Stalking, breaking in, and verbal harassment aren't in the job description for customer service. But that wouldn't stop these people from being the absolute worst on the job. Seriously, they deserved every bit of karma that came back to them in these stories. COntent has been edited for clarity.
Deranged Driver Or Hit Man?
“I needed my hot tub repaired, so I called a repair/cleaning service in a nearby town. I live out in the boonies, but the company’s website said they offered repair service to all cities in my county. The phone representative made an appointment for the following week. I was planning on taking time off work to drive home to meet him, but got a call an hour BEFORE the appointment from the phone rep, saying the driver had driven around my town and couldn’t find my address. His GPS wasn’t working, so they were cancelling the visit and taking my town off of their service map. I was beyond frustrated, so I posted a one-star review on the company online. I got a voicemail two hours later from the phone rep, who politely said that he felt the review was unfair. He tried to explain the company’s reasoning for not showing, and he asked me to remove the review. A few minutes after that, I got a cal from the driver himself, who was verbally abusive right off the bat. The driver exclaimed, ‘Do you have any idea how far your county is form civilization?!’
I simply replied, ‘Well, I drive to civilization every day for work, so not that far.’
The driver snapped back, ‘Well it is when your truck gets twelve miles to the gallon!’
This back and forth went on for a minute or two, and eventually I offered to change the review to two stars, because I was still severely disappointed in their service. The driver refused my offer, demanding that I delete the review completely. I told him I was done discussing things, and I hung up. The driver then called me six more times in rapid succession. I simply posted another review, saying that this guy was currently harassing me over the phone. That’s when I started to get the text message, asking me what time I would be back home tonight. I was too spooked to respond. That night, I got another call from this deranged driver. He told me, ‘So I know two of your coworkers and the real estate agent who sold you the house!’
He proceeded to tell me the wrong real estate agent, but I would let him be deluded a little while longer. I asked him, ‘So you’re stalking me now?’
He said, ‘Oh, I haven’t even begun to stalk you. This is the last time I’m going to ask you to take down the review.’
With that, he hung up. The next day, I got a phone call from the phone rep, who relayed the same warning from the driver. I learned that the driver was also the owner and boss of this entire operation. I eventually took down the review, not wanting to have to go to court over anything. A few days later, I noticed a $20 charge on my bank account. I had to call three credit agencies to get the charge reverse, and I had to fill out a form for identity theft. I looked on the Better Business Bureau website and a few others, and I uncovered that this owner/driver makes a regular habit out of this sort of thing. He runs a credit report on anyone he has a conflict with, hence the surprise charge. Nowadays, I run a thorough background search on any business before I contact them.”
Salesman Snaps
“My wife and I needed some furniture for our new house, so we went couch shopping a couple of months ago. Now that we are in our thirties, we are looking for pieces that are a little better quality and will last longer, so we went to a ‘nicer’ store. Before our visit, she had gone in with her folks to scout the place out and had been helped by a very nice salesman. This time when we walked in, that salesperson was not around, and we were approached by someone very pushy and quite unfriendly. We politely told him we did not need any help, as we were just looking. As we made our way around the store, it was clear that this new rep was keeping a close eye out for us. He came over to offer his assistance once again, at which point I told him that we would not be needing his help today, and I continued shopping. After about thirty minutes, the wife and I had narrowed our search to a particular couch. As I was testing it out, my wife happened to see the salesman who had helped her and her folks. She walked across the store where he was just finishing with a customer, and she asked if he could help us. He recognized my wife and told her he would be over there in a minute to give us a hand. All of a sudden, out of nowhere, the second salesperson comes up to my wife and says, ‘What do you think you are doing?!’
My wife was surprised, so she asked him what he meant. He said, ‘You are supposed to be my customers. I haven’t taken any other customers since you walked in, so how dare you talk to another rep!’
Well at this point, I got up from the couch and walked over asking who he thinks he’s talking to. He began arguing and telling me that I was supposed to be his commission, and that I was cheating him out of money. At this point, I just about lost it, and thankfully the nice salesperson came over. He took me by the arm and defused the situation. Needless to say that the manager and I had a nice long chat. The rest of the staff could not believe what this employee said to us, and we could see them arguing with him at the other end of the store. I think he was just a bad salesperson who saw everyone else get sales, and that was the day he snapped.”
