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I can't say I've ever had anyone do that either. I get people paying me in a lot of change or a lot of one dollar bills, but at least they have the common courtesy to actually count it out before they hand it to me instead of just throwing it on the counter. Sometimes they even apologize for paying in small bills or change. Anyway. I griped in the other thread about Silly Bandz, but it's just become even more irritating when middle-aged women with wrists covered in the things see the bin of them, SQUEAL loudly, and start rooting around for new packs. Seriously, why do sad middle-aged women always have to hop onto fads meant for children? I thought it was bad when the kids threw tantrums when we were out of them, but the teenagers and adults are just...  I don't mind when people ask me for book recommendations. It's my job. But when I ask you what kind of books you like, don't just gape at me and go "I dunno." Can you at least humor me and play along? People who don't just get shown to the bestsellers and are left to fend for themselves, especially when I have a line. Similarly, I'm getting fed up with kids who have to do summer reading but don't want to cooperate with me when I try to help them pick something out. I recently had a little girl about age ten or so who had her list of recommended reading but didn't like anything on it. I took her back to the young adult section and asked her what she liked. She just kinda shrugged. I gave her the usual Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, Warriors, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Dear Dumb Diary, stuff like that. Her mom said she didn't like anything with wizards, fighting, vampires, and they read all of the diary series. Everything I recommended to this kid, she had either read, didn't like, or turned up her nose at. Suffice it to say, they did not buy anything. Look kids, I know you don't want to read on your summer vacation. Even though I like reading, I can understand that. But can you at least try to help me out a little bit? That's all I ask for. ugggh I hate summertime at the beach.
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Jul 9, 2010 04:10
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AlmightyBob posted:My dream is to invent a bell that when rung more than once within 20 seconds breaks your stupid finger How about a corollary to that where if someone rings it when you're right there, it bites their hand? "Please ring bell for service" does not mean "ring even if we're two steps away and in full view!"
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Jul 19, 2010 06:44
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It's now time for every bookseller's least favorite question: "Do you sell non-fiction here?" A woman asked me this last night and I just kind of gaped at her. I don't get this question often, but when I do it's always kind of mind-boggling. I always ask "what kind of non-fiction?" to see what they're specifically looking for, but she just got angry and said "ANY!" People, a bookstore is not an elementary school library -- we don't have two big sections labeled "fiction" and "non-fiction." I think the next time I get this question, I'm going to use my boss's answer: "Everything but the fiction section is non-fiction." That'll make 'em  .
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Jul 29, 2010 16:31
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"I'm looking for a mystery author and I don't see them over there!" "Did you look in the mystery section?" "... no." I also had a guy today who came in exclaiming "I want this to be my most favorite bookstore! I want this to be the best bookstore in the world!" He only had one simple request: a detailed map of Spain. No, a travel book would not cut it. When did we suddenly become a map store? I've had people suddenly request maps of other states and other countries, yet we only carry local road maps. Similarly, I may just be irritable but I just get annoyed when people try to suck up to us. "Oh, this is my favorite store! I love this store! I come in here every time I come by!" etc., etc. That's nice. Really. But I don't need to hear it every time you come in.
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Sep 2, 2010 03:16
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A Dapper Man posted:The only thing worse than this is the stupid jackasses looking for a 20+ pound turkey the night before Thanksgiving. Yeah, just a little late there, and even if we did have it, it would be a bitch getting it defrosted in time. In the bookstore vein, I have no sympathy for all the kids coming in trying to finish their summer reading two days before school started. Don't cry to me if we don't have the book, you were the one who had three months to read the thing and now you're coming in looking for the thinnest book on your list so you can continue to shirk your homework. I had a kid come in today and buy a 300+ page book and had to read it all AND do her huge summer assignment by Friday. 
