking after. It felt like we were all working together to make everyone happy! But every once and awhile, someone really angry and demanding would come in and just ruin everybody's day. If someone aggressive like that comes in, it really is better just to lose them as a customer than to try and keep them around. All the yelling always scared the little old ladies and made them feel unsafe. Safety was so important in our shop. |
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KathyM
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Elder
Member Since Jun 2007
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Posts: 5,518
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#5
Thanks
I think some people believe being assertive means to be mean and condescending. They think "freedom of speech" entitles them to verbally abuse other people They don't understand and don't consider the consequences of their words and behavior. They live in a bubble. What gets me about this incident is the bigoted personal attack against the clerk. An attack like that hits to the core. Having to endure such abuse on a daily basis, never knowing when it's going to strike, really wears on a person's soul. At this point in time, certain groups are fair game because many political and religious leaders have given them an evil label. Everyone else just stands by and watches the show. I've spent over 50 years listening to racial and ethnic bigotry, and my cup overflowed long ago. It serves absolutely no one, and needs to stop. |
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Onward2wards
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Legendary
Member Since Jun 2007
Location: Washington DC metro area
Posts: 15,865
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#6
Quote:
Kathy, I think you are jumping to a conclusion here. My guess is that other people remained silent because they were afraid -- not because they thought it was "funny". Quote:
As to what you "should" do -- remonstrate with her in the gentlest but very determined way, if you can manage that. Not easy to do, is it? __________________ Now if thou would'st When all have given him o'er From death to life Thou might'st him yet recover -- Michael Drayton 1562 - 1631 |
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Perna
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Pandita-in-training
Member Since Sep 2006
Location: Maryland
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#7
The other woman was horribly rude in her anger and misunderstanding that the clerk in the store could not help her. However, what I disliked most about her tirade was the volume of it, not what she said? What she said was equivalent to me of "Your mother wears combat boots"; it didn't apply to the clerk himself, Italians or Mexicans; had I been there, it would have been embarrassing to me because of how ignorant and prejudiced the woman was and she didn't even know it; it's like when you see someone with snot on their nose or spinach on their teeth and they're not aware. But the volume would get me and would have made me angry. I would have reminded the woman that her ignorance and rude expressions of her prejudice were not my problem and I didn't wish to hear about them and would she like me to get a Mall security officer to help her out of the store or could she find the door herself!
__________________ "Never give a sword to a man who can't dance." ~Confucius |
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KathyM
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Elder
Member Since Jun 2007
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Posts: 5,518
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#8
Hi Pachyderm
No, it's not easy. My husband became friends with a neighbor at the park while they were with their dogs. He sounded like the kind of friend my husband needed in this neighborhood, so I was happy. Everything was a perfect fit, with the exception of the man's overwhelming hatred for black people. He couldn't go one night without saying something horrible about them. He invited me to meet his friend, but warned me about some of the conversation. Out of respect for my husband, I was cordial - but I SOOOOOO wanted to strangle his friend at times. As the days went by, I tried to counter his disparaging remarks or gently point out the hypocrisy in his words. It grew sooooo tiresome. One day the man came over to our house to return something he'd borrowed from my husband. We weren't home, so my son (half-black) answered the door. We met him at the park that night and he told us he stopped by and met our son. Knowing he was from my first marriage, he asked "What is he?" When I told him he was black, I could see the wheels turning in his head - thinking about all the horrible things he had said to us about our son. |
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Grand Member
Member Since Jul 2009
Location: Iowa
Posts: 822
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#9
we try to give customers what they want and always do our best to be civil and polite and above and beyond service but if they are rude and wrong than that old "the customer is always right" has to go out the window.
__________________ How I long to be up rather than down, the eternal sorrow that I only escape for short periods. This must be how Persephone felt. "Sleep. Those little slices of Death. How I loathe them." Edgar Allan Poe Loving yourself must come first from there comes love for everything else. |
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KathyM
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Legendary
Member Since Jun 2007
Location: Washington DC metro area
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#10
Depends on how you mean "the customer is always right". If you mean the customer always has to be respected, even when they are "wrong", then this can be a correct policy (I think).
__________________ Now if thou would'st When all have given him o'er From death to life Thou might'st him yet recover -- Michael Drayton 1562 - 1631 |
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Elder
Member Since Oct 2007
Location: Durham,nc
Posts: 5,431
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#11
Unfortunately in the last couple of decades manners and professional courtesy have gone out the window. I listen to my younger collegues talk to business contacts on the phone, and many of them sound very unprofessional.
