Edward de Gale, Toronto Pianist, Songwriter and Poet

Friday, March 28, 2014

Telling off a noisy customer

Many years ago (decades in fact) when I was a teenager I was working in a store and trying to serve a customer. I say trying because I could not hear over the racket another customer was making.

You see we had this old customer who would come into the store and try to scam the people at the checkout line by claiming they gave him the wrong purchases and/or the wrong change back and that he wanted his money back. And he did it all the time, at least once per week.

It got to be so annoying that my boss even put up a sign, just for him, saying that all sales are final after you leave the store.

The old guy would complain very loudly until the manager came, and then the manager would talk to him until he eventually gave up his scam and left. But he would be back next week trying to pull the same scam all over again.

So this one time I was trying to help this nice elderly lady who spoke almost in a whisper. I simply could not hear her over the racket the old noisy jerk was making...

So I yelled at him. "Would you shut the hell up! I am trying to help a customer here and I cannot hear her because you are making all that noise."

And then the most amazing thing happened. He was quiet.

And he avoided me from then onwards.

And when he did come in to pull his scam, he was quieter about it.

And eventually the old jerk stopped coming to the store. Maybe he died. I don't know.

But what I do know is that my boss talked to me after the incident. She didn't punish me or anything.

If anything I saw something in her eyes that showed her true feelings.

Pride.

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