Retail jobs: the dumbest customer question you've been asked?

[funkyjiveturkey]

i work in customer service in the electronics department of my store, a surplus store no less. we get some very interesting customers both for the good and bad, but we do get a lot of very uneducated questions.

around when i started my job there, an old couple came in asking why their computer couldn't get past the BIOS post, and the woman literally asked "does my computer have dirty windows?". as i began the next sentence i cut myself off just to give her a weird look for a moment, then kept asking more questions.

now i get that, they're old, not familiar with newer technology and especially not computers, but one thing customers do that irks me on a regular basis is ask if i'm employed at the store. i'll be wearing the company shirt, and a nametag that says "Sales associate", and i'll be standing behind my counter sweeping the floor or fixing something, and a lot of people still come up and ask "Hi, do you work here?" as i pause to look at the wall of paintball guns behind me, then look back to them and say "well i would certainly hope so sir, what do you need?"

i can probably think of better examples, but these 2 really stick out.

if you work in retail, you've probably been through similar things. what is the dumbest question you've ever been asked at your job?

 

[thesilentman]

snip

I don't work in retail, but I do help convert older machines to Linux and attempt to fix machines that have viruses and other issues. Considering that most of the people I help are rather tech illiterate, it's to be expected. But the dumbest question award has to go to the person who thought that she didn't need empty files on her computer. So she deleted them.

Turned out she deleted the entire Windows folder. All of it, not just System32. There's been some Linux mishaps, like the chap who thought it was a good idea to blow away the root filesystem, but the System32 one cracks me up as this is a decade old Windows joke that even most non tech illiterate know. I laughed quite a bit after I got done fixing it.

And oh? You're new? Welcome to the Escapist, stay out of the basement, and if anything goes wrong, blame Kross. Always.

 

[funkyjiveturkey]

snip

I don't work in retail, but I do help convert older machines to Linux and attempt to fix machines that have viruses and other issues. Considering that most of the people I help are rather tech illiterate, it's to be expected. But the dumbest question award has to go to the person who thought that she didn't need empty files on her computer. So she deleted them.

Turned out she deleted the entire Windows folder. All of it, not just System32. There's been some Linux mishaps, like the chap who thought it was a good idea to blow away the root filesystem, but the System32 one cracks me up as this a decade old Windows joke that even most non tech illiterate know. I laughed quite a bit after I got done fixing it.

And oh? You're new? Welcome to the Escapist, stay out of the basement, and if anything goes wrong, blame Kross. Always.

thank yo good sir i figured i've been using this site long enough i might as well join

 

[Sniper Team 4]

I've had some people, though three come to mind. One is this old lady, and while it wasn't a stupid 'stupid' question, it was stupid in another way. She came up to the counter and asked, "Can I ask you a question?"
"Sure, I'll try to--"
"Why do you only have cashiers on THIS side of the store? How come they're never over on the other side." For three minutes I stood there and listened to her complain about how our people were set up. Funny thing is, last week we had them down at the other end and she complained about how they weren't over on the current end. It's kind of hard to do when there are only two cashiers and it's nine in the morning.
Another time a parent came up and wanted to buy God of War for her eight year old boy for his birthday. I looked at her and explained that the game was full of violence and gore and stuff that tend to give kids nightmares.
"Oh, I'm fine with that," she said. The she lowered her voice and leaned in closure. "But I heard about a certain part of the game where you...you know. Is that true?" I immediately realized she was talking about the sex mini game. My imaginary eyes rolled in my head. Blood, gore, and violence doesn't bother her, but the thought that her son might be exposed to sexual stuff worried her.
Finally, and this is the most recent, some old guy came up to me and asked me some weird questions that I couldn't really answer, but gave it my best shot. He wasn't asking about store questions, but state questions, directions, and just weird stuff. Finally, he asks me, "Do you want to make a lot of money?"
"Uh, excuse me?"
"Do you want to make a lot of money?"
Baffled, I responded, "I don't think I'd be allowed to keep it," because that's store policy and I didn't want this guy handing my a large sum of cash on camera.
He throws his hands up and walks away, shouting, "Never mind. It's clear you're not interested." Just...what?

 

[Terminate421]

At a Staples:

"Can you help me with a printer?"

(I am not only in the office supplies but also on the other side of the store AND tech isn't even in my department)

 

[Scarim Coral]

Yeah I had the whole "Do you work here?" question aswell. Not only am I wearing a red fleece jacket (which as far as I know no one else had worn into the shop) but it does have the company named stitched in yellow thread on the left side at the front part of the jacket.
Granted I don't hold it against them as I once overheard a customer asking that same question to another customer...