I blame in part our need for instant gratification, which has been made worse by technology, for the way people act sometimes in public. Kathy, your son handled himself with dignity and great restraint, he is more of what we need in this society, so a round of applause is in order. |
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KathyM
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Elder
Member Since Jun 2007
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Posts: 5,518
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#12
Hi Perna
Her tirade DID apply to the clerk himself because he was of Mexican heritage. It also applied to his mother and all his friends and relatives. It's much worse than saying "You (or your mother) wear combat boots." It's like saying "You are an inadequate human being and do not deserve to exist - a stain on the earth, an unwanted "alien" to be destroyed." If people personally insulted you in such a way on a daily basis, what would you do and what would you expect from the spectators around you? Not only did it insult the clerk, it insulted my son. My husband, his father, is of Mexican heritage. He loves his father VERY much. If she ever dared to get in his face with such an attitude, I suspect she'd be in for some serious consequences. He's had his fill of bigotry too. Would it have been better for the clerk and my son if she had whispered this to them? |
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Elder
Member Since Jun 2007
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Posts: 5,518
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#13
For the health and welfare of the business, it might be a correct policy - but what if Bridgie had used the word "bully" instead of "customer?" Why should an abusive bully be respected, and how would you teach this lesson to children?
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Onward2wards
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Grand Magnate
Member Since Oct 2002
Location: NW Arkansas
Posts: 3,734
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#14
The woman was WRONG in what she did but maybe there are things going on in her life that we don't know about. Maybe her mother is dying of cancer, her husband just left her, her car broke down on her on the way there and there wasn't any toothpaste in the tube when went to use it this morning. Maybe she was just having a bad day. Maybe under normal circumstances she is a very delightful person but that day she chose to not be delightful and respectful.
What your son did is AWESOME!! I am very glad he stook up for the little people and helped the clerk out. But trying to figure out what mean things to say to her if you would see her again, I guess I would try to figure out what nice things to say to her to help her in her situation. Jan __________________ I appreciate long walks especially when taken by people who annoy me. Noel Coward |
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pachyderm
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Elder
Member Since Jun 2007
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Posts: 5,518
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#15
Quote:
Quote:
She inadvertently insulted me as well, even though I was not there, and it made me absolutely furious. What has she done that would make me want to ease her pain instead of my own? Why should I try to help her in her situation when my situation is probably much worse? |
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Legendary
Member Since Jan 2007
Location: U.S.
Posts: 10,383
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#16
I would have been one of those who remained silent, but I don't think it's funny. I bet most people who remained silent did NOT think it was funny. I would have been terrified. I can't handle anger and hostility. This person sounds unbalanced. I probably would have left the store. I always counsel my daughters to not lose their cool in situations like that and to remove themselves from the situation when angry and irrational folks are letting loose. Who knows, they could whip out a pistol and start firing, in road rage fashion. I had a friend shot in a road rage incident so I take the angry folks very seriously and give them a wide berth, for safety's sake, and also because of my own fear of the angry and the hostile. If I had been the clerk, I probably would have said excuse me and gone into the back room and called the mall security and not come back out until the person was gone. With no one to yell at, possibly the angry woman would have soon left, or if she hung around, hopefully security would arrive quickly and remove her. I don't believe the job description includes being the object of rage, and concern for safety would prompt me to vacate. Call me a coward, but at least I'm still alive.
__________________ "Therapists are experts at developing therapeutic relationships." |
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KathyM
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Legendary
Member Since Jun 2007
Location: Washington DC metro area
Posts: 15,865
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#17
__________________ Now if thou would'st When all have given him o'er From death to life Thou might'st him yet recover -- Michael Drayton 1562 - 1631 |
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KathyM
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Pandita-in-training
Member Since Sep 2006
Location: Maryland
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#18
Quote:
__________________ "Never give a sword to a man who can't dance." ~Confucius |
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KathyM, lynn P.
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Wisest Elder Ever
Member Since Oct 2008
Location: Notzville
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#19
I have first hand knowledge of bullies and bigots.These are the quotes I carry with me as reference and protection from those people.
'Tis better to be silent and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt. - Abraham Lincoln Never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by stupidity. - Nick Diamos __________________ notz |
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KathyM, OneMinute, pachyderm
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#20
I've had many jobs in the customer service field, most of them were call center, and I spoke to alot of irritated/disgusted people on the phone. I don't care how bad of a day someone has, it gives them NO RIGHT to be abusive in any way to anyone. I've had people threaten me that they would call the police, imagine that. Now what the heck can the police do? They just shouted things to me on the phone, not even taking a second to listen to me at all. I would end the call. I'm not going to put up with that. Of course we are trained to deal with those kind of people on the phone. They're were scripts on the computer we had to follow, but sometimes with people that were really abusive, you had to think on your own in how to calm them down. I used to work with a lot of young people also, in reference to what Tim said earlier, and most of them did NOT know how to handle any call. They had a "I don't give a crap attitude". Some of them were absolutely awful sounding on the phone, not professional at all, and those are the ones that get hired. Hmmm I don't miss that kind of work at all.
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KathyM
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