I can understand her frustation. Those cards should at least say "subject to inventory and availability."

Some people have it in spades. I found myself over an hour from home yesterday (after a scary drive thru the snow) with no wallet and a long list of errands to do. I went into a branch of the Ozark Mountain Bank in Branson West, MO and with the help of the 3 very kind women that work there and my favorite bank person in my own bank in AR, we were able to get some money wired to me in a very speedy fashion, saving my day and allowing me to accomplish everything I needed to do, going even further from home. They bent over backwards for me, a stranger and not a customer at all, and with big smiles and lots of good cheer. You could tell they loved their jobs and their company. (They even offered to just lend me their own money, but I couldn't let them do that, I didn't even have any ID on me.)

Hurray for people like that. Because they didn't shunt me away or just say "sorry, we can't help you", I'm singing their praises to anyone who will listen. :)

I agree with you CS is a lost art. I would like to hear them say~~~do you want me to check other Michael's in the area to see if they have it or go over to CS and see if they can go on our .COM and order it for you?

I have heard that Nordstroms has the best customer service and some places try to model themselves after them. And I agree, I always get great service with them and they will order anything for you from another store and have it delivered to your house for free~~~and you can return it no questions asked if you want.

Here's an idea:

Paper clip.

Note that says, "Maybe".

Clipped to the card "on the floor".

I imagine that I might well have thought up such a suggestion for the manager.

Seems to me ... that that lady should at least send an email, preferably a letter, to corporate headquarters.

And ... inexperienced me, which is a shame at this advanced age ... I thought at first that she had to bend over to pick rthe card up ... off the floor!

ole joyful ... who seems to be deteriorating with age

Yeah - had I been that manager I would have said, You know you are right - that is so frustrating! I'm so sorry you can't get what you need. Let me make a call for you, but in the meantime I'm going to put a sign on the floor saying that this item is "out of stock."

I bet she would have stopped yelling at him. :)

Let the headquarter know via email or a letter. and sometimes letter work better especially address to CEO and the person's name.
I worked customer service in banking for years and loved it, because most of the time it just takes a simple explaination to the person and even though they may not be happy, at least they usually accept the reasons.

Lack of organization. I've had the same thing happen to me at both Hobby Lobby and Joann's. You pick up a card that you have to take to the register for the clerk to go get out of the locked cabinet, only to waste her time and mine finding out that the item is out of stock, yet those cards are still on the rack, and the whole time a line of other customers is having to wait.. When an item is gone, then a sign should be placed "out of stock" on that item where those cards are hanging or simply remove the cards for the out of stock items. To me that is common sense.

Here's a tale from the past. I realize that most of you were not yet born in1947 but you might be interested in what once was.

Department stores had counters and every counter had at least one clerk to wait on customers. Every clerk knew the merchandise and knew how to operate the cash register and make change.

At that time I was the Training Director at a quality department store in Dayton, Ohio.

Every new employee, including elevator operators, janitors, and maintenance personnel had to report to my classroom for a day- and- a-half of training.

Store rules, dress codes and policies were discussed before a test was given. On the second day any sales people were given training in using the cash register and making change.

For a week or so after the training I went to the sales floor to help or check on new employees.

Needless to say, there was no gum chewing, dress was to be business-like and manners were emphasized. Customer service was king.

Perhaps it was old fashioned but we had mighty few unhappy customers

Having dealt with the public for decades I doubt quite highly that any of the comments you made would have pacified this customer. She wanted the store to have the item, period. She was going to complain about not getting it. Period. Having a "subject to availability" or any such disclaimer would have made no difference because she wanted it and that was it. Common sense tells people that that's a situation where they could be out of stock. But people with the "customer is always right" attitude don't use common sense. They feel they're more important than anyone else and can order store employees to violate company policy to satisfy them. Some people don't feel they should be subject to rules. Being rude to the store manager as this woman was, simply put was out of line. Shame on her. She should be sent to bed without her supper, grounded, given a "time out" or any other such treatment.

