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<p>I think if you were a 21 year old parent still in college and working at Walmart, you’d probably use the money for diapers and daycare, not a trip to Europe and a car. ;)</p>
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<p>There you go assuming I have my priorities straight :P</p>
<p>I am curious…what did you want the manager to do in that particular moment to “back you up”?</p>
<p>^I think ask them to leave? (Which seems unlikely given she was about to spend $$$).
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<p>Situation: Customer was disgruntled, being rude to me, and cussed me repeatedly, all the meanwhile demanding me to check out her groceries. She was acting ridiculous. </p>
<p>Possible solution:</p>
<p>Reprimand customer from cussing and tossing things at me. (Ex. “M’aam, I’d like to ask you politely not to use that kind of language with our cashiers.”) If she continued to do so, I would have liked for my manager to have excused me and dealt with the situation accordingly, not just have me stand there and check the customer out.</p>
<p>We have security at the store for a reason.</p>
<p>I have not read your vent entirely, but to answer your question, yes, you will face the experiences at Wal-Mart in every step of the way of your life in the future. It is not a perfect world, not everyone can get along in personalities and to manage people is the most difficult part of a job. And yes, all your future clients will try to get as much as he/she can, just like those people walking through the isles. They may show their desire in different ways, some may jump on you right away, others may express their desire more subtly.</p>
<p>Here’s the attitude. Your boss is not your boss, your boss is your customer. If there are no customers? There is no job.</p>
<p>This is the job, please your boss. Your boss is your customer. Not your boss.</p>
<p>Now, there are some people who are absolute genius’ at retail. Seriously. They are. </p>
<p>They make a fortune in this business. You may not be one of them.</p>
<p>As they say, “smile and nod, smile and nod.” </p>
<p>What is your major? What do you want to do when you graduate? Maybe Walmart has a great corporate job for you when you finish? I know working for Target can be a career.</p>
<p>I don’t think it’s reasonable to be verbally abused at work or have things thrown at you by a tantruming customer. It sounds as though you’ve been good at the job and generally it’s suited you well until this incident and that you are upset more with management than customers. It may well be a good decision to return to your previous job for the summer but it might also be that when you’ve slept on it you decide the flexibility of the current job is better for you till you get out of school. It doesn’t sound as tho most days are like this one. I think you’ve weathered some rather harsh responses on this thread…</p>
<p>MarinaDiamond - Just wanted to say that after reading this thread (and your answers) it is obvious that you are more mature than most posters. Working with the public is very trying - especially if you have difficult supervisors. I seriously doubt your ‘career’ will involve retail sales so grin and bear it - if you decide to keep the job.</p>
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<p>No… definitely don’t want to make a career out of it! I just like it for the time being while I’m supporting myself through college. I started working working retail before I even had a plan for what I wanted to do after high school- it just sort of stuck. The plan is dental school.</p>
<p>I appreciate that charlottemom! 
Thank you kindly.</p>
<p>Marina, I guess I’m in the minority here, but I feel for you. I had a job similar to yours once and can attest that the coping mechanism in such situations is not <em>smile and nod</em> but <em>bite your tongue and stifle your response</em>. Kudos to you for self-control.</p>
<p>Everyone deserves common respect and decency, not excepting the person accepting payment from someone with money in hand. The possession of cash and the power to spend it does not empower the right to abuse.</p>
<p>I’ve seen customer rudeness in check-out lines, and I admire the employees who deal with it calmly and gracefully. In my opinion, you and the other checkers deserve better support from management when customers treat you in a demeaning manner when they are in a position to observe and respond. Loyalty cuts two ways.</p>
<p>axe:
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<p>Now who is passing judgement.</p>
<p>BTW OP …you DO seem very mature and well thought.</p>
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<p>Wrong. Students are welcome to post in the Parent Forum and Parent Caf</p>
<p>I am amazed at the level of support on this thread for abusive, dishonest, obnoxious customers, just because they are going to spend some money. If the store had a policy of expecting respect from everyone, including customers, I bet that long term they would make more money.</p>
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<p>I’m curious as to why you find this annoying.</p>
<p>Thankfully, MarinaDiamond read this part of my post which some others may have missed
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<p>My point was that calling an aisle “express” means about as much as calling this forum “Parents” ie, not much. I was giving a lighthearted “jab” and Marina understood that :)</p>
<p>Others of my comments were based on what had been written up to that point. Marina cleared up some misconceptions (and did it well without getting bent out of shape).</p>
<p>I haven’t actually seen any comments that were not supportive or in answer to the questions posed. </p>
<p>Marina, I hope that you don’t quit your job today because of what happened yesterday. That customer was a total jerk and we all know she was in the wrong. Don’t give her the power to change your life and possibly derail your worthy goals. You handled the situation and yourself well. That manager didn’t do the right thing by reprimanding you in front of the customer (thereby giving her license to treat you even more badly). Actually, the manager or whoever trained you in the first place should have told you the rule about taking everyone in the express lane, not left you to “discover” this rule on your own. </p>
<p>You have more managerial skills than that manager, but right now you want a no-brainer job. Keep to your original goal of not “taking work home”. When you walk out of Walmart after your next shift, leave it all behind. :)</p>
<p>Today is a new day, and hopefully you’ll only get customers like me and the rest of us wonderful CC parents and students who are always pleasant to cashiers! :D</p>
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I would think it’s because every other customer behind this one who has only a couple of items is now going to be annoyed. I can’t understand why stores are trying to keep one obnoxiouse customer happy by risking making all the ones who are being polite unhappy. </p>
<p>I too think the OP is showing maturity and would love to hire you to work with us. I work two different customer service jobs and it’s amazing how rude customers can be. Luckily, in both my jobs we don’t have to put up with it. We are successful enough that we can turn away the customers that are making our jobs miserable.</p>
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I totally agree with you. And I personally would not shop at a store that allowed those customers to get away with it while annoying the good customers.</p>
<p>I’ve worked in a few retail positions and my job right now involves some level of customer support. Yes, you do need to try to make the customer happy, and we have bent rules for customers, but every good supervisor that I’ve seen has made supporting their staff a priority. That kind of work is hard. I have not had a job in that environment where I haven’t seen a customer make a staff member cry at some point. The good supervisors have, at the very least, pulled the staff member aside afterward to make sure that they’re okay and given them a break to pull themselves together. Most of them will also deal with the customer themself – right now, my supervisor always tells me that if I have anybody on the phone that’s really irate, I can transfer them to her, because I’m “not paid enough to get yelled at like that.”</p>
<p>I’m not disputing that you do need to be able to let a lot of stuff roll of your back in retail, but I’m horrified that a staff member would berate another staff member in front of a customer. That’s just a set up for the customer to continue to abuse the cashier.</p>
<p>Any manager who has any skill at all should be able to appease the customer and still treat the employee with respect. It’s too bad Walmart doesn’t have better screening and training for their managers, though I can’t say I’m surprised. </p>
<p>Marina, try not to take all this personally. Your manager is either an idiot or has been placed in a position he is not yet ready for. Either way, just recognize that the issue is not yours. Put up your shields and carry on.</p>