TL;DR Salesperson though it was my job to provide him with his commission. I had to inform him differently
Dealing With An Earthquake Expert
“My husband was in one of the Marine units sent to Haiti to help with the earthquake relief. We had just gotten new phones through Sprint, and after hearing from other wives that they were able to get international calling on their husband’s phones, I thought I would call customer service and see if I could do the same for my husband. I must have gotten the most clueless rep ever. After explaining where my husband was and why, she told me that unfortunately his phone couldn’t do that. She told me if he could find a Sprint store in Haiti, he could buy an international phone. I stuttered out a reply and asked her if she really expected my husband to find a Sprint store in a country that had just been hit by 7.0 earthquake. She didn’t see a problem with that, and I just hung up on her, speechless. Definitely the most bizarre experience I’ve ever had.
I honestly didn’t think that we would be able to get international calling on his phone, but I didn’t think it’d hurt to try. I still think it was an outrageous suggestion, considering the Sprint person and I made small talk about how bad the destruction would be beforehand, so it was clear she was aware of the situation.
I would have bought him a new phone and mailed it to him, but that would have taken a month, and we were initially told that he would be working in that area for a few weeks (which we later realized was a few months).
Considering that she knew what happened, as it was huge international news and it was a week after the fact, she should have known. It was a stupid suggestion. And do you seriously expect a cell phone store to be open when an earthquake has pretty much decimated the whole country?!”
Irritating Impound
“A while back, my ex got arrested after taking my car without permission. My car was impounded, and it would cost $250 to get it back. Needless to say, the entire situation made me fairly irritated. I arrived at the place to get my car, and as I walked into the building, my ex’s mom called to try and find out more about what was going on, and to see if I needed help. I was inside, but I had not addressed any staff whatsoever, and it was obvious that the conversation I was having was with the person on the phone, not anyone in the building. On the phone, I was explaining that I had just gotten there, and I wasn’t sure if they had my keys or if I needed to go to the jail and have them released to me (the ex may not have given them up upon arrest). I’m sure I sounded irritated, because I was. Queue the receptionist aggressively snapping at me, telling me that they know how to do their jobs, and that I’m being totally rude. I look over at her and explain that I’m sure they do, I’m on the phone, and I’m sorry if she thought I was talking to her. She was having none of it. She got up and starts screaming in my face. I’m a pretty shy person until you bring your spit into my personal bubble.
I tell her she’s being inappropriate and absurd, and I want to speak to her supervisor. So she screams for him to, ‘Get out here and handle this stupid witch!’
He comes out and starts screaming at me to get out if I’m going to treat his staff like garbage. I tried to explain that I hadn’t even addressed her until she started screaming at me, and that I needed to get my car out of their impound lot. He wouldn’t listen. Long story short, I was 25 at the time and had to have my mother come help me get my car out of impound, because the people who worked there were insane. I had never experienced anything like that. They did have my keys though, my ex was smart enough to give those up at least.”
This Cashier Was Way Too Extreme!
“My brother and my mother were off shopping one day at one of the smaller grocery stores in the area, and they were having a relatively good time finding what they needed there. When they got to the checkout lane, they were both speaking French, our native language, and were patiently waiting for the cashier to finish scanning their items. While doing so, he kept listening to them and when my mother handed him her credit card to scan it, he took out a pair of scissors and started threatening to cut the card in half for them being, ‘stupid French turds that need to get out of my country.’
I am assuming the guy expected some sort of confused response in French, but what he got was a flurry of insults in my brother’s very clear English, and a nice little threat to beat him to death if he didn’t think twice about what he was about to do. The guy just lowered the scissors, hung his head down in shame, and finished doing his work. It was a pretty crazy story when they told me.