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Sep 9, 2010 05:25
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I think I had the most memorable night in my five years at the bookstore. I'm gonna copy and paste my description from my LJ because holy crap this guy was a spectacle.  Ladies and gentlemen, I had a close encounter with Chris-chan lite at work tonight. I got to the store and went in the back to put my dinner in the fridge. I came out and there was a morbidly obese guy leaning on a cane in Young Adult. A few minutes later, he came up to the register with The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner and profusely thanked B [my coworker] for letting him know it existed. He then went on a rant about how "some fool had to go and leak the fifth book and now Stephenie will never write it!" He was visibly dismayed that Midnight Sun will never see the light of day. But this was only the tip of the iceberg. According to him, even if Midnight Sun never comes out that's fine because there's tons of awesome fanfiction out there to help fill the gap. Just like Harry Potter! And you know what, JK Rowling should totally write a second-generation Harry Potter series. She should also team up with a manga author and write a crossover manga. He writes Pokemon/Fullmetal Alchemist crossover fanfiction as well as Inuyasha fanfiction, desu. Okay, so he didn't say desu. But he came close when he got on a rant about fansites. "HNNNNG IT MAKES ME SO ANGRY WHEN PEOPLE MAKE FANSITES AND THEN ABANDON THEM WITHIN DAYS, IF NOT HOURS OF CREATING THEM!" Yes, that is almost exactly what he said. Apparently everyone should be totally devoted to their fansite creations. He got angry that everything was being overrun with trolls and spambots and yelled "STUPID BAKAS!" in the middle of the store before proceeding to do a shoryuken with his cane. I swear I am not making this up. He asked me and B if we knew about fanfiction. B, being a sensible guy with a social life, didn't, but of course I did. And being the genius I am, I had to let it slip that I enjoy a handful of anime. Well, naturally he was all over me like weeaboos on rice and started talking about all his fanfiction and how he used to be a moderator on some forum before they took his mod position away. He said everyone else told him he was having "delusions of grandeur" and he was very mad because nobody else took their mod position as seriously as he did. He then goes on to say "now, I'm not a fanboy or anything..." before he continued his rant about how people never take their roleplaying seriously and his favorite Inuyasha site is nothing like it once was. He finally left after talking to me for about fifteen minutes. B said, "Well, at least when we find your body in the dumpster we'll know who did it." Since I am a creepy internet stalker (him giving me every screen name he had under the sun helped), I managed to Google him. He was pretty easy to spot on The Inuyasha Journey. Turns out he's 36 and still uses the ^_^ face. 36. This man is the epitome of the word "manchild." Just... my god. There's a video of him on Youtube telling people to "play with their inner child" and all it's missing is Goodbye Horses playing in the background. 
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Sep 17, 2010 04:29
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side_burned posted:One thing I've learned working retail is expect nothing from management. No raises, no benefits, no respect nothing. Ain't it the truth. I work for a semi-local business -- the home office is located in Pennsylvania, but they have locations in New Jersey and Delaware as well. We haven't had a raise in two years. I've worked for the company for over five years and minimum wage is starting to catch up to me fast.  My manager is awesome to a point, but she's very meek/naive and doesn't speak up for us. The assistant manager and keyholders have to fight for us instead. When one of the owners came down with our buyer (who I'm pretty sure is retarded, but that's another story), raises were brought up. Naturally we get a "no, we've put a freeze on raises, we can't afford it," yet it's well-known that the owners just bought a brand-new boat.Also, they instituted a policy where if you forget to clock in or out three times, you're fired. Nobody can go into the system and edit their time without the manager filling out what we call "naughty papers." It's a ridiculous policy because it's very easy to forget to clock in or out sometimes. I just recently hit my third strike because of stress (200 boxes of a new bargain shipment HNNNGH), so now I'm actually kind of worried. Nobody's actually enforced the policy, but the pedantic timesheet guy at the home office recently sent out an email saying "AHEM, I've noticed that people have had their timesheets edited more than three times and nobody's been fired yet, GET ON IT." I seriously cannot wait to get away from this company.
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Oct 9, 2010 07:17
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A guy stopped me on my way to the back room a few minutes before I was supposed to leave asking for a book about "computer jargon." I was pretty burned out from moving several sections around and pulling a ton of returns today, so I didn't quite grasp what he was looking for. After a while I finally realized he wanted a computer dictionary, but we don't have any in stock right now. I went to see if we could order one, then showed him the most recent one that was actually in stock. He wanted all kinds of information that we couldn't get, like how concise the book was and what kind of feedback it got, but whatever. He decided he wanted to order it, and per our new policy I took a 50% deposit from him. After I rung him up, I gave him his credit card receipt with a cheerful "there you go!" : "There you go"? Whatever happened to "thank you for your business"? : Um...: I'm getting this all the time now! Why do people always say "there you go" instead of "thank you"? No, I really want to know!: I... I honestly can't tell you. I was going to say "thank you and have a nice day" in a second.: I just want people to say "thank you!" Is it really that hard? It's nothing personal, I just want to know! : I just wanna go home.Luckily the two women behind him were very nice to me afterwards and told me to take a deep breath and not to worry since he was a pedantic rear end in a top hat. He was almost as bad as the guy who insisted the college who gave him a parking ticket for trespassing while he was obsessively searching for information on Henrietta Lacks was linked to al-Qaeda.
