Customer Standard Time

[Jay 2K Winger]

We all know this term. It often applies for the so-called "clock vultures," the customers who attempt to swoop into your place of business right around closing time and will argue until they're blue in the face that they have <x> minutes left, etc.

Let's use this thread to talk about our experiences with CST.

Here's my most recent tale.

Last night, Hoss and I are coming inside after finishing our cart retrieval job. It's right about 10pm, our closing time. My coworker on FDLP, CR, has stopped an SC trying to get into the store, telling the SC that "We're closed." The SC pulls out his cell phone, showing it to CR, showing him that the clock on his phone says 9:57pm.

I'm in the process of taking the cart pusher back to its storage location when I notice the SC starting to drift toward the store, in spite of CR's continued demands the SC leave the store. So, I step in to provide reinforcements.

J2K: "We're closed, sir."
SC: "You're not closed, I just need to buy milk, it's not ten o'clock yet--" (holding phone for me to see time)
J2K: "I understand your clock says otherwise, but the store's clock says it's ten. We're closed."
SC: "It's not a clock, it's my phone." (showing it again)
J2K: "I can see your phone says it's 9:58, but the store's clock says it's past ten."

Right on cue, one of the MODs makes the "all remaining customers please come to the front, we're closed" announcement.

J2K: (points up) "See? We're closed."
SC: "You still have people in the store, making their way up? I just need milk. I can be out before they get up here."
J2K: (flatly) "No."
SC: (bewildered) "You're saying I'm not that fast?"
J2K: "I'm saying we're closed, you cannot go into the store."
SC: "I just need milk!"
CR: "Sir, if all you need is milk, there's a grocery store further down the shopping center."

Fortunately, MOD MS-- on his way out the door to close the gas station-- was there by this point, having witnessed my attempts at penetrating the SC's Shell of Self-Absorption +1, and he backed up both me and CR. The SC left our store, milk-less.

[superhotelworker]

See, thse are the moments I'd turn into Wiley Coyote, start holding up signs with (BOSS! I NEED HELP!) or (My brain's gonna explode). On it lol

I wonder how many different ways there are to say "I'm closed." LOL cause you did fairly well.

My CSTs are more like:

"I called an hour ago and HE said I could have a room for free." (Usually about midnight, my shift starts at 11.)

"No. Because an HOUR ago it was ME on clock and I'd NEVER tell you you could have a room for free." *click*

Or "I asked you to call me a cab an hour ago and you still haven't."
Dude, it's been 5 minutes, chill out!

[Mr Hero]

I can't remember CST from my own job, but I have noticed that customers have the tendency to need rooms during shift changes, and any time I'm using the facilities.

[Jay 2K Winger]

Just milk my eye. Who goes to a big warehouse club just for milk at 10:00?

More people than you think. We get quite a few last-minute shoppers (who have better timing than this guy) who come in, and leave with a couple gallons of milk.

We all know if you would have let him in he would hve been there for 45 minutes filling up a cart.

Like hell he'd have been in there 45 minutes. MOD MS wants to be out of the store just as much as the wage slaves, and he actively tries to make sure things get finished well before 10:30pm rolls around. There's a reason everyone likes closing with MS compared to, say, JA, he of the really bad radio etiquette and controversial political views.

[Mondestrucken]

My favorite had to do with the mother of a 16 year old kid. For anyone under the age of 18, they must have a parent or legal guardian sign that they have permission to get a license.

So it is a Friday, at 4:50 pm. One of the great things about my office is that with our traffic patterns, we are insanely busy from 1 pm to about 4 pm. Then it dies way down, and we are real dead just before 5 pm, so closing is usually a breeze.

Anyway, this 16 year old comes in at 4:50, and there is only one other customer. We are questioning him, because we are not going to do anything until he has a parent to sign for him. Um, well, she dropped him off. She went to pick up his sister, and then she is coming back.

And I am thinking: "You bitch! You assumed that we would be so crazy busy that you could pull this little stunt and still get back into the office after the door is locked because there would be a horde of people in here to cover you sneaking in."

To him, I just said, "You have 10 minutes for her to get here."

And so at 5 pm, when we told him that he had to leave, he tried the puppy dog eyes trick: "I have to go out BY MYSELF?"

"Well, your mother had no problem doing it to you. Why shouldn't I do the same?"

So when Mommy Dearest shows up at 5:15, she is screaming and pounding at the door. "He was here before 5!"

