Blockbuster manager calls customer an idiot via receipt
by Conrad Quilty-Harper 
{ Nov 30th 2005 at 1:00PM }
When TeamXbox forum member oltranzista pre-ordered two copies of Perfect Dark Zero from Blockbuster, the last thing he expected was to be insulted for doing so. Instead, when he decided to change his pre-order (due to the store being out of stock) and purchase a Hard Drive for his Xbox 360 he was insulted by the manager. Not directly mind you, but via a receipt. Here's an extract of the message oltranzista saw when he picked up his game.
11/28 13:38 COM [EMP#]
WHAT A IDIOT.....I THINK HE IS ABUSING THE SYSTEM…BUT…WITH SO MANY CHANGES I TOLD HIM THAT NOMORE ECHANGES ON PRESELLS..[EMP NAME]
Not suprisingly, oltranzista is working on a formal complaint to Blockbuster. Read the full receipt after the jump.
[Thanks, scott]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
scampy @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
this manager is a tard. Proper english would be What AN Idiot....not, What A idiot.
Kevin @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
Wow...hello to one unemployed Blockbuster employee.
Shapyi @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
Thats a great way to get fired.
bd (formerly b) @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
"11/28 13:38 COM [EMP#]
WHAT A IDIOT.....I THINK HE IS ABUSING THE SYSTEMBUTWITH SO MANY CHANGES I TOLD HIM THAT NOMORE ECHANGES ON PRESELLS..[EMP NAME] "
Well, proper english would also be not writing with all Caps.
"No more", as opposed to "nomore" (what the hell is that supposed to mean anyway?).
"Exchanges" as opposed to "echanges".
And "resales" as opposed to "presells".
What A idiot. LOL
CapAmerica @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
Someone is going to get fired.
Nico @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
I hate customers too! The worst kind are the ones who come in 5 minutes before closing. They should be violently beaten!
As a bouncer that is allways tempting!
SickNic @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
Blockbuster as a whole is a shady business. They were quick to take $60 from my debit card without my permission, and it took me 3 months to get it back from them. I don't do business with them anymore.
XBoXer @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
While the behavior from the manager is definitely unprofessional, uncalled for, and unacceptable, lets read between the lines here.
It sounds to me like this buyer has changed his order, then come back and changed his order, repeat. Manager even notes in his tirade of remarks that he thinks the customer is messing with them now at this point. I've had customers before that I've had to POLITELY ask to leave and this would have been the proper way to deal with this. I'd like to know the full story here, it sounds like it would make a funny read. I read the customers story and I'm not buying that version for a second.
Zachary @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
And the problem here is what?
Miz Monkey @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
Blockbuster IS shady... I used to work for them, but WHAT A MORON to not realize that if you print a history, those comments will show up. There's a reason why you hand out a receipt, not a history report.
I love comment #1... "an" is plucked out rather than any of the dozen other errors.
Either way, it's brilliant... though not a recepit. No one is typically handed a history report unless there's a problem (as there seemed to have been in this case).
Also, I hope the sign is a witty joke, considering the error? My sense of humor is way off today.
Chris_C @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
"I hate customers too! The worst kind are the ones who come in 5 minutes before closing. They should be violently beaten!"
Why though? I mean the store doesn't close at "5 minutes to 6" it closes AT 6! You shouldn't be preparing to close down at 6, close at 6 dammit!
And back on topic, yaeh this guys toast. Perhaps the customer will get a free game from Blockbuster?
Rockwell @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
And this is news why?
dslamngu @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
LOL, it's an effective way to get fired, but totally worth it. Talk about an idiot customer. Retail employees have better things to do than to spend hours handling some tard's nickle-and-dime BS. Let's run through what he tried to do:
Pre-order 2 copies of PDZ - because playing 2 copies is more fun than playing one. Even if he's planning on hitting eBay or giving it as a gift, I'd imagine it's not too common.
Gift card and tradeins to pay these off - already at least three types of tender involved in this transaction: store credit, gift card, whatever else to pay the difference.
PDZ was out, so instead of asking for a full refund to store credit and just getting the hard drive (or, um, WAITING), the guy asks for a refund for his real money tender, application of store credit on one partially paid game to an accessory, and then it sounds like a totally separate refund to store credit on the fully paid game. To make matters worse, it sounds like somebody may have screwed up on subtraction.
