Honour

Clara felt her ears burn. Her eyebrows knotted. Her jaw clamped. Her fingers threatened to snap in half the body of the cheap blue biro that was in her sweaty hands.

“... A cardigan is clearly a top,” leered the man. “They’re not pants, are they?”

“Yes, but they are not part of the deal,” Clara said, as calmly as she could.

“Well, that’s obviously misleading! This is false advertising,” said the woman dramatically.

“You need to honour this deal with the cardigan.”

Clara surveyed her antagonists, her mind sighing and wondering if the fuss was even worth it. They were both overbearing, self-important individuals who were all too accustomed to having someone shove their throats with a silver spoon. They were spoilt brats who have grown up thinking they can get whatever they want just by kicking up a fuss. They were, simply, utter arse holes.

He was the type who covered his steroid-charged biceps with stupid tattoos, probably to overcompensate for the lack of width and length his flaccid penis possessed. He looked like a gorilla wearing a white tank top. From the embellished trucker hat on his giant head, down to his scummy grey thongs on his fat hairy feet, everything about him screamed “big skull, tiny brain”. She was the type who always had a “thing” for over-bulky men with tiny wangs and usually (but not always) enjoyed a fuck or two with the man’s best friend. Dark hair and orange fake tan, her voice was nasally and she always over emphasised her “s” and “th” sounds. Clara wanted to throw the store’s calculator at their faces, and maybe even throw in a stanley knife or two. Or jab her biro into their eyes.

Whatever was easiest and most painful.

“Other customers have never complained that they were misled by these signs. I am very sorry that you think that they are misleading, but I can’t sell this cardigan and this singlet for thirty dollars. The cardigan itself is already thirty,” said Clara.

“Are you calling us stupid?” growled the man.

“No, not at all. I’m just saying that I’ve never had other customers complain about this before,” said Clara.

“I want you to call centre management right now. We are not going to leave until centre management removes these misleading signs. This is absolutely ridiculous. We are in the right. You really should be honouring this deal,” said the woman, glaring at Clara.

Clara sighed. With dread, she picked up the phone and dialed the number. Anger pulsed through her body in big doses. Her hands were trembling. The couple looked at each other smugly, clearly impressed that they’ve terrified Clara to a submissive, trembling mess. The man placed his tattooed arm tightly around the woman’s waist and kissed her orange face, while her heavily-lined eyes glowed proudly, affectionately rubbing the man’s strategically-carved stubble.

Clara wasn’t going to let them win.

“Security, Roger speaking. What’s the problem?”


*This is my attempt to write a short story. It is clearly inspired by recent events involving annoying people I've met through my time in retail. The ending is totally lame, and it never happened. I guess this is what people call "based on real events". I hope it was ok.

tea tea tea

Working in retail has really killed any sort of excitement I reserved for sale time. In the past, I was an avid supporter of sales. I remember when I was 15 and I went into Myer (an Australian department store) and bought this grey and black asymmetric dress for $21 and a pair of yellow Converse Chuck Taylors for $49. That was a sweet sale time experience.

Now, sale time just means rude customers, messy tables, regional managers obsessed with stock, and shit rack up. Working in retail has drained out any possible desire to participate in sales. You just don't care enough to really be part of it. After working a tiring shift, all you want to do is sit and look outside. It's soul draining.

Although, I did buy a pair of heels. And they were originally $149.95 and were reduced to $99.95 (I had to have them).

This got me thinking: I really believe that sale items are only worth it when you buy quality items. So good quality shoes, nice bags and wallets, facial products, quality coats and jeans - all these things that would normally cost you a fortune are worth buying on sale because they are quality, and they will last.

So if you want your money to be worth all the sale time frenzy, go buy good quality items.

Maybe just tonight we should forget about what's right for one last time...

The weather is rather weird right now. I'm wearing my fluffly whte robe at the moment. I cannot believe how comfortable it is. I don't have any clean pyjama pants left so I am wearing shorts but it's way too chilly for shorts, hence the robe.

