Sieg Heil! Today's Customer Service Horror Story

[jmowreader]

Before I tell you the horror story, I have a brand-new Situational Question. All of you HR types who use situational questions in your hiring process should add this to your questionnaires immediately.

A customer tells you he wishes Adolf Hitler would have won the Second World War. Do you:

a. Slap the living dogshit out of him for being a fucking dumb-ass.
b. Hold out your hand and say, "Hi, I'm (your name) Epstein. Would you like to come to temple with me this Friday evening?"
c. Tell him you voted for Clinton twice, Gore once and will vote for Kerry in November because you really can't support a president whose grandfather was a Nazi sympathizer like Bush's was.
d. Don't say a damn thing, smile, and hope like hell he can find what he's looking for at the competition because we'll make sales plan this week without any Nazi money.

So here I am selling an attic staircase to some guy when all of a sudden he grows horns and a tail and starts spewing all this total freeper tin-hat gibberish. Let's see...

* They can watch you through your TV screen
* They can watch you through your computer monitor
* Those wires on top of the utility poles are really antennas they use to watch you through your digital watch. (It gets better.)
* The monitors at the cable TV company are so they can watch you through your TV set.
And finally...
* It's too bad Hitler didn't win the war, because he would have stopped them from watching you through your TV set.

I just looked at him with that "you have got to be kidding" look. He wasn't.

[physioex]

1. Did you make that sale?? EOM

[jmowreader]

13. Yeah, actually I did

And it was a decent sale...the guy wanted a wood attic ladder because if the roof leaked onto the wiring, he would be electrocuted on an aluminum one. (Which made more sense than anything else he said, strangely enough.) He bought one, and they cost around $70 each.

But I wasn't real happy about it.

[NYC]

2. I knew someone who thought she was being watched

through her television. She was almost totally deaf, and had closed caption service. Other than that, she was totally harmless, very pleasant, etc.

The only response you can give to someone like the customer you had is, "Really?"

[SCRUBDASHRUB]

3. I was working as a cashier at a local grocery store to help pay

for college and a lady came thru my line. After I rang her up and bagged her groceries, she handed me her card; she was trying to sell me cosmetics. She remarked to me, "Oh, I just look like I'm in a concentration camp without a facial." Now, what praytell, would make someone even contemplate saying that? WTF!?

I wish I had told her, "Hello, my last name is Adelman, and I'm sure my dead Jewish relatives who were slaughtered by the Nazis sure appreciated that comment, you stupid cunt!"

[stevedeshazer]

4. I have to go with D

But I'd like to go with A!

[baldguy]

5. Play along.

They can hear you through the attic staircase. Acts like an old-fashioned ear-horn, doncha know.

I used to work in a liquor store. We had a lady come in every few days, but we couldn't pass her wine over the barcode scanner, because the laser would put radiation in the bottle.

[22181]

6. When I was a kid I thought Big Bird could hear me on Sesame Street...

All because once my sister and I were yelling at the TV that Snuffelupegus (spelling butchered, I know) was right behind him. Big Bird looked right at the TV and said, "What's that? He's right behind me?"

We went nuts thinking he could hear us. We were very young then. :-)

I got over it.

[kestrel91316]

7. Heck, that guy's not.....................

a freeper, he's a paranoid schizophrenic off his meds. Sounds like my mom's fretting that her neighbors sneak into her apartment when she's at the store, to steal her forks and ice cubes.

[Gryffindor_Bookworm]

8. That sounds less like political beliefs and more like

paranoid schizophrenia, which is a legitimate mental illness.

It would've freaked me out, too, though. :scared:

[Richard D]

9. Um

That's more like untreated schizophrenic symptoms. Be careful with that one.

[Richard D]

10. Oops

Didn't read the two posts above before posting.

[jayavarman]

11. Mental illness

is a sad and scary thing.

I cannot even imagine going through life with that crazy shit coursing through my mind.

[bookfreak]

12. If that's not untreated or undertreated paranoid schizophrenia...

then maybe he's just some freak who's watched way too many reruns of "The X-Files" :7

[TrogL]

14. They can watch you through your TV set

Here's how it works. The cable TV company knows what channel you're on either through your set-top box or by back-resonance on the lines. Once the (pick your agency) knows what channel you're on, they can set up a thing that senses the vibrations in the glass of your window (audio and video). The raster in your tv set makes the glass vibrate. They cancel out the signal from the TV (since they know what channel you're on) and then they get a picture.

[jeff30997]

15. I'm guessing that...

You bought an attic staircase recently?

[Mr.Green93]

16. sell him some "make youself invisible lotion" only 99.95

[noonwitch]

17. Ask him if they are broadcasting his thoughts on the radio or tv.

If he says yes, he is not just paranoid, but is a paranoid schizophrenic.

Lots of people are paranoid delusionals, but not all of them are schizophrenics. When the paranoia becomes personal, then it's more schizophrenia.

He needs Risperdol.