life during wartime
A woman turned to me with a query about a phrasebook we didn’t have and then paused to ask: ‘You do work here?’ I must have been glaring at her or something.
I get this all the time.
A man shoved a very neatly written letter through the letterbox to inform us that he’d bought a book but, on arriving home, found that it wasn’t in his bag, and therefore (he concluded) we must have it still (so we’d given him, and he’d accepted, an empty bag?) The letter was to inform us that he was coming in later that day to get it. It was like a threat. We were trembling. Because of course, we didn’t have it.
Anyway he came in (thankfully) while I was at lunch, and demanded that he be able to buy the book again at half price, which I suppose was his idea of a compromise. Verity said no, and he had a go at her in front of a queue of customers, and then came back five minutes later to say that, actually, he’d found the book and - sorry.
It seemed a very odd way of going about things. I began to wonder if he was a ‘mystery shopper’, testing our manner of dealing with awkward customers. If that were true, it would make me feel like shooting someone from head office. Even more than I normally do. The fact that it even springs to mind perhaps suggests something about the relations between shop floor and management. The other day we were told to be understanding if people from the accounts department were short with us, because they’re understaffed. Does that mean that we, fighting off customers and trying to avoid being crushed by enormous deliveries, are free to be ‘short’ with them when they ring to ask for a receipt from 1974?
Clearly, I exaggerate somewhat. Still, this feels like the start of a war. Next Wednesday, one of ‘them’ is coming to do an audit, so I suppose we’ll be compelled to go hunting through all those cardboard boxes we’ve stuffed the old paperwork into. Well it isn’t as if they aren’t labelled. On one of them, I noticed the other day, I’ve scrawled in marker pen: ‘Junely’. See, we’ve even invented a new month, we must be on top of things. Although I imagine this auditor will be after more recent stuff, from Augember or even Septober.
My attempts to promote Pets With Tourette's have come to naught, sadly, due to resistance from decent-minded members of staff. It’s a shame, because I had a whole advertising campaign worked out, complete with a slogan (‘Every home should have one’) and a jingle based on Roxette’s Dressed For Success but with the lyrics - obviously - changed to ‘I wanna get Pets/With Tourette's’) and even a whole Get Selling-type initiative in which staff pepper their sales patter (such as it is) with obscenities. Those of us who have always found it hard to say ‘You can take your card’ at the end of a transaction without adding ‘And you can shove it up your fucking arse’ will be gratified.
Unfortunately, this is just the kind of thing head office frown on. The boring bastards.
I get this all the time.
A man shoved a very neatly written letter through the letterbox to inform us that he’d bought a book but, on arriving home, found that it wasn’t in his bag, and therefore (he concluded) we must have it still (so we’d given him, and he’d accepted, an empty bag?) The letter was to inform us that he was coming in later that day to get it. It was like a threat. We were trembling. Because of course, we didn’t have it.
Anyway he came in (thankfully) while I was at lunch, and demanded that he be able to buy the book again at half price, which I suppose was his idea of a compromise. Verity said no, and he had a go at her in front of a queue of customers, and then came back five minutes later to say that, actually, he’d found the book and - sorry.
It seemed a very odd way of going about things. I began to wonder if he was a ‘mystery shopper’, testing our manner of dealing with awkward customers. If that were true, it would make me feel like shooting someone from head office. Even more than I normally do. The fact that it even springs to mind perhaps suggests something about the relations between shop floor and management. The other day we were told to be understanding if people from the accounts department were short with us, because they’re understaffed. Does that mean that we, fighting off customers and trying to avoid being crushed by enormous deliveries, are free to be ‘short’ with them when they ring to ask for a receipt from 1974?
Clearly, I exaggerate somewhat. Still, this feels like the start of a war. Next Wednesday, one of ‘them’ is coming to do an audit, so I suppose we’ll be compelled to go hunting through all those cardboard boxes we’ve stuffed the old paperwork into. Well it isn’t as if they aren’t labelled. On one of them, I noticed the other day, I’ve scrawled in marker pen: ‘Junely’. See, we’ve even invented a new month, we must be on top of things. Although I imagine this auditor will be after more recent stuff, from Augember or even Septober.
My attempts to promote Pets With Tourette's have come to naught, sadly, due to resistance from decent-minded members of staff. It’s a shame, because I had a whole advertising campaign worked out, complete with a slogan (‘Every home should have one’) and a jingle based on Roxette’s Dressed For Success but with the lyrics - obviously - changed to ‘I wanna get Pets/With Tourette's’) and even a whole Get Selling-type initiative in which staff pepper their sales patter (such as it is) with obscenities. Those of us who have always found it hard to say ‘You can take your card’ at the end of a transaction without adding ‘And you can shove it up your fucking arse’ will be gratified.
Unfortunately, this is just the kind of thing head office frown on. The boring bastards.
posted by martin at 9:17 AM
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