I caused a scene at BestBuy today...

[MadMike]

slightly OT: recently came back from a cruise to the caribbean, and before i left, called both credit cards simply to inform them i would be out of the US, and if they see any charges from that area, its me. both of them tried to "sell" me additional products, upgrades to gold card, etc etc etc.

They did the same thing to my wife when she called in for a replacement when her card never arrived in the mail. So her card is missing, she's SOL if an emergency comes up, and someone could be out having a spending spree with it, so they're going to try to push other services and crap on her? Real intelligent!

Incidents like that make me glad I'm with a credit union.

[Catwoman2965]

Than again, there's the other side of the coin, when you go in, and no one even acknowledges your presence. I don't shop here normally, but once or twice a year, i get a coupon from Victoria's Secret, for a FREE item - usually undies. i take full advantage, in spite of the fact i won't set foot in there otherwise.

The last two copupons i've gotten, i've gone in twice, for a total of 4 visits, and no one has even bothered to say hello, how are you? so i walk around for a few minutes, still nothing...getting nowehre, i walk out. I won't shop at Macy's for that very reason too -and the fact the stores are always a disaster, and if you are lucky enough to find someone to help you, they act as if you are inconveniencing them (at least that's my experience with most of the Macy's in northern NJ)

In my store, we are required to greet every customer, as they walk in...and we do...i ususaly say hi, how are you - wait a bit, and then ask if they need any help, etc. - if they haven't come to me first - if they say no, i simply say, ok my name is "blank" please let me know if you do need anything, and let them go on their merry way. i know i like to know there are people to help me if i need help, but will also just back off and let me wander about, as i do most of the time.

[LostMyMind]

Call the DM, they want to know if a manager is berating a employee while the employee is assisting an customer. That is one major a***ole. Since he turn and didn't speak to you politely either, that would be a bigger offense considering how much you were spending.

Wouldn't it be so awesome if sometime we could go check out somewhere, hand the cashier our money, get our crap, and just LEAVE? Man! I know that's crazy talk, but I can dream, can't I?

This happens alot for me, just stuff ear plugs in and play deaf. You'll be surprise how quick the "speech" ends. When you walk up and point to your ears and shake your head.

[Dreamstalker]

He asked me why I thought they should hire him.

I couldn't help myself. I said 'I've shopped here before. Frankly, you need me'.

End of interview right there.

That's exactly why I've never applied to BB, CompUSA (that was my shrink's suggestion, long after everyone else knew the chain was axing a bunch of stores...doesn't sound like prime time to apply to me), etc. There's no way I could say "I enjoy shopping at your store" if the employees I try to ask for help with X don't even know what X is or "why I'd want it".

Yes, please call the DM and complain about that ass.

[HawaiianShirts]

In my store, we are required to greet every customer, as they walk in...and we do...i ususaly say hi, how are you - wait a bit, and then ask if they need any help, etc. - if they haven't come to me first - if they say no, i simply say, ok my name is "blank" please let me know if you do need anything, and let them go on their merry way. i know i like to know there are people to help me if i need help, but will also just back off and let me wander about, as i do most of the time.

That's pretty much what I do. I think that's what most customers expect and what most managers expect. There are wanderers, and there are customers with questions, and sometimes wanderers become customers with questions or vice versa. That's fine. I'll bug a customer once, then, unless they get that look that says "I'm utterly confused but afraid to ask for help," I figure it's their responsibility to bug me. I just make sure I regularly make an appearance somewhere in their field of vision so they know I'm still around. And if what they need is not my department, I'll go find someone from the right department for them.

I think I've gotten lucky. The few Best Buys I've been to were pretty good. Employees were not pushy but fairly helpful (with one exception at the store just down the road). And they were fairly knowledgeable (with one exception in Idaho where I heard them tell an old lady she needed an external hard drive to fix a monitor problem and then told me that VGA and Serial cables were the same). I like that store. I go there regularly.

I think a lot of the problems people encounter have to do with the employees and managers of a store and not with the store or company itself. Management style can have a huge effect on the atmosphere of a store, and customers can feel it. And, of course, employees can mess things up from time to time, too. Case in point: Visconti's restaurant in Washington. I visited the Visconti's in Wenatchee and absolutely loved it! I visited the Visconti's in Leavenworth a few months later, and, though the food was the same, I had a terrible experience. It was the people who made the difference.