Other than that I can't think of a really dumb question asked by a customer. Sure there "do you got..." when it's behind that customer but to be fair the store does change its stock around quite often.

 

[smearyllama]

I work at a coffee shop/store thing. I once had a customer walk in, stand directly in front of the big menu we have, and ask "Do you all serve food here?".
Now, I'll admit that the menu isn't the most simple thing. It's all arty and written in fancy chalk, but a few seconds of reading will clarify that yes, we do serve food here.

 

[Aris Khandr]

"Why is it so crowded in here?" Asked on Friday, November 26, 2010

Which, as some of you may have picked up on, is BLACK FRIDAY. At a craft store that was selling $300 die-cut machines for $99, and $500 sewing machines for $200, among other insanely good deals.

Others from the same day:

"Stop trying to cut in line." Said to me as I was trying to get INTO the store, two hours before we opened. Naturally, my apron was inside, and they would not accept that I was supposed to be in there until I called my boss and made him open the door for me from inside.

"Where are those sewing machines?" Asked around noon. Note, I got there at 4 AM. The doors opened at 6 AM. How can anyone possibly believe we'd still have them six hours later? He then tried to insist I didn't want to sell one to him. Because, you know, I hated him or something.

"Why are you so lazy?" Asked of me as I was eating lunch outside the store. At 3 PM. Eleven hours after I got there, that was my first break. My Pokewalker said I'd walked twelve miles that day. I was, almost literally, everywhere in that store. So yeah, I wasn't giving up my lunch break to help anyone else.

"You're not a triplet, right?" That one was actually funny. Remember when I said I was almost literally everywhere in that store? I pretty much ran from one job to the next. So I had helped a woman in the yarn section, then again over in patterns. It was only when she got to the register, where I was ringing people out at the time, that she realized that the store wasn't employing twins.

 

[triggrhappy94]

"Why are you so lazy?" Asked of me as I was eating lunch outside the store. At 3 PM. Eleven hours after I got there, that was my first break. My Pokewalker said I'd walked twelve miles that day. I was, almost literally, everywhere in that store. So yeah, I wasn't giving up my lunch break to help anyone else.

Where do you live? I don't know if this is just a thing in California or national, but it's illegal to work past 5 hours straight without a half an hour "uninterumpted meal" break.
You are technically allowed to wave your meal, but then you have to punch-out after 6 hours.

 

[Amethyst Wind]

"Why are you so lazy?" Asked of me as I was eating lunch outside the store. At 3 PM. Eleven hours after I got there, that was my first break. My Pokewalker said I'd walked twelve miles that day. I was, almost literally, everywhere in that store. So yeah, I wasn't giving up my lunch break to help anyone else.

Where do you live? I don't know if this is just a thing in California or national, but it's illegal to work past 5 hours straight without a half an hour "uninterumpted meal" break.
You are technically allowed to wave your meal, but then you have to punch-out after 6 hours.

Well I'm not American but I have worked retail sales before. I'd assume that the management's response to that on Black Friday, being the busiest shopping day of the year, would be "Do it or you're fired."

It's illegal but pretty much accepted as that's what'll happen.

 

[Amethyst Wind]

"Why are you so lazy?" Asked of me as I was eating lunch outside the store. At 3 PM. Eleven hours after I got there, that was my first break. My Pokewalker said I'd walked twelve miles that day. I was, almost literally, everywhere in that store. So yeah, I wasn't giving up my lunch break to help anyone else.

Where do you live? I don't know if this is just a thing in California or national, but it's illegal to work past 5 hours straight without a half an hour "uninterumpted meal" break.
You are technically allowed to wave your meal, but then you have to punch-out after 6 hours.

Well I'm not American but I have worked retail sales before. I'd assume that the management's response to that on Black Friday, being the busiest shopping day of the year, would be "Do it or you're fired."

It's illegal but pretty much accepted as that's what'll happen.

Where the hell do you live? You can only get fired on the spot for gross misconduct. You could show an employer a picture of your solicitor and they'd shit their pants if they tried to fire you for that. It's actually quite difficult to fire people. They'll more than likely make your life hell until you quit but then you just keep a record of unafair treatment, get a few testimonies from co-workers and report them for harassment.

I know that. My point was many people, such as the young teenagers who take such retail jobs as their first employment, do not. The threat is often enough for them.

You seem to have reacted very strongly to this. Why?

