A while back I told my Facebook friends to remind me to blog about an encounter I had at the Stop & Shop Customer Service desk. No one did. Lucky for you, I remembered on my own.
I had found four gift cards to Stop & Shop while pumping gas a few months ago. They were on the top of the pump and, although I assumed they had no money left on them, I took them anyways and made a special trip to Stop & Shop to inquire about their worth. Why would I pass up potential free money? I wouldn't. Call me greedy...
When I got to the service desk, there were two people in front of me. Two crazy people.
Crazy customer #1 was returning a half-eaten bag of potato chips. Can you actually do that?
Crazy customer #2 had a laundry list of things he needed taken care of. He had explained to the service representative, me and anyone else that would listen that his mother's boyfriend had just passed away and, while cleaning out his house, they found a pile of scratched lottery tickets, gift cards and paper gift certificates.
The employee took the pile of lottery tickets and, one by one, scanned them into the machine. Each scan prompted a ridiculous jackpot alarm. This took a few minutes and, honest to God, by the time the employee was done scanning the tickets Crazy customer #2 had turned to me at least three times to apologize for how long his transaction was taking.
"I'm so sorry. If I could've come at a different time, I would've. I take the bus..." What? So you would've wasted someone else's precious time? It didn't matter what time you came in...you still would've been wasting someone's time.
Crazy customer #2 was given over $60 in cash for the deceased man's winnings. R.I.P.
Next, he asked the man at the service desk to check the balance on each of the gift cards. There must've been 20 of them. They were still connected to the cardboard just like the ones for purchase at the register and they have their amounts printed right on them. The very patient employee checked each one and verified that they were for the amount that was noted on the cards.
Finally, he asked if the paper gift certificates were still valid. The employee apologized and stated that they no longer accept those paper gift certificates. Crazy customer #2 requested to speak with the manager on duty so he could complain about how a business shouldn't be run that way. The woman manager advised that those paper gift certificates were years old and their current system no longer could process them.
Crazy customer #2 took a phone number for the corporate office so he could lodge a formal complaint against...the store? The computer system? Time?
I couldn't get over how greedy this man was. Between the lottery winnings and the never-been-used gift cards, he walked out with hundreds of dollars but, like many do, he wanted more.
Anyways, he finally left...and waited for his bus.
The employee looks at me and calls me, "Ma'am". Ugh. I tell my story about how I found the gift cards and hand them over and, almost guilty, asked him to check the balance on them. Of course, they all had a balance of $0.00. I also asked him to exchange my $10 for a roll of quarters and he denied me. "You'd need to go to the bank for that...but it's Sunday and they're closed. Sorry."
I took the rejection well...and I thought I was bad. Hardly!
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