The second ordeal happened when I went car shopping with my parents and my girlfriend. We’ve got a large assortment of car dealerships minutes away from my house, so we had plenty to choose from. First amongst these was the Hyundai dealership. We were first greeted by a man who spoke French fluently, and he made a great first impression. What happened afterwards wasn’t the best in terms of commendable salesmanship. A completely different salesman was assigned to us, an unfriendly and seemingly uncaring individual who only addressed my father and didn’t give a single look or offer a handshake to myself, my mother, and my girlfriend. He also didn’t mind keeping us waiting in the blazing sun, just so he could sit inside in his office and twiddle his thumbs. After a good thirty minutes of waiting and my father loudly mentioning how there were plenty of other dealerships around, the salesman rushed out and immediately tried to sell us a car we were looking at. While doing so, he finally looked at me and told me, ‘Son, this car will be perfect for you! You can go out with it during those hot summer days and throw your girlfriend in the back of it.’
I really didn’t know how to react, other than looking bewildered and thinking to myself, ‘I’m pretty sure you’re supposed to treat your girlfriend like a gentleman, not toss her in the back of an already small car.’
Needless to say, the poor service prompted us to look elsewhere.”
The Kroger Maniac
“Last year, I was going through the self-checkout at Kroger late one night. There were a few other customers using the other self-checkout lanes, but the store was far from busy. I scanned this item on clearance, but the screen gave me this ‘Wait for attendant’ message. I see this kid working in a nearby section, talking to one of his coworkers. They held these little devices, almost like a walkie-talkie, but it was for notifications about the self-checkout lanes. His device was going off, but this kid simply presses the ‘ignore’ button and continues with his conversation. I knew this item wouldn’t scan without this kid’s approval, and I really just wanted to go home, so I hit the ‘call attendant’ button again. This little brat presses his ‘ignore’ button again! This proceeded to happen, I kid you not, eight more times, back and forth. I finally had enough and walked over to ask this guy for some help. As soon as I did, this kid bolted and ran over to the back of the store before I could catch him. I wasn’t angry, just supremely confused at this entire exchange. I decided to just take back all my items and move over to the regular check-out line. On my way over, I ran into a manager, who asked me if I was having technology issues, since I left the self-checkout with all my items. I told the manager what had happened to me, and she was absolutely furious. I never saw that kid in Kroger’s again, but I really wish I got to see this manager go off on him.”
Snooty Car Salesman Gets Sweet Karma
“About two or three years ago, my husband (who was my boyfriend at the time) and I went car shopping. He was divorced and wanted to get rid of his Forerunner because his ex-wife picked it out, and it wasn’t the car he wanted. So we decided to stop by a Lexus dealership down the street where he lived and check out the SUVs. Now, I have to say we weren’t ‘dressed’ to shop at Lexus. He was sporting a scruffy Irish beard and wearing long board shorts, faded tee, and flip-flops. I was in a frayed denim miniskirt, a ‘vintage’ tee, flip-flops, and my hair in a messy ponytail. We walk around the lot, checking out some sedans first, but he really has his heart set on another SUV. We were then approached by this silver haired sales guy.
My husband’s first question to the sales guy was, ‘What’s the difference between 4WD and AWD?’
The sales guy answers, ‘For someone who is looking to buy an SUV, I would expect you know the difference.’
Strike one. My husband goes quiet, and I can see in his eyes that it’s on like Donkey Kong. He already cannot stand this guy. Then my husband asks about the different specs for the RX. The sales guy goes on saying that they can’t customize them, and that they only have what is in their inventory. Strike 2. So you’re telling us we can’t customize a $50k SUV, and it only comes in two preconfigured specs that happen to be at the dealership? Anyway, my husband then asked him, ‘Does Lexus have any deals or specials going on at the moment?’ to which the sales guy replies, ‘If you’re looking for $10,000 off or something, you might want to go across the street to Chevy.’
Strike 3. At this point, I just want to get out of there. I only know it’s going to blow up at some point, and when it does, it’s going to be bad. We end up getting into a baby blue colored RX for a test drive with this sales guy, and as we turn the corner,a conversation ensues between my husband and the sales guy.
The sales guy stated, ‘I’m sorry if I’m being a little testy, but I’ve had people come in who waste my time looking without even buying anything.
My husband replied, ‘Do I look like I can’t afford to buy this car?!’
