4 ms·
> Dealing with rude customers is quickly learned. No, it's not, many workers I know face repeated and regular stressful abuse, which is almost always worse if
by lsiebert 5y ago
> Dealing with rude customers is quickly learned.
No, it's not, many workers I know face repeated and regular stressful abuse, which is almost always worse if they are visibly part of a marginalized group of people, who also get racial and misogynistic slurs thrown in their face. There are dramatic differences in treatment, and many managers don't step in to protect their employees. That's not to say the other stuff you mention doesn't also occur.
It's not even necessarily retail, I know a really sweet Latina woman, she manages and runs multiple bicycle rental places in SF. People will be incredibly rude to her, but when she says, "Hold on, let me get someone else to help you" and gets a white male employee of hers, they are suddenly all smiles and apologetic and understanding.
I honestly would encourage folks here to remember to be good customers, to treat workers as you would want people to treat you, because workers in the US are almost always underpaid and dealing with work related stress.
Try to know what you want by looking online, understand that workers don't owe you happy smiles and social interaction beyond the goods and services you pay for, listen to and ask for suggestions and consider them as expert advice if you are having trouble making a decision, and if possible be polite and say thank you.
- ipaddr 5y agoIf she is the manager and has a staff why is she working the front counter? I've never seen a manager hand off a difficult customer to a lower employee. As a customer I would ask to speak to the manager if I wasn't getting service never does the manager ask the co-op student to handle this difficult customer they can't. Something about your story doesn't add up. You say she is the nicest person but is she good at customer service because those are two different skills.
- lsiebert 5y agoAh, you are reasoning from your own anecdotal experience to say that something is unlikely because you haven't yourself observed it. Maybe you should try an experiment? https://www.huffpost.com/entry/what-happened-when-a-man-signed-work-emails-using-a-female-name-for-a-week_n_58c2ce53e4b054a0ea6a4066 https://www.huffpost.com/entry/what-happened-when-a-man-sign...
- lsiebert 5y agoThat experiment from her perspective. https://nickyknacks.medium.com/working-while-female-59a5de3ad266#.ginj3xk30 https://nickyknacks.medium.com/working-while-female-59a5de3a...
- ipaddr 5y agoI do post under various genders / ages / races and the advantages of being part of each identity are not shared between groups. There are advantages to being female or black or old or young or male depending on who you are talking to. It is eye opening.