Customer with a dirty mouth!

[Sidvicious]

Hey guys, new here and I work at a small family owned dry cleaner. Most of the customers that walk in are usually nice and even the ones that are rude usually don't give us any problems. It's really a lack of manners for the most part. Either way, I stay respectful to everyone. I always just smile and tell them to have a nice day. However, there finally came a time where I had to do something about a rude customer.

Few days ago I see a car parked right in front of our store where there's a huge No Parking Fire Zone sign. We are located in a shopping center. An elderly man walks out with a handful of clothes and comes into the store. He's never been to the store before since I have to get his information onto the computer. He walks in and smiles. I greet him with a "hello! how can I help y-" He cuts me off.

Customer: No, listen to what I have to say.

He throws his clothes on the counter and demands that I make sure to put heavy starch on his dry clean only shirts. I tell him that unfortunately those type of shirts we cannot. Long story short, those particular shirts would have been ruined if we tried and I explain the details to him

Customer: WHY NOT?! (rolls eyes)

(After giving him the details)

Customer: FINE! I'll do it myself once I pick them up. Useless...
Me: May I have your telephone number and if you are new here, your name?
Customer: WHAT? Oh! Yeah...try this. xxxx (gives me four digits)
Me: Pardon?
Customer: I SAID XXX-XXXX. Damn.....Name's (gives me his name)
Me: Thank y-
Customer: You'll put starch on this shirt aight?
Me: I am sorry sir but this shirt is like the other one. We cannot put starch in thi-
Customer: WHAT!? That some bulls***! I'm bout to lee (?) yo a**!! (I assume he's saying "leave your a**") I'm tellin you. You best put starch on these damn shirts aight!! (he slams his hand on his clothes on the counter)

Now at this point I knew I had to politely tell him that we would have to refuse service. The manager from the beginning when I first started working here has informed me to refuse customers that hostile. If a customer is rude, just be respectful. If a customer uses profanity and any type of physical responses like slamming his hand on the table like he did, do not give him service.

Me: I'm sorry sir but we cannot accept your clothes now. There's a cleaners across the street that may be able to fulfill your needs but we cannot
Customer: WHAT!? Fuck is this? No..I want starch on my damn shirts!
Me: Okay sir, I'm going to have to ask you to leave
Customer: NO! I want STARCH..on my damn shirts!
Me: You are being very disrespectful (I don't know if that was the right thing to say, if any of you guys believe it wasn't, feel free to let me know)
Customer: hell I ain't! Do my shirts!

Worker comes from the back to see what's going on.

Customer: I ain't leavin til you put starch on my shirts!
Me: No sir, as I said, I am asking you to please leave.
Customer: NO!
Me: Sir, I am asking you to leave now. We will not accept your clothes
Customer: I AIN'T LEAVIN!
Me: *sighs* If you do not leave, I will have to call the police
Customer:...Go call the fu-

He stops and stands there for a second or two and then quickly grabs his clothes and goes

Customer: F*** this place. You just lost MY business. I ain't comin back to this s***hole!

(He then just stands there)

Me: Sir, I have to ask you to leave right now
Customer: well F*** YOU!...aight? F*** you! C***suckah! F*** you!
Me: I'm sorry you feel that way but I'm asking you to leave
Customer: Motherf***er! F***in f****t! s***face! F*** You!
(two insults I couldn't make out. Sounded like a racial slur against Asians but I can't confirm it)
Co-worker: Please don't speak like tha-
Customer: I speak anyway the F*** I want. Fahhuck him!

At this point, he yanks the door hard as he could and storms out.

Never in my entire life have I seen act the way he did. Let alone an elderly man. I was more surprised than angry or upset with what just happened. Our co-workers and I had a laugh afterward.

You guys may have more experience than I do with this type of situations so if I anyone feels I didn't handle it the right way, I am definitely okay with hearing criticisms. I would like to learn and how to be better on dealing with these situations.

Few minutes after he stormed out, a customer came in to pick up his clothes. He asked how I was doing and we joked for a few seconds. He handed me the cash and quickly walked out telling me to have a good night. I found out he quickly walked out because he gave me more than the cost of his clothes and didn't want me to refuse. He left me a nice tip so it got better during the day!

[emax4]

Think of it as a victory since that's one less SC you'll ever have to deal with.

[wagegoth]

You were a lot nicer a lot longer than I would have been.

Next time it gets to the point where you say you've going to call the police and the SC won't leave, pick up the phone and start dialing. Unless they're psychotic, they'll leave. If they are psychotic, it's best the police were on the way.

[KatherineB]

Yes, I would have picked up the phone as soon as he didn't leave the first time after grabbing his clothes. Better to file an unnecessary report than risk your own safety.

[XCashier]

The only cleaning that guy needs is a bar of soap for his mouth!

(Yes, I admit, I can use the "colorful metaphors" from time to time...but not that much, over and over! IMO, profanity in speech is like habañero sauce in cooking: a dab here and there heats things up, a gallon slopped all over renders it unpalatable.)

[bainsidhe]

Sounds to me like you handled it fine. When it gets to that point, it's always best to remain civil, yet firm. And I agree about picking up the phone to start dialing.

Oh and

[EricKei]

You handled it exceedingly well, with much more politeness and patience than he deserved. You did everything right!

As others have mentioned, once someone reaches the point of being verbally abusive, all bets are off -- the best thing you can do is pick up the phone to tall the cops, & get a manager. This will often scare them off anyway.

to !

[Sidvicious]

Thanks all!

@emax4 that's very true. There's no reason he would want to try to come back. I have no proof but I believe he only came in because the cleaner across the street (not the one I recommended him to but another behind our shopping center) closed and we have been getting a number of people coming in from there. I've been told by another person that the cleaner that closed down had to deal with many nasty costumers. Not all but the stories match up with some of the people that came in.