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Oct 21, 2010 02:46
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MJP posted:Back when I did my time in retail, I infinitely preferred customers using credit/debit cards as opposed to the ones who deal in cash. It involved less motions and gave me a second to have a breather while the card was authorized. For me, no. Our machinery is so old that our credit card terminals are separate from our registers (which run on an MS-DOS-esque program that hasn't been updated since 1999), so I have to turn around to do credit/debit. I swear I turn around in a complete circle twice just to do one transaction with credit/debit. Don't forget initialing the receipts and dealing with people who scratch out their credit card number even though we're legally allowed to have it on our copy of the receipt because we don't store transactions electronically. Cash is just so much quicker.
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Oct 26, 2010 00:53
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It should go without saying, but good God are people stupid. This morning was pretty cold, but as long as you had a coat on it was fine. A woman came in around noon wearing a sleeveless dress with no socks and bellowed "IT'S COLD OUTSIDE!" so everyone in the store could hear as soon as she walked through the door. She then asked me if the movie Hereafter was based on a book. I get this a lot, so I went to IMDB. They say right on the page "Is Hereafter based on a book? No." She said it was based on a true story; right beneath the previous question, IMDB helpfully tells me that it is NOT based on a true story, but incorporates real-life events into the story. I showed her these and she said "oh no, no, no, it's real! They had it right in bold print before the movie that it's based on a true story! It's based on the tsunamis in Asia! The woman in the movie may have been a man in real life, but she was a reporter who wrote a book about being dead and I want that book." I need out of this job before Christmas, I can't do it anymore. 
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Nov 11, 2010 02:08
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I'm working 10am to 6pm Black Friday. We open at 9:30am, but going by past experience we don't really start getting busy until lunchtime or so. Most people want to hit up more expensive stores early in the morning. At least my coworkers try to make Black Friday tolerable. One is bringing in homemade baked ziti for lunch/dinner, and since my birthday is on Thanksgiving we're having a cake for dessert (we celebrate everyone's birthday). Ugh, I am getting so sick of our regulars. There is a woman who will bring her kids into the store with her and camp out all over the childrens' section for HOURS. Today is the first day I've seen her come in with less than three kids. She probably has five total, but I think she's been dropping the older ones off at the tae kwan do place across the street and coming in while they're at lessons. They treat the place like it's a library and hardly ever buy anything. Oh, did I mention how they'll take up the whole children's section? They sprawl out in the AISLE right next to our back room despite there being a bench for people to sit on across the store. The father once brought in the youngest kids and did the same thing, except he got out our flashcards and workbooks and used us as a free tutoring center for a few hours. Didn't buy a thing. This angers me more than it should, and I complain to my boss all the time about it. Nobody will tell them that this isn't kosher because they buy something once in a great while. 
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Nov 20, 2010 02:50
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ChirpChirpCheep posted:Do you work in a bookstore? I work in a bookstore cafe and people do stuff like this in our store ALL THE TIME. There have been times where I've seen people in the cafe at the start of my shift and 6 hours later, sure enough, they are still there without having bought anything, not even food or drink. I like magazines as much as the next person, but I can't imagine just sitting at a table for six hours and doing nothing but reading about the latest celeb scandals. I do. I've worked for the same company for the past five years and I'm getting to the point now where stupid little things bother me all the time -- a big sign that I need to get out of retail. We don't have too many people stay for hours on end because we're a small store with no cafe and only one uncomfortable bench to sit on. That doesn't stop people from sitting on the floor though. There's a strange girl who comes in a lot, picks up a pile of young adult vampire/demon books, and just sits on the floor babbling to herself for about an hour. When she decides to buy something, her card is almost always declined and she asks us to hold her books until she comes back with money... which she never does. She makes me incredibly nervous when she comes up to the counter because she NEVER STOPS MOVING. Ah, the perks of working at the beach...
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Nov 20, 2010 06:04
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Soy Sauce Beast posted:I was told that if you call in on Black Friday at my work, you're fired. No exceptions. I've only asked off for Black Friday once, and that was just because my birthday happened to be on Black Friday that year. (I was originally born on Black Friday, so I hate that my birthday usually falls on a holiday or coincides with crazed mobs of holiday shoppers.) I felt bad about it, especially since it was my first year in retail, but luckily everyone was understanding. This year my birthday falls on Thanksgiving, so I have the predicament of not truly being able to celebrate it and visiting with family I hate. I still had to fight to get the 27th, a Saturday, off so I could do SOMETHING. Death Bear fucked around with this message at 17:54 on Nov 22, 2010 |
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Nov 22, 2010 17:52
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My manager made both registers at least $50 short on Saturday. She is no longer allowed to touch them until our sale is over. This goes on until Christmas Eve. Long story short: We're having a holiday sale with tiered discounts. Spend $35 and you get an additional 5% off; $60 nets you an additional 10% and so forth. A couple bought some stuff in one transaction, then came back with some more stuff and wanted to add it to their previous transaction so they could get a percentage off for the sale. Now, this is annoying in itself, but we'd normally just refund the first transaction and then ring it up all as one. But no, my manager can't do it that way. She rings up the second transaction, tries to refund the difference to the card, and colossally screws everything up by making both registers short. Oh, and we all agreed not to put Christmas music on until December 1. What did she do? Turned it on on Black Friday to "put us in the mood."
