50 Customer Service Workers Share Memorable Interactions That Continue To Haunt Them To This Day

I used to work in a luxury perfume shop while at uni, and I had more bizarre interactions than I can count. My favorite was an old lady. She came in, wearing a dirty house-coat and slippers, violently searching in the store. I asked her if I can help, but she said no, and went on with her search.

After a while, she came to me, and said:

"Ok, I give up, and just ask. Do you have horsefood?"

I told her politely, we didn't. And she started agressively yelling:

"I KNEW IT! I KNEW IT SO MUCH"

It took us at least 10 minutes to calm her down. She then filed a complaint, and left.

I have so many. I've done retail, food service, and call center work. The weirdest one was probably the Happy Meal guy from when I worked in rental car billing. That job I did both taking customer calls and responding to customer emails. I am so grateful this guy was an email, because I probably would have laughed in his face if he'd called.

So this guy rented a car from the Phoenix, AZ, airport in July. For anyone who isn't familiar, this is a desert in the western part of the US and it gets ungodly hot in the summer. Cook an egg on the pavement hot. Anyway, when he gets to the car he goes to put the contract in the glove box. But when he opens it, he finds a half-eaten McDonald's Happy Meal. Cheeseburger, in case anyone cares. At this point I'm thinking that's disgusting and the dude wants compensation for us not cleaning out the glove box properly. But no, that's not his issue.

He goes on to write that he naturally assumed this was a benefit of being one of our gold members, ***ATE IT***, and got sick. He wanted compensation for his medical bills, distress, and (I s**t you not) false advertisement. I gave him a coupon for a discount on his next rental and told him we apologized for improperly cleaning his vehicle.

I worked at a smoothie shop, I don’t have many wild stories other than the fact this dude came back and complained about how the smoothie was too cold and proceeded to yell at another employee. We didn’t know how to react, I was trying my hardest not to laugh, but... bruh. You go to an ice cream shop and say you want your money back after you discover ice cream is cold???

I’ve had customers come in and ask if we sold water, cell phones, and phone chargers.

I work at a paint store...

I’m a cable guy. Back when I was doing installs and trouble calls, this lady told me her cable worked fine but asked if I could help with something else real quick.

I had time so I said sure. She lead me to the bathroom and told me to be quiet. That was a quick change that made me feel very confused about what would happen next.

She asks me if I hear a scratching noise. I listen and I do indeed hear it. She proceeds to tell me it’s her pet turtle whom she lets roam around her house freely. Apparently the little guy found his way into an air vent that she normally kept covered up and she didn’t know how to get him out and wanted my opinion.

While this is going on, I hear what sounds like a little girl keep crying out “mama!” My confusion must have been pretty apparent because she then tells me that’s her Macaw. She leads me to the living room, takes the blanket off a cage I didn’t notice when I came in, and sure enough there’s a big white bird. It looks at me and just says “Hi!”

It was very strange.

She contacted animal control who I guess had a way to get the turtle out of the vent so he was all good. Not sure what they did but it worked so all is well.

I use to work in a small public library. There was an older business owner that came in for a weekly club/lunch meeting. These meetings were in a back meeting room that I had no control over. He came into the library a couple of times furious at me, because his chair was too cold. He informed me that for the rest of the winter I needed to sit in his chair before he got there, so his chair would be warm for him!

I worked as an it support tech for an online company. Usually we do password resets and stuff. Had a woman call in because she forgot her password. Wouldn't give me any information that I could use to help her. She then accused me of racism. How could I know what race she was over the phone, without knowing anything about her. She yelled many times at me and demanded some free stuff cause...racism. she called me a honky and hung up. I'm not white.

ive worked at several restaurants. however...about a year ago, this is how a convo went with this lady:

"hello there. what can i get you today"

"i would like a sub"

"ok, what type of sub would you like?"

"ya know..a sub, just make me a sub"

"ma'am we have over 12 different types of subs here..."

