Toilets & Other People's Kids.

[journochick]

Just a silly little pet peeve of mine!

If there's one thing I can't stand, it's people thinking that every store has a public toilet.

A lot of places, like both my former workplace and present, do not have public toilets. That's because lots of stores don't have insurance for customers, only staff.

At my last place, I lost count of the number of people who'd rush in demanding to use the toilet. You know they wouldn't be buying anything - they'd just run in expecting to use them.

And you'd say, 'we're sorry, we don't have customer toilets,' and they'd look at you as if you'd just admitted to beheading your own mother.

SC: 'But why?'
Me: *explains the insurance thing, and that we are not insured if their little angel happens to fall and crack their head open.*

And then, the big one, the line you've been waiting for...

'But my son/daughter is DESPERATE!'

I used to be nice. I really did. Until I heard this about 100 times every Saturday and just couldn't face another irate-looking customer with a whining brat thinking that we should just bow down at their feet because their kid needs to use the loo.

Not only that, but when we DID let people use the toilets (in the case of customers having to wait a while for credit agreements to go through), someone would have to escort them as the toilets were behind a locked door with a code. We just couldn't keep doing this as we'd have to take time away from our jobs.

The one time, I'd had enough. I saw this woman rush straight through the doors with a toddler in tow and straight to me. I knew what she was going to ask before she even reached the counter. She wasn't there to buy anything, just to ask -

'Do you have a toilet?'
Me: 'No, we don't have public ones, sorry.'
SC: 'None at all? Can she just use the staff ones?'
Me: 'We don't allow that as we don't have the insu-'
SC: 'But she's DESPERATE!'
Me: 'Sorry, there's nothing I can do about it. Your daughter is none of my concern. I can't leave this till. McDonalds has a public toilet.'
SC: 'But she can't wait that long!'
Me: 'Um, it's just across the road...'

*SC stamps out*

Seriously. I DON'T CARE ABOUT YOUR KIDS!

Is it MY fault they didn't pee before they left the house? No. Is it MY fault they now decide they want the toilet? No. Is it MY fault if they can't wait long enough for you to dash across the road to McDs taking all of 20 seconds? No. Is it MY fault I have to serve customers rather than drop what I'm doing immediately and escort you to the toilet even when you're not buying anything? No.

Yet these parents look at you as though YOU'RE in the wrong.

Granted, kids can be pains sometimes with the toilet issue. I have a younger brother, and my parents have always kept a travel-potty in the boot of the car should anything like this happen and he unexpectedly needs the loo. He's never used it, but it's there just in case.

One of these parents came into my mum's store the other week (TK Maxx) demanding use of a toilet. Again, it's a store that doesn't have customer bathrooms. Not that there's any need to HAVE any, as it's not a restaurant, or a coffee place etc.

The woman started having a go at Mum because her daughter couldn't use the loo. She then continued to rant about how stupid the place was and unfair because there weren't public toilets.

Woman: 'Right, well then, I'm just going to let her pee in the corner!'

With the lady in front of her, my mum picked up the phone, called security. 'There's a lady down here who's just threatened to let her daughter urinate in the store. Could you keep the cameras on her please?'

Security followed her the whole time.

Needless to say, the kid had to wait.

[Kogarashi]

When I've had to use a restroom while out in public, I went looking for a restaurant or grocery store, since those were more likely to have the public restrooms.

And since when is it okay to let your child pee on the salesfloor just because there's no public bathroom? O.o

[Quicksilver]

When I worked at a carry out/delivery Pizza place, I would get that sometimes. On a sunday night once, a man came in to pick up his pizza and he had his little boy with him and asked for the bathroom. I politely apologized and informed him that we did not have a public bathroom and that the chinese restaurant did two doors down. He got all surely and left with the kid and came back and paid for his pizzas and told me that was the last time he would ever come here and that I could shove the pizzas up my ass and the owner could shove the pizzas up his ass....

I just explained that I could NEVER let anyone behind our counter that didn't work there. He just kept saying he wouldn't come back blah blah blah. I just walked away because I didn't care anymore. Buying a pizza from me, giving me money entitles you to a pizza, not a place to take a leak.

If you don't have a dining room you don't have to have a bathroom. So there!

