Praise for the shop assistants

Finch

I really feel for the poor SA's at this time of year. I have seen such rude and greedy behaviour from shoppers, and many seem to think they can take out their frustrations on the sales staff.

The VAST majority do a cracking job, and are so friendly if you are polite.

I'd like to say a bit thank you to all the SA's out there, especially those in Boots today, who were blooming wonderful!

NattyVee

Thanks for that. I work in retail and it's absolutely shocking how some customers behave.

I've been personally screamed at for not having an item in stock (this is my fault how?) at the end of the season. I've been lucky, some of my colleagues have had screwed up carrier bags thrown in their faces, often because the customer wants a refund they are not entitled to etc.

Looking forward to the sales! It'll be all this x100!

Thanks again.

Blackpool_Saver

yes and all the others who put up with the public at large........

Wicked_witch

Hear hear! The staff in my local Morrisons have been wonderful this season, even when I heard one of them being loudly berated and called 'f-wording pathetic' because the trifles that were on special offer were out of stock at 4.30 pm... Yes, I did go and tell CS how good he was under fire :-)

Volvic

Great thread, I also used to work in a supermarket, not on the checkouts or as close to customers as the checkout operators work but I've seen some customers behave disgracefully. I remember at one point the girls on the checkouts were giving away vouchers for a couple of quid off some bottles of lager. One guy had obviously been given some one day, when he came back the next he didn't get anymore so he went to CSD to complain that he didn't get any vouchers that day when he had the day before. They really do LOOK for things to complain about sometimes. It's nice to hear praise as most people don't let the staff know if they think good of them, only bad!

emmas42

In a way i miss High street retail as the lead up to Christmas was always lovely. I always found that the customers were more cheery and would happily wish you a merry Christmas etc. The local hospice would hold their carol service right outside my shop on the last late night shopping of the year too.
The only downside I found was that at around 2pm on Christmas eve some shops would start shutting for the break and the panic would set in. People would get very frantic, pushy and rude. One year we shut up shop at 4pm as planned and all sat down the very back of the shop with a glass of champers to wish each other a happy christmas and say goodbye for a few days, when a customer started going NUTS at our front door because we had closed. She hammered on the glass and eventually started to throw things at the window!
Even with scenes like this happening every now and again I would still love to go back and work another christmas eve. It was the lovely customers that made it all worthwhile :-)

michaelvintner

Good post. I used to work in retail (for 13 years), never again. Shop assistants get a bad press but if you ever worked in it you would realise what they have to put up with.

Christmas is total mayhem and very stressful and it does not help when the public blame you for stuff which is beyond your control such as stock supply.

Any professional retail staff (underpaid) will do all they can to help and assist customers often for little or no thanks. many of the people I met who worked in retail were fantastic people and the only thing I now miss about the job is some of the great people I met.

BligBlag

Great thread Some people seem to forget that Shop Assistants are humans (not robots), that they're only doing their jobs, and it is not their responsibility for any failings of the company they work for.

I worked in M&S as a Christmas Temp a few years ago and even though I was only there for 10 weeks, experienced my fair share of horrible customers.

A man came to my till once with a £50 note and asked me to change it into £10's. I politely told him that A) We're not a bank and I can't open the till at will and therefore C) He'd have to purchase something or try the Customer Services desk. He went completely mental, ranting and raving, swearing at me etc, and ended up having to be taken away by security.

Another time a man threw his goods at me when I had to tell him he'd come to a Cash Only till He said "Well tough" and flung his card at me at first, so I explained that the till wasn't even equipped to take cards (even as an exception) as the card reader had broken several weeks ago and that's when he threw his goods at me and walked off.

I would never work in retail again, the people you work with = Great. The hassle with customers = Not worth it.

marleyboy

I have to add that not ALL customers treat Sales Assistants like robot's, indeed many shoppers are always respectful and still say "thank you" and "Please".

Likewise - not ALL Sales Staff are polite, indeed some take their frustrations of "work" out on their very customers.

People will instinctively treat others the same way as they treat them

woody01

BligBlag wrote: »

If you read my post more carefully you will see that I said SOME not ALL, please don't misquote.

God how 'retentive' are you.

mazza111

As many of you know, i'm working in call and collect for Royal Mail at this time of year, the biggest problem is the underpaid xmas cards. The majority of people are nice when they come to collect their underpaid items. But I have had around 5 in a week tell me to shove my effing xmas card up my effing 4rse. Charming. Sorry, but how can good customer service come into that. " Yes Sir, thank you very much, goodbye"?