The sales guy quickly said, ‘No, it’s just that I’m tired of people walking in and wasting my time.’
My husband, through gritted teeth, says, ‘I am turning this stupid car around, I don’t want to deal with you anymore.’
Thus began the most awkward silence imaginable. We got back to the dealership, where my husband spoke with the General Manager. The manager assigned us to a different sales person, but we decided not to give this dealership our business. Apparently, the guy who ‘helped’ us was new and had just come from the BMW dealership across the street. He had sold a single car since starting at this place a few months ago. My husband called the dealer that originally sold him the Forerunner. He managed to get an RX for much less than the Lexus dealership would have charged us. It was important to him to feel victorious against the monster who gave us such terrible customer service.”
The Strangest Solution
“The sheer number of horror stories I have regarding Comcast customer service is astounding. I’m not normally the type to whine about the poor guy on the other end of the line. It’s a tough job, and I’m thankful that I’ve never had to do it. But I have absolutely lost it with them several times. Just thinking about how many times they have extended my contract WITHOUT MY KNOWLEDGE OR CONSENT, locking me into another year of service each time, really makes me want to choke the innocent dude on the other end of the phone call.
For those wondering, I learned of this after an especially thorough reading of the contract. It’s not as if I’m just allowing it to extend as the contract ends, which is also a stipulation meant to hurt the little guys who have less experience with contract law than myself. This company has willfully disregarded the contract, extended the contract without notice, and demanded I pay an expensive buyout fee a couple of times, only for it to amount to virtually nothing. Seriously, what can I do about this? All I thought I could do was to politely accept it, until I figured out a wicked scheme. Apparently, claiming that I moved to a fictional city in Sweden counted as ‘termination with cause.’ Finally, I could rid myself of this toxic company. I was still out by several hundred dollars, but at long last it was finally over! Writing this out makes me want to curl up into a fetal position of rage and scream my lungs out. Seriously, do not go within five hundred feet of a Comcast business, never respond to any of their advertisements. Save yourselves!”
Home Sweet Airport
Delta Airlines is utter trash. So for context, my uncle passed away. The man was like a father to me, and I got a plane ticket from Iowa to Ohio for the funeral, with a layover in Detroit. In addition to weather problems (which was understandable), the airlines could not locate the pilot for several of our delayed and re-scheduled flights. So we had to stand in line for over six hours, waiting on them to get another one. Immediately after that, they couldn’t locate enough flight attendants, because one of the girls ran off unexpectedly before the pilot arrived, so we waited another four hours. I was stuck overnight without a hotel reservation, and the airport refused accommodation, so I slept on the floor. I met a woman that had been in the airport for a week, completely stranded for the same reason, and she could not contact her family in her home country. I felt like I was in a horror movie. I had only been there two days, and I only had enough money for my trip. I was horrified. People started giving up and they called several rent-a-car centers (not sure of the name). Soon, every rental within the airport was taken. One guy rented a van and offered to take some of the more distraught passengers home himself.
I remained waiting. Understandably so, people started complaining in the line, but we weren’t threatening or getting violent. I think this was predictable and highly understandable in this awful situation. Nope. They called security, who circled our line and herded us onto the plane with their hands on their weapons. Children were terrified and crying. There were a couple foreign people on the flight that didn’t speak English, and they looked like they thought we were getting hijacked. I ended up missing the funeral. I will never fly Delta again.”
Flat Tire Fiasco
“I got a flat tire a couple months back, and I took my car to a Walmart service center to get a new tire. Everything was done and I was happy as I could be.
I go outside to pick up my car with the new tire, and I notice the tire is a little low on air. I don’t know anything about cars, so I assume this is normal and it just needs air after you get a new tire. I take it immediately to a gas station nearby to get air and go straight home. The next day, I go into my garage to get to my car, and my tire is flat, sitting on the rim. I go straight to a gas station right beside my house and get more air, and then right back to Walmart. The girl behind the counter is friendly and says she will have one of the guys look at it. A few minutes later, a woman comes out and says she is the manager, and that they can’t replace the tire. I ask why, and she says because there a hole in the tire, that I ran over a nail. I tell her that it must have happened while her guys were working on it, because I didn’t see any sort of holes when I took it in. The manager says that she’ll have to charge me another $140 for a new tire. I asked her if there was a warranty, since I didn’t even have the tire for twenty-four hours. She told me, ‘Once you drive on it, it voids your warranty.’