[Catwoman2965]

Of course, with us, being a woman's store, we can always tell when its Christmas or Mother's Day - when, and no offense to anyone, the clueless men come in. You can group them into 3 groups:

1. those who know their wife's/mother's/etc. size, preferences, etc, and just need a little help or pointing in the right direction;
2. those who don't know, but really want to make an effort to actually pick something out, so will ask questions such as "does this go with that (and most of the time it doesn't), and we are happy to assist an find them an outfit; and
3. those who have no clue at all, and make a beeline for the register to buy a gift card....

But most of the time we simply greet, offer assistance, and back off until they need you.

[Becks]

Did the "manager" (if the dick even deserves to be called that) ever think, oh, I don't know, maybe the checker knew you as a regular customer and knew not to ask you about the magazines?

Seeing as how (IIRC) the "manager" is new, I don't think it would occur to him. There's also that whole "if it makes sense, it's not allowed"™®© thing.

[Noelegy]

Why this company is so entrenched on the idea of losing money is beyond me, especially since the repeated questions only serve to annoy customers, as you've pointed out.

Whenever I run across a company policy or decision that makes no sense to me--and they are legion--I say "Someone who makes a lot more money than I did must have come up with that."

[Noelegy]

He asked me why I thought they should hire him.

I couldn't help myself. I said 'I've shopped here before. Frankly, you need me'.

End of interview right there.

Heh. I impressed the store manager when I went in for my Hastings interview by taking him on a tour through the book department and showing HIM where everything was.

[Noelegy]

Than again, there's the other side of the coin, when you go in, and no one even acknowledges your presence.

When I got ready to graduate from college, I went shopping for a new dress--yeah, it really mattered what I was wearing under my cap and gown, but I had a family do to attend afterward--and I looked at several stores at my local mawl. I was dressed quite casually that day--in fact, I don't even think I had makeup on. I forget exactly which store I was at where I was both older and um, larger than both shoppers and staff (I'm a US size 14 most of the time), and I was in the store for maybe ten minutes, browsing, and was completely ignored. Not greeted once. And they weren't that busy; it was about 10 or 11 on a weekday morning.

So they got a scathing customer comment card from me. No follow-up whatsoever. No one called me, nothing.

Shockingly, this store is no longer in business.

[Kiwi]

We dont have a best buy in our city but we do have a future shop.... one of the sales guys (who was great) and I had a fun time laughing that when he put through my $4 transistor radio it came up with an extended warrenty plan! HAHAHAHA he laughed and apologised and said "Im sorry I just have to ask" and not suprisingly I turned it down. It was more than twice what the radio was going to cost.

At christmas I went in to buy a new mouse, keyboard, headphones and mp3 player around $550 total and decided that as the mp3 player was most important I wanted to pick it first to make sure I had enough money for it. Employee #1 comes over and starts off friendly, asks what I want etc.

The following conversation happens...

me: ok it can be anything you reccomed under $200 and it cant be an ipod
E1:what!? why not an ipod? whats wrong with an ipod?
me: its a gift for my boyfriend and he hates apple
E1: well thats stupid an ipod is the best mp3 player out there!
me: well he doesnt want one
E1: well theres nothing wrong with ipods! (all defensive)
me: um...ok...well he said no ipod so what else do you have
E1: well hes going to miss out on having the best
me: you know what I think i'll keep looking, I actually want a keyboard and mouse....
E1: thats not my department...
me: oh ok well um....ill have to think about it thanks
E1: yeah call me if you need any help

E2 was watching us the whole time, shaking his head, he comes over, I tell him what I want, he helps me pick out a creative zen (which kyle loves) and then takes me over to select a headphone set, mouse and keyboard and gets a nice $500 plus sale on his tab. He was friendly and polite and we joked about sensative pententious mac users (totally kidding though mac rules)

and I bet the corporates wonder why they are loosing out sales to sites like ncix?

[Andara Bledin]

I've noticed that Best Buy is really erratic as to how decent their stores and staff are. The one local to me is a pit and I wouln't shop there even with a free gift card. The one not quite local to me, however, is quite nice, with friendly helpful staff.