@wagegoth @KatherineB @Xcashier @bainsidhe you guys are all right about that. He knew I was serious so he grabbed his clothes but I should have reached for the phone when he still stood there yelling all sorts of profanity.

@Xcashier I don't think one bar of soap would have been enough! =)

@bainsidhe thank you. That's what I was going for too. Civil yet firm. People have told me that the cleaner that closed would just let anyone walk all over them and would agree with lot of the demands asked like discounts and such. They received a lot of abuse. Someone told me that they moved to a better area so I'm glad to hear that.

@KatherineB Very true! Always better to be safe. I don't think he will come back and start trouble but if he did, I already have his info when he gave me his name and number as well as I remember what car he drove since he pulled up and parked illegally next to the curb.

@wagegoth it wasn't easy I'll admit. While many of us (including me) all love to tell him to go **** himself and all, it's just not the right way to go upon it. He's an elderly man who isn't in great shape at all. Doesn't make it right for him to act the way he did but I figured it's just best to let him be and not return the verbal abuse.

@EricKei Thank you! Exactly! I fully agree with the all bets are off when someone is being verbally abusive. I get a number of rude customers but it's mainly just a lack of manners or if they aren't happy with what I tell them (sorry we don't do one hour cleaning or guarantee that the wine stain you got 2 years ago and left in your car all that time), they usually just immediately leave with maybe a rude comment or would just say "thank you for your time, I will try someplace else" This was a different case. Being verbally abusive and slamming your hand onto the counter is a sign of trouble/red flag.

[HotelMinion]

You were fine. I tell customers that act like a foul mouthed 12 year old that they're being disrespectful and I'll hang up (if they're on the phone) or call the police (if they're face to face) all the time. And I will. Police are there to help you. Make sure you write a log if they keep harassing you and better yet, tell the manager. Call if s/he's not there.

[Skarredmind]

Yeah you were polite longer than I would have been in the situation and +1 to the idea of picking up the phone and dialing MUCH sooner after warning that you'd call the police. TBH you don't even really need to dial most of them time, usually the simple fact that you're going for the phone takes the wind out of their sails really fast.

The problem I have when this kind of stuff happens is that... well... I start to laugh. I can't take someone acting like my 5 year old having a tantrum seriously, especially a grown ass adult. That just makes the whole situation worse though, especially if they get the "OH! You think this is funny?!" line out... because, yeah I do.

[taxguykarl]

XC, I like that habanero analogy: alright if I use it?

Back to the OP, you did the right thing, but should have called the cops in front of the SC. Profanity in the background, audible to the dispatcher won't help his inevitable plea of overreaction by you. Tell me this so-and-so is banned anyway now.

[XCashier]

XC, I like that habanero analogy: alright if I use it?

Okay by me! Glad you liked it.

[NateTheChops]

Ah, dry cleaning. There will be plenty of opportunities to apply "crappy attitudes" and the need for clean pants to any story you tell.

Although I agree that you should have gone for the phone sooner, it's easier to say what we could or should have done in retrospect. So based on what you've told us, I don't think you did the worst you could have done. God knows I've handled situations in ways that could have been better or worst.

[Seshat]

Call the police. You can always call back and inform them that the abusive customer has left.
But if the abusive customer grabs the phone and breaks it, or does something worse that renders you unable to call; you're suddenly in a LOT of trouble and risk of personal safety.

Call before that happens.

Oh sure, it might happen only one in a thousand, or one in a million times. But it's not worth the risk that YOU are that one.

[Sidvicious]

@HotelMinion I never knew why people would think throwing a tantrum would get what they want. A co-worker said he wrote down the SC's license plate # and I already have his name and phone # (unless he gave me a fake one but the license # is real) so the police could have identify this guy if they needed to. Good idea about writing a log. Thank you!

@Skarredmind You guys are all right about dialing sooner if something like this occurs again I will do just that. We did laugh about it after he left. It's unbelievable how people can act!

@taxguykarl Very true. More evidence to show how he acted and how dangerous he could have been. He is not welcome at our store of course although I highly doubt he will ever return at least not anytime soon but I will call the police right away if he ever steps foot into the store. That was a long sentence! Funny thing is that I keep telling him that he has to leave, he said that "you just lost MY business! I ain't comin back to this s***hole!" Well obviously we do not want his business when I repeated told him to leave.

@natethechops Thank you. You are definitely right. That's the problem when you provide service where you have someone else's belonging in your hands i.e. dry cleaning (clothes), mechanics (automobiles) etc.
Going off topic but sometimes a customer will fail to point out a tear on his pants when he/she drops it off. I had one woman dropping off a suit and tells me that she has never been to our store and that it's her first time here. It appears that she tried to hide a noticible rip on the front of the pants. I point this out to her and she goes "well, that happened last time I was here!" I ask her "but didn't you say you've never been here before?" She quickly snaps with "when did I say it happened HERE?? I said at another cleaner!" She quickly grabs her suit and storms out. I can understand why when I dropped off my car at the dealership to get my oil changed when a worker ran out to tell me "excuse me sir!!! are you aware of the dent on the side of your car?" I told him I was and pointed out other marks on the car. He was relieved!

@Seshat True! Better to be safe than sorry. If I call back the police telling them that the guy left, I'm sure the police would understand and wouldn't think I was wasting their time. I've met many of the police officers in the city where I work. They do a great job and care about their citizens.

I want to say thanks to everyone who took the time to read my story and respond and give me tips/hints. I really do appreciate it. I'll probably be busy for the remainder of the week due to the holiday coming up so I just want to say Happy 4th of July to everyone here! Not everyone is American here I'd imagine so I want to also say then, have a wonderful week!