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Post by ragdoll on Jan 7, 2006 1:03:24 GMT -5
I just went to the post office to mail a package and the women behind the counter was so mean and cruel to me, practically accused me of being a criminal, telling me I was trying to mail something I shouldn't (it's a long story), anyway I was so humiliated (I hadn't done anything wrong) and from there I went to Ingles to buy a few groceries and as I walked up to the cashier she said something hateful about me to the other cashier (I guess because she felt I was "bothering" her) and then with a mean look on her face very huffily checked out my groceries without one friendly word and then practically threw the receipt at me. I went home and ever since then I've been so depressed. I just can't believe how mean people can be. I don't even want to go out anywhere anymore. Why is it so hard for people to be nice? I wrote a letter to the post office postmaster explaining what had happened and I also wrote one to the manager at Ingles (though I haven't mailed it yet). I don't really know what to do. I want to do something like actually call the manager at Ingles and explain what happened because I don't think people should get away with stuff like this but I don't think I'll ever be able to get my nerve up enough to do it. Do you think writing letters will help and is it a good idea? Have any of you people ever experienced treatment like this from customer service people and how do you handle it? I'm too shy to stand up for myself but now I keep dwelling on it and trying to figure out ways to get revenge. I know it's probably childish but I hate being like this. I need lots of advice.
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Post by zaab on Jan 7, 2006 1:17:39 GMT -5
I just went to the post office to mail a package and the women behind the counter was so mean and cruel to me, practically accused me of being a criminal, telling me I was trying to mail something I shouldn't (it's a long story), anyway I was so humiliated (I hadn't done anything wrong) and from there I went to Ingles to buy a few groceries and as I walked up to the cashier she said something hateful about me to the other cashier (I guess because she felt I was "bothering" her) and then with a mean look on her face very huffily checked out my groceries without one friendly word and then practically threw the receipt at me. I went home and ever since then I've been so depressed. I just can't believe how mean people can be. I don't even want to go out anywhere anymore. Why is it so hard for people to be nice? I wrote a letter to the post office postmaster explaining what had happened and I also wrote one to the manager at Ingles (though I haven't mailed it yet). I don't really know what to do. I want to do something like actually call the manager at Ingles and explain what happened because I don't think people should get away with stuff like this but I don't think I'll ever be able to get my nerve up enough to do it. Do you think writing letters will help and is it a good idea? Have any of you people ever experienced treatment like this from customer service people and how do you handle it? I'm too shy to stand up for myself but now I keep dwelling on it and trying to figure out ways to get revenge. I know it's probably childish but I hate being like this. I need lots of advice. I worked in supermarket customer service for several years and the best thing to do is go to either the customer service desk or find a front end manager and ask to speak to a store manager. Speak to the manager as calmly as possible, because this will get the best results, and explain what happened. Any good manager will reprimand the people involved and try to make it up to you to keep your business. Don't feel bad about doing this since this is a store manager's top priority (or its supposed to be) keeping customers happy. A letter may work but is more likely to be put aside and ignored or misplaced, especially inside a busy supermarket. A phone call would be fine, but probably not as effective as a face to face meeting.
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Post by shytothebone on Jan 7, 2006 2:02:34 GMT -5
I just went to the post office to mail a package and the women behind the counter was so mean and cruel to me, practically accused me of being a criminal, telling me I was trying to mail something I shouldn't (it's a long story), anyway I was so humiliated (I hadn't done anything wrong) and from there I went to Ingles to buy a few groceries and as I walked up to the cashier she said something hateful about me to the other cashier (I guess because she felt I was "bothering" her) and then with a mean look on her face very huffily checked out my groceries without one friendly word and then practically threw the receipt at me. I went home and ever since then I've been so depressed. I just can't believe how mean people can be. I don't even want to go out anywhere anymore. Why is it so hard for people to be nice? I wrote a letter to the post office postmaster explaining what had happened and I also wrote one to the manager at Ingles (though I haven't mailed it yet). I don't really know what to do. I want to do something like actually call the manager at Ingles and explain what happened because I don't think people should get away with stuff like this but I don't think I'll ever be able to get my nerve up enough to do it. Do you think writing letters will help and is it a good idea? Have any of you people ever experienced treatment like this from customer service people and how do you handle it? I'm too shy to stand up for myself but now I keep dwelling on it and trying to figure out ways to get revenge. I know it's probably childish but I hate being like this. I need lots of advice. I worked in supermarket customer service for several years and the best thing to do is go to either the customer service desk or find a front end manager and ask to speak to a store manager. Speak to the manager as calmly as possible, because this will get the best results, and explain what happened. Any good manager will reprimand the people involved and try to make it up to you to keep your business. Don't feel bad about doing this since this is a store manager's top priority (or its supposed to be) keeping customers happy. A letter may work but is more likely to be put aside and ignored or misplaced, especially inside a busy supermarket. A phone call would be fine, but probably not as effective as a face to face meeting. I would have told them both I wanted to talk to their boss right then. I would go back and talk to the both of them. What did you say or do to cause the cashier to get pissed off? and does this happen all the time?
