What makes people think it's ok to be so rude?

Are they so self absorbed that they just don’t give a shit about anybody other than themselves?

Yes.

http://notalwaysright.com

@Seek_Kolinahr Great article! lol
That just about sums it up. Thank you for sharing and for the laugh!

They post about ten stories a day there. You can get lost for hours.

It’s a power thing. Customers in retail situations do have a little tiny bit of power: the retailer wants their money, and the customer is in a position to set the conditions for giving it up. There are people who just don’t deal well with even those tiny bits of power. It’s their moment to rule.

As Orwell wrote, ”‘How does one man assert his power over another, Winston?’

Winston thought. ‘By making him suffer,’ he said.”

Common courtesy has been replaced by common rudeness, and that’s only one of the many, many symptoms of the continuing general coarsening of our society—coarsening that can be found in language, humor, TV and movies, political and social discourse and on and on. As for rude customers, it’s not only unkind to the business person trying to help him/her, it is—if you’ll pardon the tiny pun— counterproductive for the customer.

Of course, rudeness happens on both sides of the counter. One day last week while I waited in line at a UPS Store, I was so appalled by how rudely the counter person treated the two people ahead of me that I walked out and vowed never to go back to that store, even though is only a few blocks from my home.

@Pachyderm_In_The_Room
Funny you should say that. I actually work at Staples and we offer UPS drop off. I have so many people come in there for that because the people that work at the UPS store across the street are so rude. Maybe being an asshole is a prerequisite to working at the UPS store. Haha

@thorninmud
Good point. It’s just too bad that people can’t find a between outlet to use the “powers”!
I have bad days too, but I don’t take it out on some poor innocent person behind the counter.

I do not work in retail and I can imagine it’s very hard to tolerate the rude, selfish people that retail workers have to deal with. However, slapping people is never acceptable. NEVER, unless for self defense or defense of a child or family member.

@jca
I wouldn’t have slapped her for real. It was just one of those things that went through my mind. lol
Besides, she wasn’t worth going to jail over.

Did you really throw her papers back at her? I can’t imagine doing such a thing. If you have a job in customer service… you are paid to provide customer service. Period. Granted, you have to put up with a lot of crap… but you get paid to take it and give back professionalism.

Some people really have very little respect for people in service jobs.

However, the situation might be that someone has fulfilled that same request she asked you for, either in your store or another store, and she is having a hard time understanding why you can’t get it done. It happens all too often that employees are clueless, give bad service, don’t care about satisfying the customer. It does not mean you are clueless, I just mean it prepares customers to get frustrated, because they have had several interactions over time with bad service, and this is happening more and more in my opinion.

As your manager I would not be very happy you even threw the papers back at her. I would write you up at minimum, maybe fire you. Did she actually toss them at your body or face? Or, just pushed them across the desk towards you. If she threw them at you I would escort her out as your manager. If you are not able to handle a situation, meaning you won’t be able to say yes to a customer and she is not accepting no, get your manager right away, don’t just keep saying no and think in your head, this woman is a rude lunatic. Your attitude comes through that you don’t care about helping her. A staff member saying no when a customer feels sure it should be yes will never be satisfactory to the customer, unless they have an ongoing relationship with you as a regular customer.

My advice is, and you might already do this, I am not assuming, is always have an attitude of wanting to help and wanting to say yes, even if it is impossible. If you just say no with no explanation you can come across as not giving a damn. This particular customer you describe sounds like an unreasonable bitch, so I am not saying she could have been calmed down no matter how nice you were, I am just talking in generalities.

When someone complains, the answer is, “thank you for bringing this to our attention,” not to be defensive. I saw this at exponential levels when I lived in Memphis, they could not handle a complaint to save their life. Even when a customer just was trying to help and not get anything, the people working at the retail establishment, restaurant, doctor’s office responded in a way that was unreasonable and ridiculous. No ability to take criticism and overcome it.

Always try to put yourself in the customer’s place.

I’m curious, did your manager do what the customer wanted? Or, did your manager also tell her no and get rid of her?

@Cupcake
I did. I’m not proud of it, however. She was just pushing all my buttons and I had had it with her. This wasn’t the first time she’d been in the store and it wasn’t the first time she’d been rude.
I actually told my manager what I had done. He wasn’t mad, he had seen how she was acting.

@Katniss: Did the Manager do what the customer wanted? Or did he tell her no and get ride of her (@JLeslie‘s question).

Well… repeat rude customers are certainly tough to handle. I’m fortunate to have never lost my cool with a customer (slightly less lucky with coworkers…). It sounds like your manager is supportive.

Repeat rude is very frustrating. Eventually the manager needs to tell the customer obivously your store cannot satisfy her, and maybe she should shop somewhere else.

I see you did not actually throw the papers back at her, that’s good.

@JLeslie
This is the thing. I’m generally the person that goes out of their way to be helpful. I’m also really good at calming down pissed customers, but this lady was just beyond reasoning with, and once she called me stupid, all bets were off.
This is the reason why I didn’t get in trouble. My manager knows that I usually just deal with the shit and go out of my way to be helpful. I have had numerous customers actually call him to tell him how much they appreciate me.
This one time I guess I just kinda lost it.