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Nov 30, 2010 06:15
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Jesus Christ Christmas shopping brings out the weird people. Tonight a guy came into work looking for a parenting/childcare book. We didn't have it, so we offered to special order it for him. He wanted to order it, then he saw the price -- $24.99 for a hardcover, then we'd take 10% off. "$24.99?! Is it signed by the author and illustrator for that price?" $24.99 is the standard price for a hardcover book and is actually a pretty good deal these days since they're getting progressively more expensive. I'd say he doesn't buy many books, but...... a few minutes later, he wanted to order a hardcover Captain Marvel book that was just as expensive and didn't say boo about that. He wanted to special order it because the one we had on the shelf had very minor shelfwear and it wasn't good enough for him. About half an hour later, he came back up with some of the single-issue comics we have. These are from the early '90s and are just weird, obscure stuff that we get in discount batches. He refused to let me touch them whatsoever because they were "perfect, and the spines aren't bent because people just cram them back in the racks!" I have to count them to enter them into the register, but no, I couldn't touch his precious comics. Not even to bag them. Then he had the audacity to ask me who my favorite comic book character was. Although I like comics I really didn't want to talk to him, so I just muttered "Sailor Moon" figuring he wouldn't know who she was and I could avoid having a conversation about which character can beat up whom. Sure enough, he gaped at me for a second and then said, "Oh, HAW! You like them independent comics, don'tcha? Not bashing them or nothin'." Yeah sure, whatever. I made sure to touch his hand when I gave him his change just to annoy him. Someone else can have the honor of calling him when his special orders come in. Death Bear fucked around with this message at 05:14 on Dec 1, 2010 |
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Dec 1, 2010 05:12
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Kaninrail posted:"Clever" customers seldom are. Especially the "Oh, that one item just rang up at $0 (because it's a rider item to something else), so my whole purchase is free, right? Hurr hurr derr!" line that I hear at least a half-dozen times a day. One night I just kind of snapped and (politely) told a woman that nobody working in retail finds the "oh, it must be free" joke funny. Her reply? "Oh, I've never worked retail.  "My friend used to work at a record store where they were encouraged to make distinctive marks on the $50/$100 bills when they swiped them with the counterfeit pen. Why, I don't know, but it gave him an excuse to draw angry eyebrows on Grant and Franklin. When a guy busted out the tired "I just made it this morning!" thing, he drew his angry face on the bill and replied, "President Grant isn't amused at your lame, unfunny joke, sir." Death Bear fucked around with this message at 03:24 on Dec 23, 2010 |
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Dec 23, 2010 03:22
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When I worked at Dollar Tree, there was no break room. Just the back stock room. There were no chairs or anything, so when it came time for lunch/dinner, I had to sit on the floor to eat because I wasn't allowed to sit at the desk in the office. Luckily the bookstore has a lovely back room with a table, fridge, and chair. It's also relatively close to the register so I can make an easy escape at break time. The only annoyance is when customers stop me for help when I'm trying to make a break for the bathroom and they manage to intercept me.
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Jan 6, 2011 14:47
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JamesJBuffalkill posted:If they weren't cowardly losers they wouldn't be retail managers. I was very proud of my manager today. She's usually a complete doormat, but she's been getting better. Our store had another branch out near the beach, but it permanently closed a bit before Christmas. I worked there to help out over the summer and there were several giant signs notifying customers that all sales were final -- it was printed on the receipt and everything, so there was no excuse. All of our other stores were notified that we were not allowed to take any returns from the closing store. Today a guy came in with a book that someone had bought for him in October as a Christmas gift from the store that closed. He wanted to exchange it, but we pointed out to him that there were absolutely no returns or exchanges and even showed it to him on the receipt. I had my assistant manager back me up, but he just wouldn't let it go.  BUT YOU'RE A BOOKSTORE. Why can't you just put it on the shelf? Because our home office told us no. The sale was a way for them to get rid of the remaining inventory and we were instructed that we can't take any returns. BUT YOU'RE A BOOKSTORE! We shouldn't even take it back anyway, it's damaged. Look, I can go get the manager and see what she says.I cringed when my assistant manager said that because my manager is a really big pushover. She even let someone "borrow" a book once before I started working there and they naturally never returned with it. But, to my surprise, she stuck to her guns and said that we couldn't take any returns and we could actually get in trouble for it. She told the guy that she'd have to call the home office since it was a decision she couldn't make. He finally gave up and left fuming, exclaiming that he'd go to the only other bookstore in town where I'm sure they won't take his damaged Christmas gift as a return either. She's still incredibly naive and usually lets the assistant manager handle the dirty work, but boss lady definitely got my kudos today.