I actually was in a Victoria's Secret a couple weeks ago, looking to get a new bra or two. Someone greeted me and asked if I needed help fairly quickly, and other than that, I wasn't bothered until I got that, "I need someone to answer a question," look, and that was when someone came over to check on me. I didn't buy anything and I think they didn't expect me to, although they were professional about it.

There is only one place that I consistantly get the same semi-clueless clerk experience nearly every time, no matter the location, and that is at Fry's Electronics. But then, Fry's has some incredible deals, and I know that the service will be iffy. I can afford to do a little research first to save a bundle of money.

He was friendly and polite and we joked about sensative pententious mac users (totally kidding though mac rules)

Heh, but it's the truth. There are some seriously out of whack Mac zealots out there. They balance the over-the-top anti-Mac camp.

The Zen is a pretty solid MP3 player, and if I don't get an iPod, I'll probably get a Zen. Of course, by that time, something else might come along and outperform them both.

^-.-^

[aurelemsrealm]

Kiwi, maybe you should have asked E1 if he was insinuating that you or your boyfriend were stupid for not wanting an iPod..... I'm good at turning such comments on the people who speak them in those kind of situations. That's just ridiculous!

Speaking of managers reprimanding employees in front of customers or other employees.... I witnessed an incident at one of the local Kroger locations which made me mad. I'd went to pay my car insurance, and the agent's office is located behind this particular Kroger. I use my check card for just about everything, so I rarely carry cash or even the check book. The insurance office is not set up for credit card payments at the moment due to computer maintenance issues. Okay, that's fine. I figure I'll just run to Kroger to get some cash because I didn't bring the checkbook.

So, I go through an empty lane and pick up a pack of gum. I usually try to think ahead about these things, but my mind is on paying the car insurance at that particular moment. So, the cashier rings up my pack of gum, and I swipe my card for debit. The terminal asks me to select a predetermined cash back amount or type in something else. So, I type in $60, thinking that if it doesn't go through for that amount, I'll just do $40 and get another pack of gum to ring up and do for $20. The receipt prints, so I figure it's all good. The cashier gets this dreadful, look of panic on her face and flips the light on. Apparently, I was only supposed to get $20 cash back even though $40 was another listed option and it let me type in $60. The manager on duty comes over from customer service comes over in a huff and hatefully tells her that she has no choice but to give me $60 cash. So, she hands me the cash.

He then makes a comment that she should have known better and told me ahead of time. It just set me off, so I piped up and informed him that I didn't say anything to her about it, and that she had no idea of the amount I requested until the receipt printed. He said that it doesn't matter because the cashiers have all been told that $20 over the purchase is all that's allowed. So, I fired back, "Then you should program your registers to only allow amounts up to $20 over purchase, or just do presets in increments of $5 or $10 up to the $20 over purchase. It's not her fault that your computers aren't properly set! I think that's a management issue."

I looked at her, "Sorry if I've caused you any problems over this." She looked at me quietly, not quite sure what to think. Then, I wished her luck and left. I felt bad for her because that manager probably gave her hell about it after I left, but I didn't know what else I could do after point out that it's management's mistake for not setting the cap on the cash back options like that.

[justZu]

The Zen is a pretty solid MP3 player, and if I don't get an iPod, I'll probably get a Zen. Of course, by that time, something else might come along and outperform them both.

^-.-^

I don't have any experience with the zen, but both my son and I have iPods. Both have frozen and needed to be restored to factory settings - meaning all music is wiped off and it resets to the original serttings. It has happened once to mine and three times to my son's iPod. They have been treated carefully, not dropped or handled roughly. A family friend has had to send her iPod back to the company to be repaired, and it still does not work right.
Just something to think about...

[auntiem]

Than again, there's the other side of the coin, when you go in, and no one even acknowledges your presence. I don't shop here normally, but once or twice a year, i get a coupon from Victoria's Secret, for a FREE item - usually undies. i take full advantage, in spite of the fact i won't set foot in there otherwise.

The last two copupons i've gotten, i've gone in twice, for a total of 4 visits, and no one has even bothered to say hello, how are you? so i walk around for a few minutes, still nothing...getting nowehre, i walk out.

Our Victoria's is the same way, plus I swear if anyone larger than a B cups heads for the bras all the sales staff hides so they don't have to try and find your size. Try ordering thru the brochure - those folks are excellent.