When will these people learn that the manager doesn't set the rules. He's there to *enforce* the rules. Gee, is that really that hard to understand? If she handled the situation properly she would have contacted the corporate office after first being told he has no say on it, but NO, she wasn't going to do that, she expected special treatment. And she was going to try to make life miserable for an employee thinking that they'll give in just for "customer service" and in reality she only made herself look like a total fool. They she's likely to go home crying "bad customer service", when the employees can go home laughing about an unreasonable and childish customer.

This woman's attitude is classic spoiled brat customer action. You see this all the time. And they generally do the same thing. ACT friendly... at first. Put what they think is a jovial, light sing-song in the voice (which most people with a couple weeks experience can see through, knowing what's coming next!) simply to try to get what they want. It's no different than a spoiled brat kid saying "I want a cookie". They're told they can't have what they want (Like telling the young brat we're out of cookies.) then they start getting louder and stamp their feet at times to a flat out fist pounding temper tantrum (just like the kid on the floor "I WANT IT, I WANT IT, I WANT IT!!!!) Shouting, screaming and yes, even pretend crying can be included in both. The similarities are striking. These types of people should be subjected to the same treatment in their job sometime, it'd be interesting to see how they react. I'd gamble they'd go "CAN YOU BELIEVE WHAT THEY WANTED? LOL

The staff could go ahead and say they agree with her or use other touchy-feely comments and but anyone who is pragmatic and any retail experience knows that it's not practical to try to assign someone to watch each item and go put OOS signs up and then take them down when stock is replenished.

I've found that the bellyachers are big talkers but little doers. One of the first thing they spout is "I'll NEVER come back here again!!!!" Any retail employee is hard-pressed to refrain from splitting a gut when that happens. Contrary to what people want you to believe, it takes a lot for a customer to truly ban a store from their shopping armada. They shop certain stores for certain reasons. They put up with things. It's part of the shopping mentality. Lots of studies have been done. People will sit and wait in line, they'll pay more, they accept lower customer service, etc to get what they want and that's usually things like convenience, brand recognition and price, whether an actual savings or a perceived savings. When people *do* drop a store, with the exception of a small store, they'll usually be back within a few weeks to a couple months.

"People want to be heard, and know that they are being taken care of."
Some people do, but this woman wanted the world handed to her on a silver platter. She WAS heard. She was informed that the manager could do nothing about it but that wasn't good enough. She expected him to jeopardize his job to give her what she wanted. He had no right to do it and having to tell her THREE TIMES is stupid. That woman needs a reality check and she owes the store manager an apology. I wish I (or someone else with some sense) would have been there to explain the reality of life to her.

People need to learn how to complain properly. If you have a complaint, fine, voice it. But voice it properly. When you find out you're talking to the wrong person they shouldn't have to tell you THREE TIMES that you're b!tching out the wrong person.

"Abdocating blame seldom works under any circumstance."
LOL Get real. Telling the truth is NOT abdicating blame! It's INFORMING the person that they have to go to the place where their unreasonable demands could stand any sort of chance of being granted. I will grant you that not everyone will realize that a corporate store has corporate policies. Again, common sense is not so common. BUT, when someone is told that they have no control over the situation and they keep on with their temper tantrum, they're not interested in voicing a grievance, they simply want to throw a temper tantrum like any other spoiled brat. Once the shrieking starts in a tantrum, it generally has to run its course, whether a 2 year old or an 80 year old.

Customer service is getting less and less these days, I'll agree with that. But what so sorely needs teaching is consumer education and how to complain, and the more important thing is WHERE to complain. And the other thing they need to be taught is that the store will likely *not* go out of business even if the spoiled brat *does* take their business elsewhere. I haven't seen Michael's file bankruptcy yet because of this and I doubt I will. There is a part of business that there are some customers a store does not want. These are the types they don't want. They don't buy much, they complain about everything, trying to get a discount or other compensation (well I had a LILT in my voice and you didn't give me a new car as compensation!). They're far more like to use and abuse items then return it out of return policy expecting full cash refund.

And don't even let me get started on loud music in restaurants because "corporate" deems it necessary, and if "corporate" happens to stop in and the music is below a pre-ordained decible setting, staff catches he!!.

If the manager hadn't been pounced on repeatedly like that, he might have been able to think straight enough to figure out how to placate the customer (tho she really went overboard).