Then he calls the whole thing off and pays for the accessory on his credit card, while leaving merchandise at the counter.
No wonder the manager just gave him a blind refund over the phone, nobody has time for that kind of BS. (Also, stores like this often have customer purchase databases.) The manager's job is to make angry retard customers STFU so normal customers can get service.
Idiot indeed. I hope Blockbuster laughs at him.
shaun @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
Blockbuster seem to be in the news a lot this last few weeks.
"Blockbuster puts Gamestation on the block"
http://www.joystiq.com/entry/1234000927067900/
"Blockbuster shareholders sue rental chain"
http://today.reuters.com/business/newsArticle.aspx?type=ousiv&storyID=2005-11-14T215303Z_01_SCH478734_RTRIDST_0_BUSINESSPRO-RETAIL-BLOCKBUSTER-DC.XML
"Blockbuster's idea of Christmas cheer"
http://www.theage.com.au/news/business/blockbusters-idea-of-christmas-cheer/2005/11/23/1132703252607.html
Whatever happened to "the customer always comes first" approach?
Spence @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
I'd photocopy it, post it around the store hand it out to people with advice telling them to shop elsewhere, throwing hundreds of copies around the store, out the front and on shelves, generally being an urban renegade before swiftly removing my arse before I got nicked by the cops.
prfectjon @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
#11, it's more so an issue of customers who walk in 5 minutes before closing and try to do 30 minutes worth of shopping.
It's just inconsiderate on the part of the customer. If I go into a store 5 minutes before closing, I make sure it's just to grab something really fast and to get out.
alex @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
A similar thing happened to me at Dominos pizza. ... The guy typed something like "call first stupid motha f*cka" in the receipt. ... It would be some good leverage for some free pizza. Too bad I lost it.
Mark @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
I used to work at Blockbuster and comments like this were the norm. Back in the good 'ol days you couldn't print them out, so you never had a problem when you called someone a tard onscreen.
DG @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
I read the kid's story and had a tough time understanding it. However, I'm not a Blockbuster employee and it isn't my job to understand. It sounds to me like this young man likes playing video games and has a lot of time and energy to devote to that hobby. If he is preordering, redeeming store credit, and other things, he is probably a repeat Blockbuster customer.
I would imagine the kid made some complicated sense of what he wanted to do, Blockbuster got busy, and he got called an idiot. Documenting that -- especially by a manager! -- is an incredibly stupid thing to do. I hope Blockbuster gives the kid some recompense. Kudos for keeping the receipt.
tylerfulltilt @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
This is total made up bullshit.
I work at a blockbuster and employee comments do not print out on receipts. His recepit would never have had that stuff on it.
can we say attention whore?
tylerfulltilt @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
forgot to add that the receipt is probably photoshopped
Jago @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
He works at Blockbuster and he can't spell...HEY! It's a match made in heaven!
deffjeff @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
This is total made up bullshit.
I work at a blockbuster and employee comments do not print out on receipts. His recepit would never have had that stuff on it.
can we say attention whore?
whatever you fucking idiot, blockbuster sucks and has not seen a dime from me in years due to the shady buisness practices like charging late fees on movies that were turned in days early on several occasions.
Jago @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
...and charging a late fee on a game that was turned in exactly 1 minute late. (and no I'm not joking)
Miz Monkey @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
::This is total made up bullshit.
I work at a blockbuster and employee comments do not print out on receipts. His recepit would never have had that stuff on it.::
tylerfulltilt -- go to a register and type... hmm, I think it's chist (it's been almost three years). A customer history should print out. It will look just like the above.
If you're the caliber of employee they've got these days, I'm really glad I left.
Jeff @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
"And "resales" as opposed to "presells"."
No, it is in fact "presells". They're two different things.
Anyway, when I worked as a salesman just after college, we did stuff like this a lot on our internal system (I won't mention what store I worked at). The customer obviously never saw it, but we had to leave notes to warn any sales or customer service people who talked to them later. People who were a real pain in the ass would get the dreaded "PITA" tag. Occasionally you'd see something even a bit more colorful. I'm not sure how I really feel about this as a general practice; I will say that it did help me save a lot of time with these customers. Given the volume I had to deal with, I didn't want to sit through 10 minutes of bitching before I myself realized the customer was a PITA. Seeing that note let me handle the situation quickly and get to the next customer. (Usually by handing the PITA off to customer service, which is where they should have been to begin with...)
