“I was working at a gas station that had updated pumps, except for one. The one old pump had the thing under the nozzle you had to flip up to turn the pump on. Now I could see on the register if someone was using or trying to use a credit card.
This lady came in and said, ‘My card isn’t working at the pump.’
A simple mistake on that older pump. So I explained to her that you had to flip up the lever for it to work.
She told me, ‘Well I already put my card in.’
I said, ‘Ma’am, your transaction cancels after a short time to prevent inaccurate transactions.’
It’s a pretty common precaution honestly but apparently, this went over her head.
‘Yeah, well, I already put it in,’ she said again.
I thought, ‘Okay, something is not clicking here.’ I explained to her that I could see active cards by looking at the register but this just wasn’t computing in her brain and now it was starting to get busy. I explained to her an honest to god, two to three more times that she had to run her card again but she was still not understanding.
By now, I was staring down a line of 15 people behind her. So at my wit’s end, I looked past her and onto the next customer and said, ‘What can I get for you?’
She stormed out, got her gas, and came back in, looking ticked off as ever to wait in the line she created.
She got to the front and sneeringly said, ‘WHAT’S YOUR NAME?!’
I told her, ‘Patrick.’
She said, ‘WHAT’S YOUR WHOLE NAME?!’
I took an exasperated sigh. This could not be happening to me.
I said, ‘Well, what’s your whole name?’
She told me her whole name. I told l her that it didn’t matter because I was the only Pat that worked here and she told me she would be making a complaint because I was very rude. At this point, I put my line on pause for a second and said, ‘Lady, you came in, I told you what to do, you went back out and did WHAT I TOLD YOU, and got your gas. If I wasn’t busy I would have come out and helped you.’
I was being completely honest but she obviously doesn’t buy it.
‘I’m sure you would have,’ she said sarcastically and then left in a huff.
Luckily my boss had my back. I told him about it the next day and he said, ‘Well if she calls me I’ll tell her you only have one leg.’
We both laughed off the whole thing.”