I stood at the locked door. "And you weren't. The computers are down, and we are closed." We turned off the lights and walked away from the door.

That is one thing the state allows us to do. They don't want to pay overtime, and it is a security issue. As long as I don't use bad language, I am allowed to say No once that door is locked. Neener-neener-neener.

[Lace Neil Singer]

Yay, my term is being used by people! This makes me happy.

CST is something I've often had to deal with, in fact every place I've ever worked has had SCs operating in that time zone. Sorry SCs, but we are operating in GMT, not CST so you're shit out of luck if you think that you're going to get into the store after closing time, when all I and every other worker wants to do is leave.

[Sheldonrs]

Our CSTers are the ones who call us up on January 2nd because they forgot to make their tax deductable donation before the end of the year and can't understand why we can't just date the donation for Dec. 31.
Sorry, but we kind of like what we do and we're not going to risk going out of the wish granting biz by breaking the tax laws just for you.

[depechemodefan]

We should also have a managers standard time. How many times have I had a manager want us to be on time to a desk, but either 1) they never show up to a desk because they forgot they were scheduled, 2) get snitty with you if you call them and tell them they are late to a desk, 3) they come late to the desk, making a joke, "oh, I didn't realize time was going so fast, I wish someone would have called me to let me know I'm late for the desk 4) Show up late, because they were too busy to come on time (which sounds like 3, does't it...)

[georgie]

nothings changed i see. i worked as a checkout chick when i was 15 for quite a few years in a large australian supermarket.

at 5:45 an annoucement would be given over the pa that we are closing in 15 minutes so make your way to checkout etc. then again at 5:55. finally again at 6.

at 5:45 the glass doors would be pulled down a touch. 5:55 most glass doors would be shut and only a couple open for shoppers to exit. at 6 only one glass door was open for people to exit.

there would be someone standing at those doors telling people that we weren't allowing anyone in since we were closing/closed.


there would always be someone banging on those doors to get at 6:05 saying "i only need milk, i'll only be a minute"

always

[Mondestrucken]

Just remembered another one from years ago, back at my part time job at Joann Fabrics.

It's a Sunday night, and we closed at 6 pm. Get a call from a customer, she is on her way to the store, and she needs 10 yards of black and white upholstery fabric.

ME: Ma'am, it's 5:45, and we close in 15 minutes. Where are you?

Crazy Lady (CL):OMG, OMG, OMG, I'm just leaving the Minnesota Fabric store at XX (They closed at 5 on Sundays). I need this fabric, just go and grab me any black and white upholstery fabric and cut me 10 yards. I'll take it no matter what.

Me: Ma'am, you are 25 minutes away. You are not going to make it.

CL: Yes, I can. I'm driving extremely fast. I can make it!

Me (starting to get a little scared - the route she is coming is heavy traffic, with people pulling out of stores all along the way): No, you can't. And, besides, we don't have any black and white upholstery fabric.

CL: Then any upholstery fabric. 10 yards. And just where are you anyway?

Now, upholstery fabric is not cheap. Our cheapest ran $15 a yard. And if she chose not to buy it, we would be stuck with a cut that perhaps no one would want, thereby basically destroying it. So I wasn't cutting shit.

Me: Ma'am, you are not going to make it in time. We will not let you in after we close. And you don't even know where we are!

CL: I basically know. Just cut it. Any fabric. I will pay for it. (She screams from a near miss traffic accident and hangs up).

The bitch is pounding on the door at 6:15, demanding that we let her in, yelling through the door that I said I would let her in after we closed. I yelled back: I told you no! You are not coming in! You are not shopping here tonight!

So from the whole experience, I learned one important lesson and gained a riddle of the ages to rival the Sphinx.

The lesson: People who have part time minimum wage jobs (all of us for the employee discount than to live on) do not give a fuck about bending over backwards for the customer. Go ahead. Call corporate. Have us all fired. There were 3 of us there that night, and all of us were willing to lose our jobs rather than wait on the crazy.

The riddle: What kind of upholstery emergency occurs on a SUnday evening that would make you risk your life and finances for?

[Alpha Strike]

Years ago I worked at an Eletronics Boutique - a gaming store now known as Game Stop. Our shop was a smaller one, located in a mall, which meant only one way in and out of the store. A few minutes to close we would start to lower the chain link "door" and post someone by the door to left folks know we were closing shortly. Once we were "officially" closed we'd pull the door altogether and only lift it to let a customer out.