 

[Aris Khandr]

Yeah, we have the same laws here. But we had people call out, one was in a car accident, and another collapsed in the middle of the store and we had to call an ambulance for her. So while I could have said "Hey, the schedule says I am taking my lunch now, so sod off", I stuck it out for the good of the store and the ease of my coworkers, who would have just been short another person at a tough time if I had gone. I actually ended up working two full shifts that day to cover the people we lost, but didn't take my lunch break until we got more people in the store to work. That may not be the law, but that's what my work ethic says is the right thing to do. Thus my objection to being called lazy when I finally did get a break.

 

[Ariyura]

snip

I don't work in retail, but I do help convert older machines to Linux and attempt to fix machines that have viruses and other issues. Considering that most of the people I help are rather tech illiterate, it's to be expected. But the dumbest question award has to go to the person who thought that she didn't need empty files on her computer. So she deleted them.

Turned out she deleted the entire Windows folder. All of it, not just System32. There's been some Linux mishaps, like the chap who thought it was a good idea to blow away the root filesystem, but the System32 one cracks me up as this a decade old Windows joke that even most non tech illiterate know. I laughed quite a bit after I got done fixing it.

And oh? You're new? Welcome to the Escapist, stay out of the basement, and if anything goes wrong, blame Kross. Always.

I've done work like you do, back in the day when they used to have those pop up ads that would appear too big for the screen and you'd have the drag the window over to click the X, I had a client who didn't know how to get rid of them so she would restart the computer each time she got a pop up. She would start 15 to 20 times a day before she came to me with the problem. But the best clients are the ones that know just enough to be dangerous.

 

[Jason Rayes]

This isn't exactly retail, but I worked in a call center as tech support for a mobile phone company. A guy had broken the screen on his phone. He could not understand why I wanted him to take it into a store for repair. He wanted me to fix it over the phone. Honestly, a broken screen "Can't you just fix it now", "Why not?", "Why do I have to take it to a store?". I eventually got him to go by comparing his situation to ringing a mechanic about getting his car fixed, he would need to take it in. He finally got it. The call went for nearly 20 minutes.

 

[Fliegar]

I was working on Boxing Day this year at Future shop, and ended up trying to ring through a man and his wife who spoke very limited English. Normally there wouldn't have been any issues, but the man didn't know his PIN number for his debit card. He tried asking me what it was, so I explained what the PIN number is, and how they should have explained it to him, and let him choose one at the bank. He then steps away and tries to get me to input numbers into the debit machine before the woman with him pulls out a wad of cash (totaling around $1000) and tries to hand it to me.

Other than that, I had a guy (again, on Boxing Day) grab the collar of my shirt and yank on it because I was helping another customer before he got there. When I turned around and told him I was helping someone else, he started yelling and demanding I help him. I apologized and mentioned that we were insanely busy, and that either I or another employee would help him as soon as we could. The moment I turned back around to face the customer I was originally talking to, he grabbed my shirt again and pulled me back, and started to yell at me again. At that point I snapped at him and said a few things a person should never say quite as loud as I did, and he left me alone.

Edit: I suppose these weren't really questions so much as stupid things that happened, but each of them DID technically ask me something.

1. *Translated as best I could from how he said it* What is my pin number? "What account is it in?"

2. "Hey! I need help with a computer!" Followed by: "F***ing do your job and help me!"

 

[William Dickbringer]

"Why are you so lazy?" Asked of me as I was eating lunch outside the store. At 3 PM. Eleven hours after I got there, that was my first break. My Pokewalker said I'd walked twelve miles that day. I was, almost literally, everywhere in that store. So yeah, I wasn't giving up my lunch break to help anyone else.

Where do you live? I don't know if this is just a thing in California or national, but it's illegal to work past 5 hours straight without a half an hour "uninterumpted meal" break.
You are technically allowed to wave your meal, but then you have to punch-out after 6 hours.

strange in ohio it only if you are minor you have to take a break for every 5 hours you work
O.T. manager had this little gold coversation with a lady in the drive through
L: "what sizes do your soups come in?"
M: "2 sizes a cup which is 8 oz and a bowl which is 12 oz"
L:*pauses for a moment* "which is bigger?"
(manager just walks away)
M: "I'm done you deal with her"

 

[w9496]

I work at a small time coffee shop in my small town, so I get "stupid questions sometimes.

"What kind of food do you have here?" We have a bakery literally attached to the counter where we take their orders. You would have to try to ignore it.

"What is the difference between Mocha and White Mocha?" Okay, this has got to be a prank TV show, but it wasn't.