Customer Complaints

Josh and I had plans for the following Thursday; it would be the first real plans we made since he told me that he wanted to be friends. I was excited, more excited than I let on to anyone when they asked how things were going with him. So when Wednesday came and I didn’t hear from Josh at all, I was starting to worry a little. I was debating calling him on my break to see if we were still on for the following night but it turned out that I didn’t need too.

I had just walked into the store when I ran into Tony (the manager on duty that night) who told me that the girl, who was supposed to be covering infants from the time the department manager left until I came on, quit. “Looks like you have a busy night ahead of you!” He called over his shoulder as he continued on his way. My first thought was to turn around and walk out because I knew how horrible it would be in there but of course I didn’t.

Since I knew what was probably waiting for me when I walked into the department, the complete chaos that I saw wasn’t a surprise - there were unopened boxes sitting in the horseshoe from the day before, the baby food and diapers hadn’t been worked, and none of the recovery had been put away – all of that along with the discarded items scattered throughout the department from the customers who decided that they didn’t want something and dropped it where they were standing and the opened packages from the customers who just had to rip product apart, only to throw it on the bottom of the shelf, or even better, on the floor. Why? I groaned when I walked past the layette and saw the mess waiting for me to clean up. Why am I so lucky?

But that mess was second on my list, making sure that the diapers and food were as full as possible was number one for obvious reasons. That was why I grabbed the ladder before I even came into the department; I knew I would need it right away. I was walking towards the diaper wall when I heard a couple ladies complaining.

“I don’t know why I even come here!” The first lady spat. “They never have the diapers I need! How hard is it to order enough? How smart do you have to be to work here? It’s not that difficult!”

Whenever I hear someone complaining about the place I work, I always want to tell them if they think they can do better, then be my guest but of course, I can’t do that and I don’t; I bite my tongue, smile or apologize.

The second lady must have mentioned the Parent Choice brand that we carry along with the Pampers and Huggies because the first lady spoke again. “I’m not buying that cheap crap! Is it too much to ask for Wal-Mart to get its act together? They are in the customer service business! But you can never –“

I couldn’t listen to any more, I turned the corner, flashed them a smile and said ‘hello, is there anything I can help you ladies with today?’ as I set up my ladder and placed my foot on the first rung.

“No,” said the first lady. I wanted to roll my eyes; I never understand why people complain to everyone else but the one person who could help or give you the answers you were looking for.

“Oh ok,” I smiled at them as I made my way up the ladder to see what diapers I had to work with.

I had gone up and down the ladder a couple times with some diapers while the two ladies were still standing in the same place, whispering to each other. I heard the second lady tell the first one to ask me and then she gave a frustrated sigh. “Excuse me,” the second lady stepped up to the ladder. “I was looking for size 5 in the Huggies Supreme; would you happen to have any up there?”

“No, I’m sorry I don’t.” I told her and went to say something else but the first lady cut me off.

“What about in the back?” She said all snotty like.

I shook my head, “No I’m sorry, all the bagged diapers that we have are all out here.” It was the one thing that the infant manager insisted on when the night crew stocked in Infants; all bagged diapers went out or on the riser.

“Thanks…” and I swear she muttered, ‘for nothing’ under her breath and since the second lady gave her a dirty look, I’m certain that’s what she said.

They started to walk away. “We don’t have any bags of the size 5’s,” I stated as they turned to look at me. “But if you really needed the diapers and didn’t mind paying the $32 for the box; we have a whole stack base in the main aisle with all the sizes on it.” I knew this because I saw it when I walked towards the department when I came in. “It’s a special purchase,” I told them. “We don’t normally carry those diapers in the boxes.”

The second lady smiled and thanked me for letting them know that, while the first one never even looked at me. I didn’t really care but as I stood on top on of the ladder to grab some more diapers, I saw that they had stopped at the stack base to grab a box.

And that’s not all I saw. From on top of the ladder I could see the entire store and normally I look for people I know; since I knew Bella was working with me that night, I looked for her by the change rooms. She was talking to someone, someone I was waiting to hear from.