The causes of Sucky Customers

[repsac]

This is in sightings because it's just something I've compiled since leaving retail. Most of this comes from personal shopping experiences I've witnessed.

1.) Check Readers: Oh these things are great. You can see right away if you're going to be having a bad day. Now, instead of your check having to clear the bank; the system tells you right away if the moron in front of you doesn't have enough in the bank to cover their purchase. Yes, we all know what that big long letter it spits out is really saying. God help the poor cashier who has one of these spit out.

2.) The Counter Check (aka starters): Oh lords. WHY banks made these things is beyond anyone. FEW places accept these types. The kind of checks with no info on them that the customer has to fill out in the first place. Great. Just great. What makes things worse, is the banks telling the customer that yes, stores will take them when of course they (the bank) know that's a lie. If you see one of these in your line, get another line cause you'll be there a while.

3.) Fake Coupons: You see these all the time. Promo coupons that really don't do anything. Like the 25% off types used to advertise a 25% off. Clothing stores love doing this. Now, these things have "NOT A REAL COUPON" written all over them, but you know full well no one reads past the 25% off. This is one of the situations that makes employees wonder, after trying to explain for the umpteenth time that the coupon isn't real, what on earth corporate was thinking by producing these things.

4.) Return Policies printed on the Reciept: This seems like a good idea on paper. (pun intended) but it's not. Think about it. Most polices are HUGE, and to get them on a tiny scrap of paper means you have to use a tiny little font. It takes a magnifying glass just to read them, and half the time it's impossible. Customers know this, and they will exploit that. Meaning that unless you've got a huge sign up with the policy in six inch tall letters; yelling will ensue.

5.) Several Registers: This is a double edged sword here. If you've got only one register, you can expect trouble with long lines. If there are many, then the trouble comes if only one or two are open. Either way, you can expect a complaint. It's usually the muttered "All these registers and only two, three or a few are open."

[Gurndigarn]

2.) The Counter Check (aka starters): Oh lords. WHY banks made these things is beyond anyone. FEW places accept these types. The kind of checks with no info on them that the customer has to fill out in the first place. Great. Just great. What makes things worse, is the banks telling the customer that yes, stores will take them when of course they (the bank) know that's a lie.

Really? Most of the banks I deal with have told me they're to pay bills with, if needed, while the printed checks arrive. There's something about a check arriving in the mail that makes it hard to refuse, especially since you can cut off service for the person if it bounces.

[csdrone]

Really? Most of the banks I deal with have told me they're to pay bills with, if needed, while the printed checks arrive. There's something about a check arriving in the mail that makes it hard to refuse, especially since you can cut off service for the person if it bounces.

And most banks tell the customer that these checks are NOT accepted many places! Of course SC's do filter out bad news.

[chainedbarista]

yes, i've had to use those lovely starter checks until my regular ones arrived; i mainly used them for bills, because of their restrictions. they suck, but there's not much to be done for it, especially when you're just starting out.

fortunately, i also had an atm card that allowed me to solve most of the 'check' problems (and being in the military helped-if a check bounces, your ass gets handed to you, so i made sure they never bounced).

[AFpheonix]

Causes of my sucky customers:
1) Insurance companies don't send out new cards when they change ID numbers or groups (although, it's hard to tell sometimes if it's insurance companies failing to send them, or people just not opening their mail in a timely manner)
2) Public aid mailing out insurance cards, but not making sure the patient is loaded into the system, so said insurance card doesn't work.
3)COBRA- always boots people if they get payment even a little late, and takes forever to reinstate. God, how I hate COBRA.
4)Doctors who neglect to sign scripts, or leave off important bits of information, or write for something that doesn't exist, then proceed to not answer their phones when we call to clarify.
5)Doctors who give out expired coupons with their scripts
6)Insurance companies that change fee structures or drug tiers without supposedly notifying customers (again, is it that, or do they just not read their mail?)

[starglitter]

UGH I hate starter checks! We had a customer throw a fit because we wouldn't take her starter check (and she was a "twenty year customer" blah blah blah) and our store manager reemed us and told us that from then on we had to call him whenever we got those so we wouldn't lose any more customers. So now when someone brings one of those in, we have to hold up the line for god knows how long while the manager calls the bank to make sure it's good. The kicker is that if he had bothered to read the check policy of the store he managers, he'd see that it's clearly stated there that we don't take starter checks.