I ask the manager how anyone can have a tire with a warranty then, but she dodges my questioning. I tell her to put my spare tire back on while I call my bank and refuse these charges on my account. The manager is upset, and she says I have to sign a paper waiving any liability on their part to do so, and hand over my car keys. I refuse. Her attitude really sent me over the edge. I growled at her, grabbing my keys and tearing up the paper in half. The service center put the spare tire back in my trunk, and my bank refunded the charges. I took my car to a different tire place, and the guy there was able to add on a new tire for way less than Walmart. It was truly stunning how terrible those workers were to me!”
Airport Trauma
“I was flying to Seattle from Cincinnati, with a Chicago layover. After landing in Chicago, I swap planes, and after pulling away from the gate on our way to the jet way, the pilot suddenly shuts down the engine and stops. Everyone’s wondering what on earth is going on for about thirty minutes. The pilot goes on to tell us he hit a luggage cart with one of the engines, and he doesn’t want to fly without getting it checked out first. The other remaining engine isn’t strong enough to get us back to the gate, so we’re stuck until a truck can pull us back. It takes another thirty minutes to finally get back to the gate, and there’s minor damage, so we need a plane swap (if available). Of COURSE, no one is at the jet way, so we’re still stranded in the plane until they remedy that. Finally, they can do a plane swap with the last incoming flight three hours later. This new plane had fewer seats, even though we were all supposed to be on this plane. They sort out who decided to opt out of flying until the next morning, and we were finally ready to go.
The customer service part comes when I called United Airlines to basically voice my frustration at not being even given any meal vouchers or anything for over six hours of being stuck in an airport. There was also a general lack of transparency, so I never knew what was going on. The United customer service woman is downplaying my complaints at every turn. She was so condescending, ignoring all of my issues and acting like I hadn’t just gone through way too much at the airport. Her worst response was when I explained that the pilot hit a luggage cart, which had caused this entire incident in the first place. She looked up the flight and told me, ‘Well sir, although you’re claiming it was a pilot error, actually this was a Delta luggage cart. That’s not our cart, so it’s not our fault.’
I was just silent for a few moments, and then I sarcastically offered to be a lookout on the next flight to spot anything crowded the jet way, Delta-branded or otherwise. The woman ended up giving me a fifty dollar voucher, right after telling me, ‘This incident doesn’t warrant a voucher.’
It was like she was giving me expensive jewelry or something. I hung up in a dizzying rage.”
Cable Service Home Invasion
“I was sitting in my house reading a book, when I heard a window smash in the other room. I suspected it was a robber, so I grabbed my switchblade off of the table and peered into the other room. I saw a TV customer service person installing cable television, hooking it up to my computer monitor. I asked the man what he was doing, and he told me that he was installing the cable television service I had asked for. I told him that I don’t want cable, and I never ordered cable, but he told me to shut up and get out. He even pulled out a weapon and aimed it at me. I left while he finished up. After he left, he left me a bill, which had the number of the ‘company’ on it. I called this ‘company’, who told me I did in fact order the service, and they quickly hung up.
I never paid that bill, but I did pay for a new window. About two weeks later, that name creepy busted through the second window. Without saying a word, he took my computer monitor and cable box. I called the company again, and they told me he took my stuff because I didn’t pay for that bill. I knew just what to do this time around. My boyfriend was a lawyer, so I put him and his threatening voice on the phone. Once I did that, the company said that I could have all of my stuff back. Three days later, the creep was back. He put back all of my stolen stuff and hooked up the wires for me again. But once I took a closer look, that wasn’t my stuff. The guy had given me back totally different computer equipment. I was beyond confused, but I simply accepted it. I tried to research this television company, but I couldn’t find any information online. I still have no idea exactly what it was, but the Russian mafia is quite common in my area, so I believe that this was their doing. This must have been a scam operation, and they just gave me back a computer and cable box out from a warehouse full of stuff they stole.”