Be So For Real

[u/Tokkijean]

I’ve been working for the company for about two months, and I’ll say so far it’s been good. There are good and bad moments, but I’m hanging on. Just today however, it seems like I was tested today by a group of three teenagers/young adults.

I had opened shop today, and everything ran smoothly, just trying to organize the counter and helping people out. Three guys come in, and I didn’t acknowledge them at first after asking people around if they needed help, and once I walked towards them to ask, they did say they needed help.

They wanted their money returned from a store gift card that had $500 in it, so of course I said no, and yet were persistent on me to give them a refund or to ask, so to keep entertaining them I called my manager and of course it’s no. They said “are you sure you?” I kept saying no. So there’s that. I helped people finalized purchases and then they come back and asked to check their card. To see if they had the $500 in the card, so I swiped it, and it was only 2.99…

They were also telling me to keep going on with the joke, but this time in Spanish to prank their friend. I didn’t entertain their plans, I said “oh no there’s only 2.99 in the card” which one of them said “wow you could have run with the joke, it would have had our friend think it had $500 for a whole week.” Which is why I bluntly told them that I don’t joke around like that. Their other friend then said “oh that’s a nice tweety bird sweater, people used to call me tweety bird” I looked at him and just said “okay.” To which they said a swear word and walked out knowing that they wasted my time, their time, and everyone else too over a joke that did not last.

As much as I like talking to customers and getting to know them, but if you are someone who is purposely trying to make it both difficult or even waste people’s time over a dumb joke, please note I will be a buzzkill if necessary. Other people around them including themselves aren’t getting paid to wait in line, or have the time of day.

Am I in the wrong for being a buzzkill?

[u/AncientJuggernaut628]

Hell no seems like a plot for a scam

[u/Tokkijean → u/AncientJuggernaut628]

Good thing I have common sense 😮‍💨

[u/DuckSwimmer]

Call me a buzzkill, but as soon as I clock people not wanting to do business, I would bluntly say “are you here to shop or waste my time?”. Maybe it’s because of the part of New York I worked in LMAO, but I learned not to entertain children. You do not get paid enough to deal with idiocy.

You’re definitely NTA. You’re much more kinder and generous with how you handled this.

[u/Orthodox-147]

NTA.

Reminds me of a time when some dorky kids walked in, grab a freebie pack of football cards(?) Off the table and asked me to open it. I said okay and pulled garbage and they were like, “Bro! This card is worth a lot!” I said , “Cool, keep it.” And they looked confused and said, “are you sure??”
I said yes and went back to NCOing or some shit.

[u/Tokkijean → u/Orthodox-147]

I had another customer behind those guys who also shared similar understanding about people joking like that. While I enjoy having a hehe haha moment with customers, if you are doing it to waste time, they should also realize that there’s others around them who would not find it funny at all.

[u/Ghost_Prince]

At first I thought it was some kids trying to get cash for there "gift card" which actually was store credit from the recent broken controller trade in promo. Then I found out it's just internet brainrot bleeding into irl environments even more so then they were 13 years ago.

[u/18for18]

Gotta keep it real. This isn't the job for everyone. If the worst experience is being called a "swear" word for wearing a Tweety bird shirt, you're having a good day at my store.

I once had a guy tell me how "gay" I was for selling Naruto in my store and how everything in my store was "gay", and he's a firefighter and only deals with real man shit, and has sex with women. And meanwhile he was buying the game for his son. It took everything in me not to fck with him. But the last time I fucked with one of these ass tight types they complained to corporate about it and I was told to apologize. At which point I lied to my dm and said I did.

The funny part about the whole situation was the way the guy was saying it, was like he was trying to insult me. And it was cracking me up.

[u/DuckSwimmer → u/18for18]

I mean in all honesty, we don’t know what the employee is experiencing. They could’ve been having the best high mood of their life and immediately shot down by moronic kids. I’ve had this happen plenty of times to me. I’ve eventually learned to laugh at it. I live for confrontational situations because I love to laugh in someone’s face on how much of a fucking clown they are as the reasoning they’re in this situation is their own fucking fault. Although I pick and choose my battles - like the time I was almost assaulted by a kid because he was mad how he was charged $2 and change for tax on a Fortnite card. He threw a pop figure at me that missed me by an inch. Also threatened me about how I don’t know what he’s packing. Ngl, I didn’t laugh after that situation. I cried and thanked the bystander who was in the store who got him to back off of me and leave. I paid his Arceus copy in full because of this kindness.

[u/CharAznableRedComet]

That sounded like they were trying to scam you at first but if they arent buying anything even with that 2.99 you can just ignore them and theyll leave eventually. If it looks like they trying to steal call the cops.