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Jan 9, 2011 02:29
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Today was the first time, in all eight years our store has been open, that we've had to call the cops on a customer. Backstory: This guy has been in several times, always looking for obscure books that we never have and he gets highly upset that we don't. For example, he read The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks last year and asked us if we knew the sources the author used; when we told him we didn't, he'd have to go to the publisher, he flew into an outrage about how he couldn't find anything about this story and that the government was out to get him. He would not stop talking to us for at least half an hour about the injustice that all books are stupid and how the college is one big zoo because he parked there without a permit and they had the audacity to give him a parking ticket. This should give you a good idea of what we've had to go through quite a bit lately. I just sent an email to a coworker who's on vacation so she could get the story, so I'll copy and paste. So yes, we ended up calling the police on our lovely friend today. I special ordered a book for him back on Monday the 10th -- it was something we didn't have in stock (who didn't see that coming?) and he wasn't pleased, but gave me the okay to SPO [our term for special ordering] it for him. We couldn't find any information about this book and he wasn't pleased that we didn't have it in the store. "WELL, I DON'T WANT TO BE OBLIGATED TO BUY THIS IF IT'S NOT WHAT I WANT. WHAT IF I OPEN IT UP AND IT HAS 'MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB' WRITTEN INSIDE OF IT? I swear you can't find books with knowledge in it anymore, you have to go to the internet or CHINA to get what you want!" I got subjected to his rant and basically told him "I'm sorry, I don't know what to tell you. You can either order it from us or get it online." He wouldn't give me his phone number when I took his SPO, his reasoning was something like "rargh, I don't want people calling me and having my number! I don't have a house phone but I have a cell phone blah blah blah." Assistant Manager tried to give him our number and suggested he call instead of coming in every single day to check on his book, but he didn't want to do that. Every day he came in, getting more and more irate that his book hadn't magically appeared in our order. Manager tried to order it and it hadn't shipped, so she tried to explain to him that she was still trying. He wanted a total guarantee that the book would be in, but it was only in stock in the Tennessee warehouse and we had no clue when it would be here. This morning (Saturday) Assistant Manager told me that he came in again yesterday looking for his book. He got very upset with Manager when she told him yet again that it didn't ship. He demanded to speak with the owner, so she gave him Owner's number, he ranted some more, and finally left. Assistant Manager told me that he was allowed in one more time to pick up his book, and then that was it. If he was to come in again after that, we were calling the police. I'm glad I remembered his face, because as soon as I saw him come in the door I banged on the bell for Manager. He wanted to know where his book was and she told him that it wasn't shipping, she couldn't guarantee it would be in at all but she would keep trying. This wasn't good enough for him at all. He wanted a definite guarantee that his book would be in, but Manager kept telling him she would not promise anything. Our friend brings out the "WELL, I CALLED OWNER AND HE TOLD ME" spiel. I can't remember the exact details, but I remember him getting very belligerent with Manager over the size of her order. He expected her to do an order just for him and his stupid book, so when she told him she had to gather a certain number of items together to send for an order, he starts yelling "THAT'S NOT WHAT I WAS TOLD! OWNER SAID YOU DON'T HAVE TO DO THAT!" (Caps lock is truly necessary for this man's speech, he yelled the whole time.) She ended up asking him if he wanted to place a deposit on the book, and he yelled "deposit nothing! I'm a paying customer!" and paid for his book in full. I ran to the back to tell Assistant Manager that he was here yelling at Manager and it was getting to the point where other customers were telling him to back off and calm down. She called the police. I went back up front where the same customer was telling him "sir, calm down, this isn't necessary." He insisted Manager was being nasty and rude to him -- that's hilarious, I don't think Manager even has the capability to be rude. The other customer told him that she was being perfectly polite and reasonable, but he wouldn't hear it. He ended up storming off to Starbucks and several customers came up to ask Manager if she was okay. She got the woman's name and phone number in case they needed her as a witness, and several other customers started offering to be witnesses too. A few minutes later I heard the siren and two police cars pulled into the parking lot. There were at least three state troopers there -- two came in to interview Manager and I, the third was standing outside with Our Pal probably making sure he didn't choke on his own tongue out of anger or something. They interviewed her, took our information, ended up calling Owner to get his story, and then went to interview the Hero out in front of Starbucks. I went to the window to see what was going on and he was having a fit, yelling so loudly we could hear him inside and pointing in the window. After they got everyone interviewed and took everyone's information, one of the state troopers came back in and was very visibly frustrated with his lunatic rants. She said, "Just give him a refund. He can get the book online. Do you not want to allow him back in the store?" Manager waffled on it a bit, but we eventually decided he is permanently banned from the store. If he comes in, we call the police immediately. He got his refund and I was hoping to see them drive off with him in the back of the police car, but sadly he is still wandering free, probably thinking we're in cahoots with the government out to ruin his life I hate knowing that whackjob is still out there roaming the streets but at least he's banned from our store. I wonder how many places he's been banned from already with that attitude.