I've never had a problem with fake coupons but lots of problems with internet coupons. We aren't suppose to take them at all. My favorite though is when people cut off the exporation dates on coupons, because they think they're being all sneaky when in reality I'm just going to tell them that I can't use it without knowing when it expires.

The problem at our store with the number of registers is that we just don't have enough cashiers. There are five registers and we typically have three cashiers (at the most) there at any given time.

[repsac]

There's another type of check I didn't list. Mostly because I'm not exactly sure what it's called or how to explain it.

While working at Lowe's, I remember shortly before my departure, I saw a series of very strange checks. Unlike a starter check, these things were in a huge book, but they didn't have any information printed on them beyond the routing number and account number. Off on the far right, just above where the person signed, they had "building account" or something similar printed. Now, the store considered them no different than starters, and refused the lot of them. Still, I had to wonder.

According to the customer, (who I think was telling the truth) these checks were used for two things. Some were personal, but others were for their contracting business of building homes. SO, when they wrote something for personal use, they wrote down their home address and information. On the other hand, if it was for the business, they wrote down the company's address. While they both used the same account and what not, these people used this type of check to keep track of what was spent where. It made sense on paper, but beyond that I had to wonder how many other companies would deny such a check.

[Banrion]

I know what you are talking about. My b/f's father is a general contractor, so he has similar checks. But all of his checks have the business name and address printed in the top left corner, and then below that he has another set of name and address lines that he fills in with the project's name and address. That way he can track the expenses by project.

Sounds to me like the other ones you have seen were just because someone cheaped out on the printing costs. At the very least they could have 2 books, one business one personal from the same account.

[K245five]

UGH I hate starter checks! We had a customer throw a fit because we wouldn't take her starter check (and she was a "twenty year customer" blah blah blah) and our store manager reemed us and told us that from then on we had to call him whenever we got those so we wouldn't lose any more customers.

I had an experience like this at my old store with a starter check. Although this woman was a long time customer, she had recently taken her business from one bank to another for whatever reason, and she tried to pay for her most recent order with a starter check.

This woman came through my line, and I told her I couldn't accept the starter check. The company was VERY adamant about NOT taking starter checks! However, I was told by the FEM on duty to take it anyway. I then told her point blank in front of everybody "What's the sense in having rules if you're not going to enforce them!?" I know, not very professional, but this was one of those things that was just STUPID!

[Mikkel]

I then told her point blank in front of everybody "What's the sense in having rules if you're not going to enforce them!?" I know, not very professional, but this was one of those things that was just STUPID!

I have often wondered what the answer is, did you get one?

[K245five]

I have often wondered what the answer is, did you get one?

Well, her response was "I don't know, just take it!"

Just to reiterate, this customer was a long time customer. But, she had switched banks, and Corporate was very adamant against taking starter checks. They said no under ANY circumstances!

[PuckishOne]

Hopefully I can address a few of these, from the insurance point of view:

Insurance companies don't send out new cards when they change ID numbers or groups

We are legally required to send new cards when there is a significant change like this; we also send a short letter explaining what's going on. I can't begin to tell you how many of them get returned due to bad addresses, however. We also get calls from people who claim to have read the letter but ask anyway why they received new cards and what they should do with the old ones.

6)Insurance companies that change fee structures or drug tiers without supposedly notifying customers

Again, at least in my state, we are legally required to notify our subscribers of damned near any change in the plan. Again, we get a lot of returned mail and a lot of confused callers.

Basically, you can't win for trying with this sort of thing, in my experience. We get it on one end and you, AFpheonix, get it on the other.

[AFpheonix]

There's a lot of times where the insurance company has a completely different address on file for the customer than I've got, too. And if it's a company like Aetna, heaven help you if you try to get an override or a correct ID number if you can't guess what address they have on file, because they are total HIPAA nazis.

I also think that half the time a spouse or someone opens the mail and then neglects to tell their partner about the letter from insurance, and then they act all suprised when stuff changes, especially the changes that take place around July. Gah.

And then, there's the kids that haven't bothered to get their new cards from their parents, and then look at you like you're stupid when you inform them that the coverage that you had on file isn't working.

[Argabarga]

I love it when people swear up and down they don't have new cards, they haven't changed plans, and you're incompetent for suggesting such a thing, then you call the insurance company, and lo and behold, they got new cards 3 months ago.....