I had a rather fucked up day at work. Being a retail whore is hard because you get a lot of shit from people. I was folding some singlets and saw that there was quite a line of customers ready to buy clothes. I jumped onto my register and called out, "who's next?". No one even looked at me. So I said it again. I was completely ignored. This time I shouted it out, and again no one wanted me to serve them. So I walked away and continued folding singlets.

After a few minutes, one lady asked me to check something for her so I took a singlet to the register to check for sizes. I was at the register and the line hadn't moved. This woman who was with her boyfriend gave me a look that said, "you should serve us". I just thought, fuck that. I asked for the next customer and you didn't come so that's not my fucking problem.

I walked away.

Gah.

How to be a shit customer

1) Treat your sales assistant as an idiot

In the words of that semi-rotund fellow with a lovely speaking voice from Maid in Manhattan, "although we serve them, we are not their servants", 'their' being clients and customers. And that is something some customers don't seem to register. There are certain people, mostly women in their 40s who seem to stubbornly hold onto their youth, who think they we are supposed to kiss their asses. Go to fucking Louis Vuitton if you want that treatment. We're not going to give you discounts or special treatment just because you're rich. Fuck off and look in the mirror.

2) Ignore our refund/exchange policies

As sales assistants, we don't write our refund policies so don't fucking take it out on us when YOU have exceeded the 14 day refund policy. And seriously, don't expect us to refund shit that has been a month over the purchase date. Don't kick up a fuss and make us feel like an idiot because you, dear old customer, are the one that is trying to cheat our system. By thinking you can get away with forcing us to give you refunds, you make us feel like idiots and to be polite, if we weren't working we would kindly flip some sort of bird at you because you fucking deserve it.

3) Saying no to charity donations

I would respect you more if you simply said, "No thanks" to buying a charity item. I cannot stand people who say, "sorry I donate a lot to charity already". I don't fucking care if you don't donate to charity; I'm just doing my fucking job. And what give syou the right to believe that you have donated enough to charity? As a fellow colleague said, "has poverty ended?". Just say no if you don't want a charity bag; don't justify your reasons for not wanting one because that's when it seems suss. And for the record, if one more customer scoffs in my face because he/she cannot believe the audacity I have to even ask them if they want to donate money to charity, I will strangle you with my lanyard. We are not idiots and you are very rude to think that we are, bastard.

4) Mess up our beautifully folded polos and t-shirts

Being a folder of clothes, you cannot believe how long it takes to make things beautiful, especially when you have about 50 of these pesky polos to fold, which all need uniform thickness and width. Don't fucking mess them up by pulling a polo from the middle of the pile. IT RUINS IT AND WE HAVE TO START AGAIN! It's not hard to pick something up, put it down next to something else, take out the polo you need, and put back the rest of them. It really isn't that hard. And if you can't be arsed doing that, us sales assistants are MORE THAN HAPPY to help you look for sizes. Trust me. Just ask us for help.

5) Misplacing items

Don't put a skirt in the singlet rack. Is it so hard to just put it back in its original spot? You were there to get that item, just put it back. Or alternatively hand it over to a sales assistant to put it back for you. And don't fucking walk away from clothing that has fallen off its hanger due to something you did. It's despicable. Give it to one of us if you can't be fucked putting it away. Just don't leave it there.

6) Using our change rooms as rubbish bins

Don't put your coffee cups or juice cartons in our change rooms. It's not a bin. AND DON'T SPIT GUM IN OUR CHANGE ROOMS! Do you know how disgusting that is? It's so foul! And same goes with band aids. We are not a rubbish dump.

7) Sticking the wrong price tags on our items

If you are doing this in a chain store, it just proves just how fucking desperate you are. I've had some horrible woman yell at me because this dress she wanted to buy was supposedly $12.50 (and it wasn't and someone stuck the wrong sticker on it). I tried to explain it to her that it wasn't and she said she was going to sue me because she was a fucking lawyer. While I understand retail law on a very basic level, if she was such a hot shot lawyer she's be able to afford the dress at its full price (probably about $19.95). Plus don't lose your fucking temper at me. It's customers like you who make me want to either strangle you or kill myself. A bit of respect would be nice.

So to shit customers out there, be a dick elsewhere. At the end of the day, we're just doing our job.