Despite our precautions, we would still have to deal with customers trying to "sneak" in when we lifted the gate to left folks out, or even ones who would lift the gate and let themselves in since it couldn't be locked while employees or customers were in the store. The one nice thing about these situations is that with only 1 or 2 employees in the store we didn't have to worry about checking with management: we could tell folks to GTFO (nicely of course!) without reservation and had no qualms about stopping last-minute shoppers from trying to get in.

That is one thing the state allows us to do. They don't want to pay overtime, and it is a security issue. As long as I don't use bad language, I am allowed to say No once that door is locked. Neener-neener-neener.

My girlfriend had to call a DMV office recently and got into their Que system at 4:45. At 4:55 someone finally answered the phone and started to talk to her; at 5:00 PM, when the office closed, the phone system automatically dumped her call. I understand not wanting to pay overtime but that seems a bit harsh.

[Mondestrucken]

My girlfriend had to call a DMV office recently and got into their Que system at 4:45At 4:55 someone finally answered the phone and started to talk to her; at 5:00 PM, when the office closed, the phone system automatically dumped her call. I understand not wanting to pay overtime but that seems a bit harsh.

We lock our doors at 5, but we still have to take care of everyone who is waiting inside. We do make announcements at 4:45 that we will be locking the doors: make sure you have a method of payment, etc. And the person who is making the announcement will also have checked paperwork before they make the announcement. So everyone knows that they have everything they need.

We no longer have public phone lines right into the branch. All public phone calls go to the central phone system. The phone system here doesn't do that, but there is limited help they can give you over the phone anyway.

[Lace Neil Singer]

At the garden centre, we used to always have someone on the door at five to closing to stop last minute shoppers. It would be someone from one of the outer sections; Pets, Fish or Outside.

I always closed the Pet Unit at half an hour before closing. That would give me plenty of time to check on all the animals and make sure they had plenty of food and water for the night, and if winter, cover the cages up with bubblewrap to keep them warm. Despite this, I'd often get people turning up to either buy pets, or (and this used to really annoy me) mombies turning up with their kids to look at the animals. Just like going to the zoo, cept this is free and means that they get in my way when I'm trying to close up. I used to just tell them that I had to put the animals to bed at 5:15 to get rid of them; I never once had a mombie reply back that that was bullshit. XD

As for the people rolling up when I was cashing up my till to buy pets, I'd just tell them that since I'd closed up the unit, all I'd let them do was pick out a pet and reserve it, then they could come along tomorrow morning and pay. I got loads of whines and bitchery but there was no way I was going to go thru all that stuff; waiting for eons for them to choose a pet; boxing it up; waiting for more eons for them to choose a cage/hutch and finally them paying for it and me having to cash the till up again.

I'd get the usual "But the store is still open!" I'd just reply, "Yeah, but my unit is closed. Pets, Fish and Outside always closes down at half an hour before the store closes. It says so on the door." But of course, customers never read store opening and closing times, do they?

[Racket_Man]

I found this pic on another site. it seems to be perfect for this thread

[EricKei]

We should also have a managers standard time.

I remember one year at BoutiqueGrocerySrtore, they had a huge number of people scheduled to come in more than an hour early on XMAS Eve in order to deal with the usual rush, get all of the catering orders out (and, of course, to laugh at people trying to PLACE catering order on XMAS Eve), etc. They had us all come in at something like 5AM rather than the usual 6 or 6:30 needed for an opening shift. They also told everyone to congregate by the rear loading dock, so that the kitchen guys could just filter directly into the kitchen, and so potential customers wouldn't see us all up front and assume we were open (didn't work; half a dozen of the younger workers were stuck outside up front for over an hour).

The temperature that day was niiice and cold, hovering around freezing. The thing is, NO managers showed up until, oh, round about 6:15. They weren't answering their phones, either. Once they arrived, they acted all surprised and asked us why were were there so early... We told them, and Every. Single. One. insisted that NO such scheduling decision had been made -- therefore, none of us would be compensated for the extra hour+ standing around outside freezing our asses off. What we all wanted to know was this -- If nobody made the special scheduling change, why, exactly, did more than HALF of all of the store's workers show up for 5 AM on XMAS Eve?! (This was a looooong time ago, we wuz too ingorant to insist on getting that hour's pay back)