How's THIS for a BS complaint?

[Kusanagi]

I just got an email forwarded to me from corporate.

Our company has a website that allows you to give feedback. Of course, it's abused by lying customers and very rarely does any praise make it there.

Basically, if someone has a complaint about a particular store/employee, the mail gets sent to the store for management to take care of.

Here's a quote directly from the email.

"On Wednesday, 8-2, I went to your store located on (my store.) While looking in through the front window, I noticed the employee on duty there (at least, I THINK he was your employee, but by the way he was acting, I am not so sure) seated in one of your pieces of furniture, reading a book and wearing headphones. I was so shocked by this unprofessionalism, that I decided to take my business elsewhere. You have lost a customer and I will never walk into another one of your stores again. I sugguest the employee who was exhibiting such behavior be severely reprimanded or replaced. If he is, I may reconsider purchasing from you."

I didn't know wether to or

I will explain. Anyone who works in retail in the field I do knows you get ALOT of down time. Some days I will work for 11 hours and not see a single person walk in. Our computer crashed on Monday and just now we got it up and running.

Almost 5 full days of no computer means no order processing. Basically, all I was doing was answering questions then sending them to a different showroom to make the purchase.

My desk is clearly visible from the plate glass windows that make up two walls of our store. My foot is still broken, and since the computer was completely down, I brought in my iPod and a novel to read. I was sitting at the desk, leaning back in the office chair, passing the time until customers came in. And they were very understanding. I mean, who flips out when you walk in and see someone reading when they have nothing else to do? When most customers come in and the computer is up, I'm surfing the web so at least it gives the impression that I am busy since they can't see the monitor.

I got permission from my manager to reply to her email, as it was basically complete BS, and am curious as to how I will craft my reply.

What's the most utter bullshit complaint a customer has ever tried to get you in trouble over?

[Mixed Bag]

That's not only an understandable way to spend down time, it's less unsettling than the time I saw a customer sitting so still in a store chair that I thought they were part of a display.

[Cyanocobalamin]

Yeah. I've got it.

I just remembered this from about 5 years ago.....
This self-entitled byatch needed a personal shopper!! In BTS season, peak hour of business, no less. She just wouldn't believe I wasn't allowed to leave the register to retrieve all the items on the school supply lists. This school even listed the UPCs of most of the items the students needed.

Yet Byatch was just afraid of selecting the wrong stuff and threatened to "write a letter" because I "wasn't being helpful." Fortunately the CSM on duty backed me up saying that I indeed, could not leave the area. I think I ended up finding a few things for Byatch when she spied me coming back from my break.

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

I had some wench ask to see my name tag because I dared to say "excuse me" to her when I tried to pass her with a cart of merchandise. She said I'm always supposed to let the customer go first. This was something that came up on the training software when I started, but never ever is followed on the floor because then you'd never be able to move across the store. So I figured she was somebody from corporate trying to get me in trouble.

She said she'd tell my manager. I never heard anything else about it.

[Mixed Bag]

If it was an older man I'd think it was the same indignant customer I heard go on about how it's the customer in front who's responsible for putting the divider on the belt.

[Crow The Robot]

She didn't even, go in?? Yeah, file that one under BS. You could write back,
"Madam: that was not an employee but a humanoid robot, which we tested for a day, to see if it's life-like. Judging from your reaction it is, so thankyou for your input. Do to budget, constarints we shall not be purchasing said robot. Also since the robot is not an employee we cannot reprimand it. The next time you WALK IN to one of our stores you will be greeted by a customer-service reprentative. Thank you ."
Jeez, louise! What did this chick expect,to see you scurrying about (on crutches) dusting furniture, or arranging furniure (again on crutches), the fact that the woman just looked in the window ,and didn't go in, is a sign of this chick's suckiness.

[Imogene]

This story did NOT happen to me, but my store was involved in this ridiculous complaint...
One day, at Chesterfield, Nice AM and I were doing our usual, store was mostly dead.
All of a sudden, one of Nice AM's friends/ex-coworkers from the Bombay company next door comes in, and weaves a tale that shocked us both, as I was in hearing range (Hell, the entire store was hearing range for me)
She had had a customer come into the store and just plop herself down in a leather chair. Said woman motioned one of the Bombay employees over to her, and yelled "Get me a water!" once the employee was near to hand.
Employee told her "I have none to get you. There's a water fountain down the hall, though."
W: "Well, get me a cup of water from it, then!"
E: "I can't leave the store. I'm afraid you'll have to go to the fountain yourself."
Repeat ad nauseum.
Employee leaves woman to fester, as the store was mightily busy by that point.
A little while later, same employee overhears woman talking to someone about "That C*nt next door!"
Which, of course, gave the employee a reason to boot the woman out of the store. And scuttle off to tell her coworkers, and foreseeing the old bat telling the next store she plopped her mighty self down into about the employee and how rude she had been.