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Post by David's Shadow on Jan 7, 2006 2:45:14 GMT -5
I know how lousy it can make you feel when another person is mean or cruel to you. If I was in your situation, I'd feel the same way; too shy or embarrassed to go talk face-to-face with a manager or even make a phone call. Letters won't be as effective, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't try, and I'm sure you'll feel better if you take some action.
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Post by Samantha on Jan 7, 2006 6:03:29 GMT -5
They were being pricks but it is not your fault. You have nothing to feel humiliated about. You can't control other peoples actions but you can control how you let their actions affect you. Not everything is a reflection on you. It is also a reflection on them. I'm sure if other people were there, they were thinking these people were pricks rather than judging you. They were not doing their job which is what they are paid to do so yes complaining to the management is good. One they should not get away with it (this is one reason why some people can't be nice, because people let them be mean), two the manager has a right to know I think if he is paying good money to bad employees.
They are in the wrong. You are not. You should not feel bad, they should. Maybe you can't stand up to them when you are there but you can stand up to them in your own mind at least and know that you have nothing to feel bad about. Doing something like writing a letter is good in that way too because you are actively attempting to set things straight. Don't feel bad ragdoll, feel pissed off and determined not to let people like that get you down.
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B
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Post by B on Jan 7, 2006 19:47:13 GMT -5
Basically, the cashier at the supermarket is a minimum wage flunky. Nobody needs to take attitude from a person in that position. Telling her you wanted to speak with her manager/supervisor would have had her shitting in her pants, and with good reason. Cashiers are expendable, and they all seem to forget about that until someone demands to speak to their manager about them. I used to work in a supermarket and although most of the cashiers were cool, friendly people, some of them were just miserable bitches to customers. They were miserable bitches to coworkers too, so you don't really need to take them too seriously. Managers WANT to know if they've got some reject up front driving away business.
As for the woman at the post office, best to just play along and not do anything else to get on her bad side. She could be armed.
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Post by zaab on Jan 7, 2006 20:21:11 GMT -5
Basically, the cashier at the supermarket is a minimum wage flunky. Nobody needs to take attitude from a person in that position. Telling her you wanted to speak with her manager/supervisor would have had her shitting in her pants, and with good reason. Cashiers are expendable, and they all seem to forget about that until someone demands to speak to their manager about them. I used to work in a supermarket and although most of the cashiers were cool, friendly people, some of them were just miserable bitches to customers. They were miserable bitches to coworkers too, so you don't really need to take them too seriously. Managers WANT to know if they've got some reject up front driving away business. As for the woman at the post office, best to just play along and not do anything else to get on her bad side. She could be armed. Yeah, but more often than not cashiers are students who need a job with odd hours, or teachers trying to make ends meet, or anyone else who needs a second job. It can be tough dealing with lots of miserable customers day in and day out and some people rise to the challenge and some cope in bad ways--like becoming indifferent or mean, to everyone. And this is one of the reasons a few cashiers develop such an attitude, because some customers assume they are human trash.
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Post by nameless on Jan 7, 2006 22:57:06 GMT -5
im not one to go in and complain, id just never go there again. i think in a lot of places some people will just be spoken to by the manager and then the whole incident forgotten! ive worked on a checkout before, you get loads of people coming through who are rude to you knowing you cant really do anything about it. i would have never been rude to a customer for no reason though!
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Post by zaab on Jan 7, 2006 23:24:19 GMT -5
Its true. Very often, rude cashier behavior, as long as its not too excessive, is brushed off by management because the cashier turnover rate is already so high that they can't afford to reprimand workers too severely. But this shouldn't discourage you from complaining. In a big city where there are many high strung customers, management often gets numbed to complaints and appeases the customer but doesn't come down on the cashier too hard. That's why its important to act like a reasonable person when making a complaint. If you act too heated you will be dismissed as just another crazy customer.