[powerboy]

I always inform the customers, that the restrooms are for staff only. I don't want to clean up other peoples mess. My coworkers on the other hand, does let them, even tho, we do not have insurance on them.

[georgiab]

We have sighns posted throughout the store stating we do not infact have a public restroom (because of the same policy it being a liability issue). Not a day goes by that someone does not ask if their child can use the restroom....What the hell do we have sighns for if noone reads them....But this one woman took the cake she blew a damn fuse because we did not have a public restroom...she cussed and screamed as if she were dying even doing so with the manager....The store next door like a few feet away does have a public restoom.....but nope she was to have everyones's job because we did not have a public restroom. Now where I work is a thrift store and our bathrooms is in the back warehouse that is packed full of donations...I have tripped,slipped and fell many times...I wuld not DARE risk someone going back there it is beyond a liablity to do so.....

[Purple Monkey Dishwasher]

When I worked at a gas station with no public rest rooms, I always responded to the question with, "I'm sorry, our insurance doesn't allow it." It's true, and by throwing the insurance line out IMMEDIATELY, it sort-of shifts the blame from ME to some nameless insurance company or our corporate bean-counters. The customer may still be mad, but there's less chance of them yelling at ME.

Joe

[Rapscallion]

I used the insurance line when children wanted to come behind the counter and watch me at the butcher's block up close.

"Aw, he just wants to watch, doesn't he?"

"He's not insured."

"Ohmigawdpetergetoutoftherenow!"

Made me realise that they were quite happy to measure their children in financial terms.

Rapscallion

[Kiwi]

At the craft store we got rid of the public restroom after the cleaners we contracted out to refused to keep cleaning it after someone smeared shit on the walls twice in a month.
The store next door to us had one and when customers would ask "where has your bathroom gone?" they would FLIP OUT that it had been closed!
Then when we informed them that *blank store* had one they would say

"where is it in the store?" .... I dont freaking know, not my problem. Do I work there!? I used to hate it when kids would plead with their parents that they had to go NOW and the parents would make them wait because they didnt want to lose their place in line

then they would complain about how long the line was taking.... again not my freaking problem!

[TruthHurts]

Back when I worked at the bookstore I actually had a guy tell me the store was legally obligated to provide bathrooms for customers. And then proceeded to tell me that if his son did not use the staff bathroom this minute he would call the cops. I offered to call them for him (what can I say I'm helpful) and he stormed out cursing up a storm.

[BookstoreEscapee]

I used the insurance line when children wanted to come behind the counter and watch me at the butcher's block up close.

Why on earth would you let your kid go behind a butcher's counter? Raw meat...big sharp knives...

We occasionally had to close the bathrooms in Store1 because someone made an ungodly mess that we didn't get paid nearly enough to clean up and people would bitch just because they had to go to Starbucks...which if they were bitching at me at the cashwrap was much closer than our bathrooms anyway

[Sliceanddice]

Sigh the memories...
My last job was too small and old to have public bathrooms.
I heard it call day long....
I told more than one person get piss about it.
I told them theres one in Native New Yorker they can use.
I loved the "Well why don't i just go eat there"s.
What i wanted to say was, Because your cheap.

Hey be happy we where kind enough to let an occasional child or customer wash their hands...

[Rolling Star]

There's no reason to make so much drama out of a kid having to go pee. Just go elsewhere! It doesn't take that much effort.

[Andara Bledin]

My mom made us go to the bathroom before we left the house "whether we needed to or not." What the heck is wrong with some parents?
^-.-^

[MinimaMagistra]

What I want to know is this:

Why is the ultimate in comebacks "shove it up your ass"? Also that the ultimate location unfound goods might be in is one's or somebody's ass, such as "pull it out of my ass." Because frankly, I have a visual mind. And because I have such a visual mind, I automatically try to figure out how the object in question could be folded, disassembled, or creatively crushed so as to fit. And this isn't something I want to think about. But with the prevelance of the phrase, some days it seems that all I think about is asses, and what might or might not fit up them.

This is especially unwelcome when it comes to food. Because while pizzas might be one of the easier objects to fit, rollable as they are, the sauce would burn and once it's there, all I can think about is poo pizza. And suddenly I'm no longer hungry.

[Sofar]

I don't like "shove it up your ass" as much as I like "blow me." People don't say "blow me" anymore, have you noticed? I'm bringing "blow me" back.