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Jan 16, 2011 07:31
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I laughed while reading posts about customers who would try to haggle on set retail prices. "Hilarious!" I thought. "That will never happen to me." Well, I was wrong. On Saturday a guy slapped down a pile of hardcover books onto the counter and began speaking in the most pretentious manner.  : I have seventy dollars worth of books here. I would like you to consider selling them to me for sixty dollars. : No.: Why not?: We're a retail store, we don't negotiate prices. Hardcovers are already discounted by ten percent.: Can I get a manager to discount them?: No you can't. Our prices are set and we aren't allowed to discount any further.: Well!Also, parents, just because I'm in my 20s doesn't mean I won't tell your kids no. If your child is going in our windows or dinging our service bell to their heart's content while you aren't paying attention, I'm going to tell them to stop for both our sakes. We ding our bell three times to call coworkers up to the front for help, so when your kid is all DING DING DING DING DING on our bell, don't get snippy with us I tell you why three other people came running up to the front. At this point I just hide it under the counter when I see a kid coming because for some reason they just can't resist dinging the bell and parents are always like "sure, go ahead!"
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Mar 10, 2011 03:09
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The General posted:You do realize that brick and mortar literally cannot price match online and stay in business right? I had an elderly customer today tell me "oh, I wish you guys were as cheap as Amazon!" I just told her it was the price of staying in business. I really wish people would stop comparing us to Amazon. That's why all of our other branches are closing, people.
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Mar 29, 2011 04:25
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Dodgeball posted:Don't expect everyone who walks through the doors (or even some of your co-workers) to be smart enough to warrant being in a book store. Be prepared for Oprah and the slew of housewives who will swarm the same day she announces her newest book. You will have no prior warning as to what these books are, so be patient. It also doesn't hurt to learn the sequence order of some popular series even if you don't read them, like A Song of Ice and Fire, Percy Jackson, the Stieg Larsson trilogy, or Maximum Ride. You will be asked this a lot. We keep a binder with series order up at the counter for occasions like this, but it helps to memorize the more popular ones. Similarly, keeping up with the New York Times bestsellers is very helpful if your store doesn't keep a list. I don't know how many stores don't go by the NYT list, but if yours doesn't then it makes things easier to remember the higher-ranking books since they usually stay in their spots for weeks at a time.
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Mar 30, 2011 04:46
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Secret Machine posted:Although my worst bathroom experience was at Borders when we were closing up and found a used Playboy magazine in the first floor bathroom. Me and another bookseller wrangled it into a garbage bag using gloves and a broom handle. Oh God, it's all coming back to me. He was a real creep, and later on it hit me that I went to high school with him. He tried to ask me out when I was 14 and he was a senior.I'm so glad the store I'm working for now doesn't have public bathrooms. The first store was disgusting. One time I found a chicken sandwich stuffed in the tampon trashcan in the women's restroom, but that wasn't disgusting, just weird. We had rotating shifts for bathroom duty and the youngest girl (about 16 or so) there ALWAYS had the worst bathrooms when it was her night. I remember her going to clean the men's room one night and came out on the verge of tears because someone had masturbated into the trashcan. I felt so bad for her.
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Mar 31, 2011 04:45
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I've got 16 hours next week. Nobody else seemed to get any fewer except me, and there's no reason for hours to be cut for the summer because I work at the drat beach. I'm already looking for a second job for the summer since looking for a full-time non-retail job doesn't seem to be working out.