*she points at my boss*

"oh he makes it when i come in sometimes..he knows how i like it!!"

my boss, very confused goes "oh yes..hi! nice to see you again" with a "who the f**k is this lady?" look on his face

he says "and what sub am i making? what type?"

she goes "ya know..my sub"

he goes "..ok? what type though?"

she starts to get very mad and goes "MY sub! the one you make me all the time when i come in" despite her coming in only once every month or something.

he goes "i dont know what sub that is. was it turkey? roast beef?"

she goes "sigh..no it's not it's a SUB"

boss goes "italian? we call it "the sub" here.

she goes "oh yes! that's it! a SUB"

he goes "ok, coming right up" just wanting to say gtfo lol

so boss says "what size bread?"

her - "sized bread? what is sized bread?"

boss - "we have three sizes, 6 10 or 12 inch"

her - "idk...i just want a sub!! is that hard?"

at this point i was getting pretty pissed off and so was my boss. i dont know if she was drunk? under stress? high? idk..she was getting pretty upset clearly.

she goes "just give me the biggest one..biggest one!"

he goes "want white or wheat bread?"

this is when all education went out the door....she asks "white or wheat for what?"

my boss..clearly pissed off..goes "for the bread.. would you like it on white or wheat bread" she seriously says "what kind of question is that? its a f*****g SUB ok?"

at this point , if i were the boss i would have told her to please leave, dont talk like that to me, but my boss kept on asking her to the point she said "just make MY sub! biggest one!!"

he makes her sub...white bread, default way we make it she says it's for here. she gets the super sub..which is our biggest sub and she goes "this was on wheat bread! why is it on white?"

she throws the tray with the sub on it back on the counter by the cashier and goes "im not eating this f*****g thing! this isnt MY SUB like you made it before!"

boss says - "ma'am..how am I supposed to know what you had for lunch in my restaurant a month ago? i have hundreds of orders a day..and you expect me to remember yours all the time?" she says "well you do it with others!!"

boss says "ma'am...those people come in 3 sometimes 4 times a week and order the same thing..and have been coming in here for more than 8 years. she says "so what?! just make my damn sub!!"

he said "i made your sub, it's right in front of you now i have to get back to making orders for the others you cut in line when you wanted to complain"

she told us and raged "i hope somebody comes in a shoots you all up with a machine gun you f*****g a******s" and stormed out.... O.o we never saw her again. ever.

THAT was the most f****d up thing that ever happened to me working with the public

I had a lady hit me in the head with a plastic spoon becuase I told her I couldn't order the McDonald's "square spoons" for her shake becuase we were, in fact, Arby's.

The most bizarre was when an old guy (a frail, grandpa-esque person in his 70's maybe) spent about twenty minutes just... complimenting me. Telling me stuff like my eyes "shine with kindness and intelligence" and that my face is "the classic, innocent beauty of the muses" (cue all-encompassing "lolwhut" on my part). Then my boss called my name (a fairly generic one that I unfortunately happen to share with a fairly well-known poet's muse), which prompted him to launch into *a f*****g poem*. Never in my life have I felt more uncomfortable, and I couldn't even excuse myself because I just.... couldn't get a word in. He even asked his (similarly old, female) friend to come over and look at me as well. It was incredibly creepy and strange and awful.

My boss had to shove a stack of (mostly blank) papers into my hand and give me a b******t task to complete, just to get me away from there with minimal fuss. The worst part? I saw the guy wandering around the store around closing as well, and he only seemed to scamper away when my boyfriend showed up to pick me up.

I have a really nice positive one for you. Still odd though cos it was Glastonbury.

I was working the front counter in the cafe at the foot of the Tor, loved it, and would make people feel welcome. Well a guy came in, looking like a full on Buddhist monk. Orange robe, shaved head etc. He had started travelling, got a small house truck together with his family, and was asking a few questions about the area. My girlfriend and I gave him as much help as we could, even invited him to out house later. We made him feel good and welcome.

Just before he left, he took my hand and pressed something into it and folded my fingers over. Told me "thank you very much etc" and turned to leave. I opened my hand and there was a bud of nice quality skunk.

She bought one item and I asked her if she wanted a bag. She screamed, "I was hoping you wouldn't ask that stupid-a*s question! Is there some rule that black people don't want bags?!?!" and I still did not know whether she wanted a bag or not so I awkwardly put her item down in front of her. She threw it into a bag and huffed away.

I was a page at NBC Studios in Burbank in the early 2000's and part of our job was working the gift shop and ticket counter for the Tonight Show.

