I used to work for a large office supply store, and we had a very strict policy about doing what the customer asked of us. And it was a strict enough policy that if you had walked in and asked me to do jumping jacks, I would need a good reason to say no. We got all of the customers that Staples refused to help, and they were mostly grumpy and overly demanding.
We had one customer who would come in every few weeks and spend about $1500. It was a huge order, and I was the only cashier. I didn’t make commission on any sales or anything like that. The only time I earned commission was if I personally convinced someone to buy a high end laptop or printer. I did, however, earn strikes for taking too long on orders. I got a strike every time this guy came in.
He always had about 40 coupons, none of which were valid at the time of purchase. But he knew someone pretty high up in the company, so we had orders to honor his 3 year old coupons. I’m not sure if you know how that system works, but if a cashier is going to honor an old coupon, they have to manually change the price of that item. It usually requires a manager’s approval, and it can be really difficult to do. So each coupon added on about 2 minutes into the time I spent helping hime, which would have been fine if he wasn’t the most impatient customer I have ever dealt with.
On orders over $300, you have to have a manager enter their employee code at two different points. On average, my manager had to come enter her code 42 times for this one customer. It was the most difficult thing ever, and I always hated working on the days he came in.
One of the times he came in, I had finished with everything with the exception of taking his payment. I stopped to ask if he needed anything else, and he grabbed a soda. I rang it up, and asked if he had a coupon for that as well.
My manager overheard and started laughing, but this man was not amused. He threatened to have me fired right then. I rolled my eyes and said “okay. I’ll just cancel this order and let my manager start it over for you.” He didn’t call anyone and it was never brought up again, but I quit about 4 days later.
Side note: I know it wasn’t professional. I was a teenager, making minimum wage. I was dealing with harassment from one of my managers, and this guy was incredibly rude. I’m a pretty nice person 99% of the time, but if you are actively trying to make life more difficult for other people than I have no sympathy for you.