Raise your hand if you have ever felt personally victimized by an entitled customer. Plenty of you probably have your metaphorical hand up. Don’t worry, you’re not alone, my hand is up too. If you’ve ever worked at any customer service job, then you understand the true agony of that encounter. It is always a scene, stressful and dramatic. And it seems like you can’t get out of it! Those can be the longest moments of your life as someone screams at you for doing your job- as if they could do it better. Any worker in the customer service industry knows this feeling well and it often makes the stress of the job double. But it’s just part of the job, right? Is this really what they signed up for?
We all know customers are necessary for business, but boy, can some really test your patience. Just ask our friend, “Jada.” She was a nineteen-year-old cashier at her local crafts store when she came across one of the most entitled customers she’d ever met. Technically, the woman wasn’t a customer, since she wasn’t at the store to buy something, but rather steal something. So when she was caught red-handed, Jada gave her the benefit of the doubt, but that was a huge mistake. Things went from 0 to 100 real quick. That was when the woman tried to play the victim card, but little did she know, that wasn’t going to last long.
Jada worked at this craft/ retail gig, where she rarely had any trouble with customers. Well, until this one night. It was the night she was working a closing shift where she spent the last few minutes ringing out the “stragglers.” Or in other words, the customers who wait until the very last minute to check out. As she finished her line of customers, she started tidying up her station. Her station was relatively close to the exit, so she normally could see when someone entered and exited the store. At one moment, she noticed a woman walking towards the exit. By the time the woman stepped into the foyer, outside of the exit door, Jada shouted in good spirits, “Have a good night!”
That was always part of her routine when working so close to the doors; greeting customers when they enter and expressing gratitude when they leave. It’s a pretty normal thing to do at business establishments in the United States. But for some reason, that startled the woman to the point that she jumped up and dropped whatever was in her hands onto the ground.
This was strange to Jada since it wasn’t like she had a megaphone or screamed, “Have a good night” at the top of her lungs to make this woman nervous. It was possible maybe the woman didn’t see her as she was leaving, and her shouting caught her off guard. But since the woman was still standing in the foyer, Jada took it upon herself to see if the woman needed assistance. I mean, she did work in customer service.
As she approached the woman, she realized the familiar item that was dropped on the ground. Then it all started to click to her what was going on. The woman wasn’t startled because of Jada’s shouting, but for another reason.
The mystery item that was dropped by the woman was one of their 10 buck vases. This took Jada by surprise since first the item wasn’t in a bag, which normally with fragile items like a vase, you would think someone would want it to be wrapped up or something. And secondly, since Jada was the one who checked out the majority of the customers at the end, she didn’t recall this woman in her line, nor in anyone else’s. This made Jada suspicious of the intent of the woman, or should she say, shoplifter.
Why steal something and when caught, just stand there until an employee approaches you? Why not run? By no means was Jada going to chase after her. She would have 100 percent gotten away with it.
Anyone who has worked in customer service has probably heard the spiel or watched a video about “not being a hero.’ For some situations at work, for example, a robbery. It’s best to comply because the money or merchandise is not worth someone’s life or your own. Well, in this instance, it was only a ten-buck vase, which Jada wasn’t going to do all that running for just a ten-buck vase. Also, it was near closing time so Jada was already tired and just wanted to clock out at a decent time that night.
To avoid any conflict or blatantly accuse her of stealing, Jada simply asked, “Were you planning to pay for this vase?”
Maybe with some “snarkiness,” but again, it was almost close to the end of her shift, so she was a bit annoyed she had to deal with this nonsense.
Surprisingly, the woman responded, “Yes.” So was this some weird, unintentional way she was admitting to shoplifting?
Again, it was late, so Jada let it go. She didn’t ask any more questions, she just picked up the vase and headed back to her register, with the woman following quickly behind. Jada could sense an attitude from the woman, but she ignored it.
It wouldn’t be much longer she had to deal with her; Jada just needed to ring her up, get her money, and give her another, “Have a good night” as she headed out. Again. Hopefully this time, she leaves without any issues. I guess that was some wishful thinking because as soon as both ladies reached the register, that was when things started to escalate. The shoplifter was now singing another tune on the situation, which couldn’t have been further from the truth.
At some point from the few steps taken from the foyer to Jada’s register, the shoplifter had switched to a whole different attitude and story. As they reached Jada’s station, the shoplifter quickly snatched the vase from Jada’s hands.
She claimed, “I paid for this!” And proceeded to say how ticked off she was that her “paid” vase now had Jada’s fingerprints on it.
This caught Jada off guard because not even a minute ago, she claimed she was going to purchase the vase, so now all of a sudden, she already purchased it?
Maybe it was Jada’s experience in customer service or watching endless videos of “entitled customer freakouts” online that she knew this situation wasn’t going to end on a good note as she hoped. Before she was beaten to the infamous punchline “Let me speak to your manager,” Jada asked on the walkie-talkie for the manager on duty, “Robert” for assistance up in front.
It seemed as soon as she made that call, all her coworkers seamlessly started piling up around her station. I guess the shoplifter thought this was her opportunity to tell her side of the situation or in other words tell false accusations.
She claimed she wasn’t the thief, but Jada was the actual one. Supposedly, Jada tried to steal her property (the unpaid vase) and accused her of shoplifting, all while yelling in her face. She tried to play the victim of her own crime, and she thought the other employees would buy into her made-up story. She thought wrong. They didn’t believe a word that came out of her mouth because they knew Jada. She was a timid, unproblematic teen who never once raised her voice to a customer, let alone yell in a customer’s face.
Realizing no one was getting fooled by her false accusations, the shoplifter then decided to amp up her story even more. Now she was claiming that Jada “physically cornered her and at one point, was afraid for her life.” She then told the employees to call law enforcement. For what? Not sure. Jada was beyond confused about the whole situation.
Not only was her story completely false, but almost physically impossible. The shoplifter was twice Jada’s size. There was no way she got cornered or felt threatened by Jada. Did she really think the police officers were going to believe her? Not even the employees believed her. However, she wasn’t backing down from her claims. That until Robert came into the picture.
Let’s just say, no one called the cops. Instead, the employees took the vase from the shoplifter’s possession and waited for Robert to make the calls. When he finally approached the group, he surprisingly didn’t seem worried or shocked about the ordeal. Little did everyone know, he already had his suspicions on that woman from earlier that night. When he realized who the individual was in question, he checked his security cameras before heading to them.
So when he heard the shoplifter say, “I want her (Jade) arrested and fired.” He wasted no time in calling her out on her lies. The footage he saw on the security camera didn’t lie, she in fact did not purchase that 10 buck vase, nor were her other allegations true.
Not wanting to waste any more time on her, he said, “Please leave my store and stop harassing my employees.”
She responded, “I’m calling corporate.”
He calmly said, “Go ahead.”
From there, she stormed off. Everyone watched as she went into the parking lot. The real kicker was that she got into an expensive-looking car. Not only did she drive a luxury car, but also was wearing top-notch clothes and jewelry. By no means, did this lady need to steal, let alone a vase? By the look of her, it seemed like she could afford a whole box full of those vases. So why would she ruin everyone’s night and have a freak out at the store over a 10 buck vase?
Entitled customers are one thing, but an entitled shoplifter is a whole game-changer. How entitled could you be that you feel you don’t need to pay for something? The world may never know. Hopefully, she doesn’t try that again or it could end worse on her part. Next time, there might not be a warning from the store. Theft is a crime, and security cameras are everywhere nowadays so there is a chance she will get caught and get the cops called on her instead.
