No More Empty Fortune Cookies!

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

The Crippled Line

One thing I detest is poor customer service. Last night The Wifester and I went to Marc's grocery store. The customer service is probably the worst I have ever experienced in my life. The cashiers are too busy talking amongst themselves to even acknowledge their customer's presence. Tonight the cashier ringing us up was discussing "the fat-ass with the cowboy hat over in the crippled line" with the cashier beside him. Seriously? "The crippled line"??!! Who talks like that? The two guys (cashiers) were shooting the bird at one another, and there was lots of "fuck that" and "what a dick" being said back and forth between them. I was appalled. Meanwhile, The Wifester was not able to hold herself back. While this was all going on, another employee came over to bag our groceries and our cashier said to him, "Finally, the customer service was sucking because you weren't here to bag" and The Wifester shot back, "No, actually the customer service is sucking because of the foul language, the shooting of the middle finger, and calling the disabled people 'cripples'. That's what sucked." I just love my outspoken wife! I would think this kind of language and behavior would not be permissible at work. When I was a cashier, we would have been fired on the spot if another cashier and I behaved like this on the sales floor, customers in sight or not. I called this location this morning to let the manager be aware of my dissatisfaction. I was further appalled when, after relaying my experience to him, Robert said, "OK." I asked, "So, OK is all you have?" To which he responded in a short, almost gruff tone, "Well, I'll have to find out who was working." I asked if that information is located on my receipt, and he again in a rather annoyed tone said, “Yep, on top.” I provided him with the name of the cashier from the top of my receipt, to which he simply responded, "OK". Having worked in retail myself for many years, and in customer service for many more, I was trained to apologize to a dissatisfied customer and to ensure that the situation will be remedied promptly. At the very least there should have a small gesture of empathy, for example, "I am so sorry that you experienced that in our store. I would have been appalled, too." But all that Marc's has to offer is a matter of fact, casual "OK". I could practically hear his shoulders shrugging over the phone. 
I wrote this up into a letter and sent it to Marc's Home Office. I don't expect them to have much more response than their store manager's, but since I promised them I would tell everyone I know about my horrific experience...See, that's what poor customer service does for ya.