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May 19, 2011 03:36
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I just about reached my breaking point today. My ASM came in at 1 and said she needed to talk to me. Earlier this week my manager had given us a project -- basically a bunch of lists of books to pull, mark down, put on a cart, and make a sign advertising the discount. The ASM and I had each taken a list and started pulling the books. I had taken the list that was nothing but kids' books, which I thought was going to be quick and easy, giving me time to make the sign. (My manager is a bit obsessive about having signs for EVERYTHING, and I always end up being the person to make them in a program so old it uses Shockwave. )The list was NOT quick nor easy. Many books were mislabeled, titles were cut off, and thanks to the way we input ISBNs for our bargain books, I can't even look them up by ISBN online to get the right title or a picture of the cover. I spent a good three hours finishing up a pull list of maybe twenty titles. When both of us were done with our single lists, the cart was full. It was about 8:30 by this time, so I had no time to make the sign. I just figured someone would get it the next day. My ASM's talk was how my manager was upset that we didn't finish the rest of the lists and didn't make the sign. Despite the fact that the cart was full already and we only had one to put the stuff on, we should have pulled everything from every single list in one night. But she was very upset with me because I didn't make a stupid sign, and she didn't even have the spine to tell me herself. She lets everyone else's stupid mistakes slide. We have a woman working for us who has been there for over a year and she's STILL making stupid mistakes when she shelves new books! A few of us have complained about her multiple times, but does my manager do anything? No. Another woman refuses to straighten her assigned sections to the point where customers are actually complaining. We won't do them for her (we've got our own to worry about, we aren't cleaning up after her) and we've told the manager this, yet she won't make her go clean up her goddamn sections. She refuses to enforce this stuff, but I get singled out over not having time to make a sign? I'm reaching a point where I just can't bring myself to care anymore. I've been at this store for almost four years. I haven't had a raise in almost three, yet the owners are wealthy enough to buy a Porche. My manager won't ask for raises either, at least not in a direct way. At this point I'll even take another part-time retail job just to get away from this outfit. I can't believe I've worked for this company for six years 
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May 21, 2011 23:40
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Ulysses S. Grant posted:"Thanks for calling T-Mobile blah blah blah blah blah my name is Ulysses, how may I help you?" The most entertaining one I had was: "Thank you for calling [blank] Books, can I help you?" "Yeah, is this Grotto Pizza?" I have an interview coming up Wednesday at Michael's. I'm hoping they'll let me work a couple extra days a week for the summer to help fill out my meager paycheck. I've been at the bookstore for four years this August and I'm still making $8 an hour. Part of me is considering scaling back my hours at the bookstore and taking more on at Michael's if I get the job there instead, but I'm getting ahead of myself.
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May 31, 2011 06:32
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Well, the interview at Michael's seemed to go pretty well. The ASM was the one conducting the interview, and it just seemed to be the same sort of stuff I do now except with craft supplies instead of books. The position turned out to be seasonal, which is great since that was exactly what I wanted, and they're willing to work with my hours at the bookstore. The downside is I'd probably be making less than I already do. I make $8 an hour already and they said they'd start me off at $7.75 or $8 an hour. I'm not too thrilled with the proposition but seeing as it would hopefully just be something for a couple extra days a week, I can live with it. I just hope it gives me some extra money to go out and buy a whole new set of clothes and shoes since I'd have two different dress codes. I got paid yesterday and after paying two of my bills I have $128 to last me two weeks. Please, please let me get some good news soon. After my Michael's interview I sent my resume and cover letters to two office jobs and applied for a part-time graphic designer position at a local classified magazine. This stupid associate's degree has to be good for something, right?
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Jun 3, 2011 18:16
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uptown posted:Is it really so hard for my manager to look at my availability when making schedules? I'm getting tattooed on the 20th and not only did I have "uptown CAN'T work" written on the time off calendar, but my availability has always said that I cannot work Mondays, and the 20th is one, hence my booking my appointment on that day. I wrote "work PM only" for next Wednesday and I got scheduled for 15 minutes after my doctor's appointment starts. Granted, I should've specified what time, but usually "PM only" means from 4pm on. I told boss lady this yesterday and now she's freaking out because she thinks we won't have enough coverage since only two people will be there for an hour.  I had an interview today at a local classified place for a graphic design position. It's part-time but has potential for full-time. I'm pretty excited, it seems like a pretty sweet job. 8am-5pm schedule, casual dress, away from the general public, no nights or weekends, AND I get to put my lovely associate's degree to use!  Too bad it's 25 miles from where I live, plus I think I asked for too little per hour.