@jca my manager was able to explain to her that we were unable to help her. He was able to keep his cool and calm her down, somewhat. Completely opposite from the way it usually is. lol He rubs a lot of customers the wrong way.

They aren’t happy and instead of doing something about it they blame everyone else for their problems and take it out on others. Self absorbed is right. This isn’t just in retail. It’s everywhere.

Some folks are just cunts, it really is that simple.

@Katniss What I always did was figure that particular customer’s life was really sucky. She just takes it out on everyone, similar to what @jonsblond just said. Take pity on her, but also, do not let yourself be abused. Just get the manager like you did. Focus on the customers that you enjoy working with.

That’s the million dollar question. I’m pretty good at dealing with difficult people in my life/ job, the madder they get, the cooler I get (wish that translated to fluther more often.)

A lot of people seem to think the more they fuss, the more people will accomodate them, especially at a business, and often at my job, it’s true. So if it works, why stop.

@KNOWITALL Exactly, it does work sometimes. When service people get really quiet and kind of let me rant I am more frustrated not less. It does not calm me down, it makes me feel condescended to and basically ignored. This was a tactic I encountered in Memphis, they would also say things like, “I won’t be spoken to that way.” Realize I am not screaming at them or doing anything out of control like throwing something, I just am unhappy with their service and not accepting their answer.

@JLeslie
I can totally understand your point. If you’re getting bad customer service you’re absolutely within your rights to call them out on it. There is no excuse for treating a customer in a disrespectful way.
This lady was just beyond reasoning with. I just didn’t have the capability to do what she needed. I was beyond nice to her in the beginning. She just wouldn’t stop. I even told her where she could go to have it done. But it’s expensive and apparently she’s getting state aid and has a teenage daughter with a baby. Ok, not my problem. Perhaps if she’s so strapped for cash she shouldn’t be spending her money on frivolous things?
She’s just a nasty person.

@ucme You are SO right!!

@Katniss I understand, I am not assuming you did the wrong thing in the situation. She has put herself into a bad spot, but at least on this Q it does come through you judge her, hopefully it isn’t coming through when you try to help her. Did she use that as some sort of reason she should be helped, did she complain she is on state aid and has a teenage daughter with a baby as way to get some pity? What a mess. I’ll never forget on one Q here one of our jellies who I liked very much once stated that she didn’t understand why people think poor people on state aid shouldn’t have nice things. The Q was about computers and smart phones, that sort of thing. I was shocked by what she said. Being a single mother has turned into some sort of trump card to supposedly get sympathy and help whilst not being responsible with money compared to the many people who sacrifice when they have very little money, or even when they have quite a bit of money.

I agree with @Pachyderm_In_The_Room about the coarsening of society. I think part of it has to do with the increase in population. There are too many people, and yet we are far less directly dependent on the people in our local communities than we used to be. In these circumstances, and in a society that does not place a premium on courtesy anymore, it is easy to take people for granted and just view them as existing to fulfill your needs, instead of seeing yourself in a relationship of mutual obligation.

@JLeslie
It probably does sound like I’m judging her. I guess I am, in a way, not based on her living situation. I am also a single mom and if it weren’t for my family, I don’t know what I would have done. I’m judging her strictly on the way that she treats people. When I got rude with her, I wasn’t aware of her situation. I overheard her telling my manager about it.
I also don’t mean to sound like I’m judging people on state aid. Sometimes you just don’t have a choice. I do have a problem with “lifers”, however. Some people use it as a way of getting out of trying to find work and bettering themselves.
I hope that doesn’t come across as bitchy.

@Katniss You don’t sound bitchy. I think most people feel the same way.

@Katniss I know, it’s a gift of mine, along with being fluent in 3…count them 3 languages, English, sarcasm & profa…;-}

@ucme
That sounds really familiar. Where have I heard that before?? lol!!

Well yeah, I did take a peek, but it suits me down to the ground too.

@ucme That’s awesome!! I cracked up when I found it.
I also found one that said “You shut the fuck up when I’m listening to Bon Jovi”. I cracked up over that one too.
Yep. I’m very easily amused. lol

I generally treat people the way they treat me +. So if someone is nice to me I will be very nice to them, but if someone is a bitch to me, I will put it to shame by taking “bitch” to a whole new level.

Several years ago there was a lady I worked with who was absolutely notorious for being a bitch to customers and coworkers. She tried being a bitch to me once and I came right back at her with her bullshit, at the end of the night she apologized for being rude to me. One of my coworkers who had known her for 20 years witnessed her apology and asked me how I did it, he said in the entire time he’s known her he had never seen her apologize to anyone for her behavior, not even to her husband who was our boss. lol.

I was at the grocery store yesterday. There is one checker who always seems to have a scowl on her face and seems very unhappy in her job, although the other checkers at this store always seem rather pleasant and happy. So anyway, there were only 2 lines open and the other line was very long and I only had a couple of items. So I got in her line. The man in front of me was very cold and rude to the checker, I could see she was irritated, so I jumped up in front of her and said in a big happy tone, “Hi, how are you? It looks like you guys are super-busy right now.” She looked up at me and gave me a big smile and chit chatted for a bit while she was ringing me up. Sometimes I love to disarm these people who look so miserable. Most of the time it works.