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Post by k151 on Jan 8, 2006 4:19:05 GMT -5
I'm not standing up for them by any means, but when someone's job is serving customers, sometimes it's extremely hard to be friendly and nice to everyone, especially when you are having a bad day. One of my jobs I had to "serve" members of a club. Most of the time it's fine, but it's kind of degrading work. It's worse when some of the members are pricks, some of the coworkers were pricks too. So when that happens, I get bitter and pissed off, so then someone who did NOTHING wrong asks me for something and i'm short and bitter with them, just because i'm so pissed off. So to that person, I seem like a mean asshole, when in fact, i'm having a bad day, or someone else just pissed me off a few minutes ago. It's a good idea to send a letter or something, but I just thought it's sometimes good to look at it from the worker's point of view. Often, jobs like that aren't wonderfully rewarding, IMO. Anyhow, there still isn't an excuse to be mean to a stranger. If a customer was being mean to me, then i'de be mean back. But I try my best to be friendly to people who don't know i'm in a bad mood. There also is no excuse to be mean to someone who is a little more self conscious.
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Post by k151 on Jan 8, 2006 4:21:49 GMT -5
Basically, the cashier at the supermarket is a minimum wage flunky. Nobody needs to take attitude from a person in that position. Telling her you wanted to speak with her manager/supervisor would have had her shitting in her pants, and with good reason. Cashiers are expendable, and they all seem to forget about that until someone demands to speak to their manager about them. I used to work in a supermarket and although most of the cashiers were cool, friendly people, some of them were just miserable bitches to customers. They were miserable bitches to coworkers too, so you don't really need to take them too seriously. Managers WANT to know if they've got some reject up front driving away business. As for the woman at the post office, best to just play along and not do anything else to get on her bad side. She could be armed. Yeah, but more often than not cashiers are students who need a job with odd hours, or teachers trying to make ends meet, or anyone else who needs a second job. It can be tough dealing with lots of miserable customers day in and day out and some people rise to the challenge and some cope in bad ways--like becoming indifferent or mean, to everyone. And this is one of the reasons a few cashiers develop such an attitude, because some customers assume they are human trash. That's exactly what I was saying. Quite often, people dealing with customers are "miserable bitches" because the CUSTOMERS treat them like shit. I see it happen all the time, and I feel bad for the cashier (or whoever the worker is serving customers). But like I said, having a cashier or post office woman be a bitch isn't very fun. I try to let things go as best I can, it just strains you more if you let it bring your blood pressure up. BTW like the others said, you did nothing wrong. Try to think the way I just did. These people were mean because of their own problems. Problems with their job, problems with their family or some other reason. It had nothing to do with you.
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Post by iroseiroared3 on Jan 8, 2006 5:17:04 GMT -5
Yeah I agree k151, a lot of the times the customers are worse. A lot of the time when I go out to eat my parents will complain about the service but I'm like What do you want, perfection? I get upset because I deal with customers in food service everyday and when you work in it or whatever it is you're dealing with when it comes to customers, you see how it is and give them a break when you go out and you're the customer. I always try to be nice and I'm never rude if they mess up my order, unless they were rude to me or something. That's also true what you said how someone beforehand can piss you off or you can have a bad day and take it out on the wrong person. I'm sure we're all guilty of that. Sometimes at work people tell me, "Oh, it's not that bad!" Or, "You can be a little more polite!" but I'm usually not rude, I mean the times they say I should be polite it's just I don't have a smile on my face and mumble Thank you or something. Another thing is it's hard to delivery quality service when it's all about how fast you do it. But that's a whole different story.
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ronw
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Posts: 172
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Post by ronw on Jan 8, 2006 7:11:27 GMT -5
Greetings Rags, It is a cold world out there in many respects. And when you're a reclusive type person, like myself - the barbs probably feel harder on you than the average bear.
Although, I will venture out on a limb here. I know for myself, I am sometimes like the moon when it comes to the ebb and flow of my emotional balance. It has taken alot of years to understand that this was something I needed to pay attention to - and in that light, here is how I relate that comment, with your post.
My balance can flow into depression, to being angry, euphoric, and then there are times where I have equilibrium. (the last being the most ideal) And what I discovered was that my tendancies towards certain unhelpful personal behavior seemed to take place during any of the swings that were not grounded - the neutral/equalibrium stage being the grounded one.
- Angry stage: I'd hate drivers, wait staff were all incompetant, bill collectors, staff at work, people in general, my wife would get yelled at, my son probably was the only person who I ever was able to be 'gracious' to during this stage. Pretty much I hated people in general during this time frame.
- Depression: I'd be bold to say that I think everyone here has dealt with this stage. I feel incompetant at work - and (in the past) I would put my own self down before others could do it themselves. I'd think that the whole world hated me - and during this stage I was very vulnerable to insult, just like the types you mentioned at the post office and grocery store.