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Jun 8, 2011 18:44
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I got the graphic design job!  That was the fastest turnaround time I've ever had on a job offer. Buuuuut since it only starts out at three days a week, I'll still have to work at the bookstore for a while until at least my probationary period ends. I don't want to cut my ties there and then not have anything to back me up if it turns out I don't like/can't do this job, so I guess I'll be there on Saturdays and another day or two during the week. But hey, weekly pay now!Anyway, related: a lady came in yesterday and bought a bunch of souvenir magnets. We had a couple that said "someone who loves me went to Delaware and bought me this magnet!" I wouldn't get that for someone I love, but whatever. She asked if we had any more, we said no. She called THREE times today asking if we had any more of those stupid magnets or if we could get in contact with the vendor. The third time she called, I just passed her off to the manager because I was tired of telling her we had no way of controlling what they sent us.
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Jun 10, 2011 05:51
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spite house posted:My store is frequently used as a concierge service of sorts by the general public -- they're always asking us to call them cars, mail letters, provide directions to obscure locations, make photocopies for them (uh no) and, most of all, provide restaurant recommendations. Why they think we would know what they want to eat and where is beyond me, and it's probably yet another example of the public becoming increasingly confused about the proper role of commercial spaces, but that's not really what I'm here to bitch about. We get this a lot too. I don't know why people think bookstores = visitor's centers, but I work in a resort town and I get questions about places to eat (I don't know) or who still sells CDs (nowhere in town). Seeing as I don't live in the town I work in, nor would I even want to, I can't answer a lot of those questions. I just end up referring them to one of my coworkers who actually live there and let them deal with it. Today someone asked me while they were buying sex books if I owned the store or if I just worked there. I look like I'm a young teenager. I just looked at the guy and said "I'm 22." He said "that doesn't mean you can't own it!" and I replied "I honestly wouldn't want to." He then said, "well, since you don't seem to care, I normally hate buying books from a bookstore. I just get them off Amazon because they're like two bucks apiece! "He then had to go borrow money from his girlfriend so he could purchase his book on how to please her.
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Jun 16, 2011 07:57
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silversiren posted:I've complained about this before but I am sick and tired of people not handing me their money I love when I have my hand out and people just put their money or credit card right beneath my hand. If they do this, I try to touch their hand slightly when they get their change/card back.
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Jun 16, 2011 20:38
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Ghostnuke posted:gently caress bells so hard. The number of people who think its funny to mash it when you're standing right there is staggering. I hate every single one of you.  " You are not funny. What are you, twelve? As soon as they do it, I take the bell from them and throw it under the counter. It usually gets the point across without them having to say a word. (e: drat, beaten!)At our store, dinging the bell three times lets other employees know someone needs help. One time a kid started dinging the bell repeatedly and I told him "please don't do that!" His mom flipped out on me, yelling "I TOLD HIM TO STOP! WHAT'S YOUR PROBLEM?" Someone showed up to the counter asking if I needed help, and I said, "No, false alarm," and pointed to the kid. And everyone wonders why I hide the bell while I'm at the register.
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Jun 23, 2011 03:34
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uptown posted:I always get asked when I am doing very obvious employee things. I once was standing behind a cashpoint Last summer I had a 13/14-year-old kid ask me if I worked there while I was standing behind the counter AT THE REGISTER. I said "I wouldn't be back here if I didn't" before I could stop myself. His mom got pissed and said I didn't need to get smart with him, and they ended up leaving when I said it was a valid answer. Granted, it may not have been the most appropriate response... but come on. Last Saturday a woman was looking for magazines to ship to the prison and asked if we had a certain magazine. I said no, so she asked for another. Again, no. She asked how I knew and I said, "I do the magazines every week." "Well, can you get a certain magazine?" "We really have no say over it, it's whatever the magazine company sends us." She started getting very huffy and said, "I just want a little help here! Every time I come in, you're very rude to me! Everyone else is very cordial but you're always rude!" I didn't recognize her whatsoever. I went and got my manager, told her what happened, and she came up front with me in case the woman started complaining. She wanted to hear what she had to say, but the woman ended up throwing her magazines down (in the wrong place, naturally) and walking out after twenty minutes of browsing. We are seriously considering discontinuing shipping to prisons now because of people like this. It's too much of a hassle to deal with because most of the time people don't know what their inmate can or cannot receive, and we end up getting returned packages at the customer's expense because they couldn't ask first. Not to mention most of the people who want to ship to a prison in the first place are rude, nasty, and unpleasant. I'm on the fence about this because many of them are nice, pleasant people and I don't want to ruin it for them... but dealing with people like this all the time is just extremely draining. At least I have my new graphic design job to help take the edge off. It's a pretty sweet gig -- sitting on a computer for three days a week for a dollar more than what I make in retail, and once I start getting more hours I won't have to work nights or weekends. I just can't get used to waking up at 6:30am after working closing shifts for so long. These first few weeks are going to suck.
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Jun 30, 2011 02:39
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