Yes, there should be better inventory control to know when to put out a "not available at this location, but we'll help you find one" card.

Maybe the woman had been driving all around town for it, or it had been the "third strike" of the day for her (I know it's gonna be a bad errand day when my first 2 stops don't bring the result I need and I realize I'll have to add other stores along the way; frequently, I'll just turn around and go home cuz the "karma" isn't with me).

So I can understand her disappointment, but still ...
The store should've at least made the attempt to call other branches.

But some customer-service people aren't trained very well to be one step ahead.

I was at Office Depot last month, wanting to check out at tablet that I'd played with before and ready to plunk my money down. But the tablet was "locked" because some punk before me set it with a facial recognition password. The store worker in the dept didn't know how to fix that, the manager didn't know. Maybe it was impossible, I dunno. And they wouldn't take another tablet out for demonstration purposes.

All they said was "Sorry."
I gave them a few minutes to see if they'd volunteer to call other stores. They didn't, so I had to suggest that. The phone call took a long time -- somebody on the other end probably got distracted, my clerk hung up and called back. Just crazy.
He did find a store that had a tablet (I had to interrupt him to make sure that it was not locked!), but by that point, I wasn't really interested in giving that store my money.

I bought it at Staples instead.

The economy still is terrible, and stores close all the time, so I don't really understand why (it appears) so little effort is put into making their customer service the best it can be, like, say, the Container Store's.

I have worked as a receptionist... and trust me, it's a no-win situation with some people.. Unless you can produce the item and make it free...they won't be happy.

When I was much younger, I had several sales jobs. At every job they taught me "The customer is always right." The cashier said "sorry' according to the first post; it was the so-called "Manager' who was rude. Another thing you see rarely offered is a "rain check" so that when the inventory comes in, you can still buy the item for the sale price.

I'm willing to bet that the store would have contacted other locations had they been requested to contact them rather than scream at them about the same thing about which the manager could do nothing. What is so bad about asking "Could you contact another store and see if they have it?" Some are suggesting that should be automatic. No, it shouldn't and here's why: You're back to the same thing of throwing gas on a fire. The unreasonable customer is looking for reasons to complain, gripe and attack. She clearly did *not* want to go to another location or she'd have asked the cashier when first told they were out. She didn't. She wanted to make trouble. Had the manager, or the cashier suggested contacting another store the odds are probably 60/40 she'd have blown up over that with the "You think I'm going to drive 50 miles to go to another store to get it? No, YOU go pick it up and bring it to me RIGHT NOW" or something to that effect.

It wasn't just in the 40s when clerks were this way. I recall even in the 60s and 70s, even into the 80s at certain stores when wages were far more than minimum allowed by law. This enabled you to have people with more product knowledge. They were full time clerks. Now the cost becomes more prohibitive to do this and be able to keep prices where people demand.

And a store doesn't have an obligation to bring out a new unit for a customer to play with when someone vandalizes the display model. Most places now are going to empty case displays - non working items because of vandalism. Sad, but rightly so. A few spoil it for many. Figure the cost of doing that - replacing whenever someone vandalizes something. Are you ready to pay more? I'll bet there's very few "yes" answers coming to this question.

I think I have the solution. For the ones who know how to teach these people how to run their stores, perhaps just open up a chain of stores being run in accordance with your models. You'll put Walmart, Kmart, Sam's, etc out of business and thereby make a lot of people happy about that. You'll have all these people employed making megabucks with all the benefits. There'll be no unhappy customers. Never an out of stock. Nothing will break and everything will probably be made in the USA (or Canada for the Canadian division.) You won't need security I suppose either and no receipts for returns should be needed. You'll have so much profit the Walton family will resemble John-boy and Elizabeth Walton family. It'll be win-win-win. Good gawd, you'll probably bring peace to the Middle East with it! I can't wait to attend the grand opening of NirvanaMart

Cynic, I'll shop there!

I started my job with the government many, many years ago, One of our training sessions was on how to calm down an irate (angry) customer. First, put yourself in their mind. Maybe your cat died that morning or you feel sick to your stomach. It won't take much to set that person off' . An out-of-stick item is certainly enough.