In this stage (depression) its easy to misinterpret what other people are communicating. People who aren't angry with me at all, or people who even like me I will think the opposite.
Euphoric stage: Just as bad, if not the worst stage. Probably the thing I noticed the most is that while I am in this stage, in the 'old' days all it would take would be some sort of confrontation with someone to knock me out into either the angry or the depressive stage. The euphoric is the most unstable.
How I deal with this: Without getting too personal/deep, I will be upfront about there being a spiritual change in my life in the early 90's that taught me how to ground myself in the world.
I learned about personal power - the ability to change things, especially one's own self. And I also learned that when the inside changes, the outside changes very much as well.
Probably the best 'tool' I acquired during this process was the ability to be mindful of myself and these mood swings I experienced. I decided to be mindful of my behavior all the time, including my thought life which needed some discipline. Over time, I was able to learn to be consistant in my communication, my behavior, and my thought process during the 'bad three' (I tend to call the 3 seasons of emotional balance that I find are not grounded in reality) I made mental notes of my thought process during the equilibrium stage, and then mindfully 'went through those motions' during the other stages. What ended up happening is that by doing this, I find I am able to 'will away' the angry, depressive, and euphoric stages in about a day of mindfulness.
The 'old' (young) Ron would drink heavily during the 'bad three' - something I did I think as a self medication from age 12. However, that 'medication' only succeeded in drawing me out into the depression phase. If I already was in the depressed state, well, it only deepened.
The fruit of that though, is now I am 40 and I still drink. Not nearly as much though - but its something I know I have in my life that I'd be better off not having there. And like I've mentioned, its something I'm working on right now. Its just one of the residuals of my past - but I am glad I am where I am today because I'd probably have killed myself by now if I didn't figure things out.
I have of late, (late as in say the last 5 years) found other 'medicine.' Cooking is something I find relaxing - it's organized, creative, fun, and cheap. I don't mind experimenting with exotic recipes - and if nobody likes it, I'll chuck the whole thing in the weeds and never make it again. (Like the potato pizza I made last weekend) However, most times these meals are a success - but in a family of three what ends up happening is we have a freezer (my parents freezer as well) full of individually wrapped meals. (Nobdody's hungry in my family)
Cutting wood tends to be another relaxant. I will cut up a weeks worth of wood for our stove in an evening.
The thing that happens though with these things is I do like drinking while doing them. And I'll wake up the next day with either more food in the frige that I know where to put, or more wood than I can possibly burn in a weeks time.
The good thing here is, I don't drink as much anymore - or as often.
Anyway, not to get off topic or all focused on myself here. I guess thats what happened all the same though. What I try and do sometimes/most times is share something of myself with people who post things I identify with. And then either share a story or something in my method that might either outright help the person or grant some insight.
Thats my intention here.
I wish you the best in this/RW
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ronw
Full Member
Posts: 172
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Post by ronw on Jan 8, 2006 17:08:24 GMT -5
I think what I'm trying to communicate here is that if you happen to be in an ungrounded state of mind, your perspective can be off quite a bit I've discovered.
Meaning, yeah those people you say were mean to you - might have been pretty damn rude. However, if you happen to be in one of those 'bad three' states - you know the rest of the story.
For instance, I can be in that angry phase (especially that state) and feel that everyone I work with are rude jerks. Then some sort of trigger goes off at some point, and when that happens, I realize that I'm the one thats off.
I have shared about my workplace - there is a sort of caste system there, and thats something that exists regardless of how I describe my reality. However, in spite of that caste system, people in that environment do trust me and like me. I am consulted on alot of things other people in my line of work aren't trusted with. Parents trust me with their children as I take them on state land's 'safaris' - and up until 4 years ago all activities I did with this (club) was out of pocket. (Which I didn't mind)
Nowdays, when 'state land days' takes place, the district provides me with two school buses, and staff if I need it. (I never need their staffing though) My father who retired from this district after 38 yrs teaching there, and a couple other inner circle people help me with the supervision of (this year it's 33 fifth and sixth graders) this club's field trips. I don't mention this 'club's' name obviously because I don't want these threads showing up in word searches.
So...when I get all bent out of shape realitywise, I think about things like that. I must be looking at the scenery through stained glass windows or something.
Thats all I was trying to describe. Re reading my own post and seeing where the whole thing went, it might have been confusing as to what I was trying to say.
Good luck/RW
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Post by pnoopiepnats on Jan 8, 2006 18:18:25 GMT -5
ron, how do you deal with the moods of your family members?
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