[ArenaBoy]

Two weird complaints: The first time, I was at the VIP chains and one car wanted to go through. I waved my hand in the motion that meant go back, you can't cut through here. The driver said my hand signal meant come here and was going to complain to my manager. The 2nd time, I refused to give a guy a receipt when I was a cashier at a drive. The guy claimed he left it in his other car. (Yeah right, I've been at the drive all day I would've remembered you.) I give him the spiel of you have to pay and he asks for my name and my last name. Thankfully, my supervisor put an end to him and made him pay. All that just for one receipt geez.

On your response e-mail, be honest. Explain that there is plenty of downtime and that you are able to help if the SC politely gets your attention. If that fails, just say that you find it entertaining to see customers try to get your attention.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

I'd like to address Kusanagi's post.

She says she wasn't sure if it was an employee or not, but the sight of a person, possibly a customer sitting in a chair was enough to drive her from the store?

Wow.

Can you imagine what it must be like to be that person?

[ladodger34]

On your response e-mail, be honest. Explain that there is plenty of downtime and that you are able to help if the SC politely gets your attention. If that fails, just say that you find it entertaining to see customers try to get your attention.

I'll second this...

After writing a few (okay, more than alot) response letters to complaints and such, the best advice that I can give you is to stick to the facts. Let her know the computers were down and that you were given permission to read and listen to your iPod*. Explain that your foot is broken and thus you have to sit unless you are helping a customer. Find a way to tell her that while she may have perceived you to be "lazy", it certainly wasn't the case and that you'll be more than happy to help her the next time she comes into the store. Also find a nice way of saying "how the hell does she know that you are unprofessional when she never stepped foot in the store?"

While I am out of practice with these type of letters (it's been a year or so), you can still zing the heck out of a customer without really zinging them.

* you might want to leave the part out about having permission to read and listen to your iPod. Sometimes this gives SCs a reason to complain about your supervisor.

[Reyneth]

* you might want to leave the part out about having permission to read and listen to your iPod. Sometimes this gives SCs a reason to complain about your supervisor.

Maybe something along the lines of "Because the computers were down and all paperwork and other normal store operations that could be completed, had in fact been completed, I was permitted to make use of my free time in a constructive manner unrelated to store duties. The moment any customer enters my store, I am completely attentive to them and help them out to the extent possible based on the current computer system limitations."

IE, bitch - there's nothing for me to do, and if you had bothered even walking in, you would have seen that, and that I would help you, not ignore you!

[LostMyMind]

The in me would make some comment about the iPod being used to "train" salesman on how to service people, and the book is required reading for "sexual sensitivity" training.

[Kusanagi]

I'd like to address Kusanagi's post.

She says she wasn't sure if it was an employee or not, but the sight of a person, possibly a customer sitting in a chair was enough to drive her from the store?

Wow.

Can you imagine what it must be like to be that person?

I was sitting in the desk area, and I was in plain sight of the door. Actually, the whole showroom is, it's pretty easy to see that I was the only one in the store and the employee.

Here's my response (and yes, I have the coolest manager in the world, as he let me write this like he was the one responding. He agreed that it's total BS and I am much better at the subtle sarcasm than he is. He signed his name to it after I wrote it because "you put it better than I could. I just would have told her to f--- off.")

"Dear -----

We are sorry that you feel you were treated unfairly by our company. However, based on your email, there are a few things that need to be addressed.

1) We have alot of downtime in our store, due to the nature of our business. During that downtime, our associates are free to spend it as they wish as long as all other showroom duties are completed. We have no policy against personal music players or reading a novel when there is nobody in the store. On that day, Kusanagi completed all store tasks by 11:AM, and our computer was down that day. Surely, Ms. ----, you have never read a book or listened to music while you have needed to pass time?

2) Your email says you did not enter the showroom. Because of this, our associate did nothing wrong. If you had entered and he then continued to read or listen to music and ignore you, then it would be a customer service issue because you would have been treated poorly as a customer.

Because of your own admission that you did not enter the showroom, you were not a customer and our associate did nothing against our polices. We are unable to reprimand Kusanagi in this situation, as he did nothing wrong.

We hope this clarifies our position in this matter.

Sincerely,
The coolest manager in the world.

Lets see how many gaskets she blows wth THAT reply.

[WHShit]

You see, this is what I just can't comprehend!

Why does she CARE? Were you bothering her? Did you assault her? Did you hurt her feelings? Did you insult her? Did you give her a nasty look? NO NO NO NO NO!!!!

WHY in the holy hell does she care?

The only time she should care is if she was trying to get your attention and you couldn't hear her cause you were listening to music, or if you would not look up from your book.

She did not even know that you were an employee, so what the damn was the POINT of this email?

This is what makes me angry...something that has nothing to do with anything...like how I can't wear short-sleeved shirts when the air con is broke and it is 90 degrees instore...I have tattoos and the customers may be offended. Why? If I give them good, friendly helpful service, who cares if I have tattoos? It is 2006, come on! I have even had people compliment me on my tattoos (I wore a short sleeved shirt the days the manager had vacation).

Anyway...yeah! lol

[karma_gypsy]

You know, I've seen what happens when people get bored too and there's nothing to do . . .
Reading a book and listening to an iPod isn't the end of the world, especially if you had permission.