This just happened. OMFG!

Customers walk in the store 14 minutes before closing time. The greeter, who actually does his job this once, says hello and let’s them know, “Feel free to come on in. Just an FYI. We close in 14 minutes.”

This prompted several comments from the customers. “Does it matter how much we spend?”

Fuck. I just bit the shit out of my tongue. Luckily the abyss exists for me to vent.

No, lady, it doesn’t matter how much you spend. Perhaps you are not a regular reader of this blog. If you were, then you’d know that not a one of us employees has ever been compensated for staying late to help customers. We are left to fend for ourselves in that extremely awkward situation. Bottom line: The company won’t pay us if we clock out late. I’ve  been 20 minutes past quitting time before and the company’s position is, “Too bad, so sad!” Zilch shows up on ye olde paycheck.

Just last night two of us were here five minutes late with a customer. The boss himself was even here, a very rare and special treat. He gets impatient, though, so he stormed out, saying to us employees in his chipper way as he dashed, “Feel free to stay as late as you want!” Yeah, you don’t mind letting us work for free much, do ya, asshole?

Meanwhile, if we ever clock in up to ONE minute late our pay gets docked in 15-minute increments. Yes, we’re in a place similar to the Bermuda Triangle. I call it the Destroy Your Employees Triangle. Here the scales of justice have no meaning. Don’t like it? Feel free to speak up – and don’t let the door hit ya in the ass on your way out.

All time clock transactions are always rounded in the company’s favor. Period. Bar none. End of story.

Additionally, we don’t see a penny of sales. So you can see, it really doesn’t matter how much you spend here?

I’ve heard many customers walk out the door about what assholes our company is regarding the closing of the doors on time. I have to admit, I jizz in my pants every time I hear that!!! Tell your friends! 🙂

Gotta run. It’s closing time!

Update

Well, I’m home now. Long story short, my car went GF (goat fuck) on me and wouldn’t start for three minutes. So I got to listen in as these customers walked out of our store a minute later. I was in for a real treat.

Woman [angrily]: Harumph! I can’t believe how rude they are!
Man: Yeah, you’d think they’d want the sale. All that over a lousy ten minutes.
Woman [wanting to go back inside]: What do you want to do?
Man: We’re going home!

Oh yes. My boss is a shrewd businessman. That ranks right up there with selling products cheaper than we paid for them and making all the employees hate him. One might assume that he’s trying to make a profit. One might, but one would be wrong. What’s he’s actually out to do is destroy his employees. He’s doing a damn fine job of it and pissing off customers at the same time. In our business we call that a “win-win.”

Most customers have two things in common. They’ve all been employees themselves and they’ve probably all worked in shitholes with signs like “the customer is always right” hanging on the wall. That message has been ingrained so deeply that they actually believe it. “I’m the one spending money now,” they think. “It’s good to be the king!” So they don’t take too kindly to being asked to leave or mind much about interrupting your lunch or hearing that you are on your break or that something is not your job or that any discount that invariably ask for (because they are oh-so-special) will be coming directly out of the employee’s pocket. I’m not making that up. Our pay gets docked if we make a deal or if we even make an honest error that costs the company money.

Too bad that’s the way this place chooses to operate. Well, too bad for customers, anyway. I still get the laughs. Sadly that is the only bonus I’ll ever see. 🙂