Two guys come in and say "We're here for the Lakers game." I was like "Uh... I'm sorry, that game isn't here, it's over at the Staples Center." One of them just gives me a look and says "It's NBC, right?"

I proceed to explain to him that while NBC is airing the Lakers game, we don't shoot it at the studio, and we take our cameras and crew and shoot it at the Staples Center where the Lakers play.

The one guy turns around and scribbles on a piece of paper and hands it to me. It says "2 Lakers Tickets for [Insert Random Name]" and he says like "What about this, huh?"

Thankfully my supervisor jumped in and said "Oh, you'll have to come back Thursday morning, we'll see you then, okay?" and that seemed to placate them and they left. My supervisor tells me this happened quite often and when you tell them to come back, they rarely do.

I used to work in a call centre form a mobile phone network.

Many years ago a customer called as he had entered his PIN too many times and blocked his phone. After doing data protection checks I told him that I had a ten digit code that would restore his phone and asked if he had a pen and paper. He confirmed he had and I proceeded to read out the number, at which points he says ‘not on me’.

Why did he think I was asking if he had a pen and paper if not to write something down! I wasn’t asking if he owned stationery.

I also had one customer complain that he had glued tin foil to his phone to stop it giving him cancer, but now he could not get a signal.

Former Retail Manager here. I have a million, but the one that stuck out to me as the most was this weird guy who never spoke all and would always come in late at night. One night about an hour after we closed I was getting ready to leave when I start walking towards the alarm and there's the dude standing in the middle of the aisle staring me dead in the eyes. I froze for a good 10 seconds then asked him if he was OK and that we were closed. In response he frowned, pulled up his shirt and rubbed his belly. I repeated that we we closed, walked over to him and started to walk him towards the entrance. When he realized what I was doing he turned and ran deeper into the store. I was debating calling the cops, but I had been there for 11 hours already and didn't want to spend another hour dealing with them, so I decided to follow him and try again.

I caught up for him in the bulk candy/nuts section. He was standing staring at banana chips. I told him we were closed and he started to wailing on the big making some high pitched whining sound. I broke and gave him so banana chips. He smiled and was passive enough for me to walk him to the door. When we got through the first set of doors I spun around and locked them, when I turned around he was inches away from me and gave me a big hug. Shocked and weirded out I sorta just stood there, then he pulled his face right into my face whispered "you big good" and gave me a peck on the cheek. I took a step back into the door, he ran his wet fingers through my beard, and skipped out into the darkness.

I work in a government office. A dude came in with a can opener to threaten the receptionist

I’m a bus driver, once had someone sprint like Usain Bolt to catch my bus, then proceed to tell me he has no way of paying the fare but needs to get the bus to the hospital as he has broken his leg! Needless to say, he didn’t get a free bus ride from me.

This one was really weird and creepy. I work at a restaurant and it's a Subway style place, food is prepared in front of the customer and it is relatively quick. It is a family restaurant. I was 17 and my coworker was 19 at the time, both of us are girls.

Customer comes in with his family, man is about 30+ and has three small children, wife's attention is on the kids. He asked if my coworker and I were my boss's daughters, which we get asked a lot because he has a daughter our age and she used to work there before moving out. We laugh and say no, but that he's like a dad to us sometimes because he's really nice, remembers our birthdays, gives us life advice and treats us like family.

We say this to the customer and he smiles in a really creepy way, and says, "So does he take you to the back and spank you if you're being naughty?" I didn't know what to say so I just laughed and asked what he would like to order. Any time he comes by the restaurant, my coworker and I send someone else to help him because he really creeps us out.

I’m a dental technician so I just make dentures. I don’t deal with the patients too often unless the assistants ask us to come out there and take a look. We had a call from a lady that said her teeth were moving so they told her to come in to the office. She shows up and they call the technicians out there and we’re looking at her teeth and thinking there’s an absurd amount of plaque around the base of her teeth but we notice the teeth aren’t really wiggling or anything. When we brought up the plaque she corrected us and told us it was gorilla glue to stop the teeth from moving around.

Don’t do drugs kids.

I work at an adult store. Door is open, lights are on, music is in. Guy walks in, I greet him and he asks if the shop is open. I reply yes, he turns around and walks out. Still not an actual clue what that was about.