Seems a little strange that someone would ever write anything like that on something that could ever be printed out, though, especially as a receipt. (This is shown as a "customer history report", so I'm not sure how common it is to really print something like this out.)
Jago @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
Aww come on now!!! Tell us the name of the company. Do you REALLY think that they are reading this website or even know who you are by your first name?
Triese @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
The reciept is not photoshopped, they just marked out the employee number. I used to moonlight as a manager at Blockbuster, this is a common occurance. The history reciept that the kid got is generally for in store use only. Its used to print up the accounts history from the day, or all the way up to the past 3 months. I've seen comments on accounts alot worse than this. I've also seen stuff like "this customer is hot", or "wow, she has a nice ass!" Generally we use them to keep employees notified of people who we suspect are stealing, returned the wrong disk, not allowed to rent because of a past due account, and so forth.
Nico @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
""I hate customers too! The worst kind are the ones who come in 5 minutes before closing. They should be violently beaten!"
Why though? I mean the store doesn't close at "5 minutes to 6" it closes AT 6! You shouldn't be preparing to close down at 6, close at 6 dammit!"
Because i dont give a shit if someone needs a beer 5 to 6. Im tired and i wanna go home. Fuck the customers, I only care about me. You would to if you had a shitty part time job like that.
Chris_C @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
"#11, it's more so an issue of customers who walk in 5 minutes before closing and try to do 30 minutes worth of shopping.
It's just inconsiderate on the part of the customer. If I go into a store 5 minutes before closing, I make sure it's just to grab something really fast and to get out."
I agree with you there, I just really hate it when I go to a shop with say 10-15 minutes left till closing and the attendants cicrle me like a bunch of mean vultures.
joshua @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
ah just do your damn job and don't put up any fuss. the customer is always right.
Miz Monkey @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
Re: Jeff in #25--
Actually, it is "presales." "Sells" is a verb; an employee could, I suppose, presell an item, but the event itself meaning the fact that Blockbuster is offering a deal to those who order before an item is in the store is known as a presale, noun.
Nico @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
"ah just do your damn job and don't put up any fuss. the customer is always right."
Yeah thats what i do. But thats not what im thinking. Anyone who works with customers in a low paying store hates customers and wants to kill them all.
Thats why you get an education..
Robert @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
The manager was stupid enough to give the customer that history report and he deserves to be fired. I don't think the customer is wanting to sue (as if he could) or anything, just some satisfaction.
As for those in the retail business who hate their customers: Hate them all you want, but never ever say it aloud or write it down.
Thomas Crymes @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
No customer should ever see a message like that. I also can't help but think we are only getting one side of the story. I'd certainly like to know the complete history behind the customer and store.
Was it an angry employee who just decided to go off on an unsuspecting person or was there a long history, where this was the last straw?
Rarely do these things just come completely out of the blue.
Nate @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
I just think it's funny that this made a spot on the blog. Who cares really? I mean, if some manager calls me an idiot (or like the case above, types it), I'm gonna tell 'em to screw off and maybe some other fun things too....then I'm gonna leave it alone. I'm not gonna post it on the internet, whining and complaining cuz someone called me an idiot. I'll take my business elsewhere if i'm that offended. People are too damn sensitive these days. And quick to file complaints. I just see it as a waste of time.
matt @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
hahahaha that customer got owned
Don Wilson @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
"hahahaha that customer got owned"
Lol
Aaron @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
Gamerush (Blockbuster) had a deal where you could trade in 2 games and get a pre-order for $29.99. The deal was only for PS2, XBOX, and Gamecube... BUT... people would keep trying to get XBOX 360 games that retail for 59.99 for 29.99. If you kept hammering the stores you would end up finding someone who did not know any better and would pre-order the 360 game for them. PLUS, people would seek out employees who would 'double dip' - let them trade in two games for the 29.99 pre-order and then give them the trade in value of the 2 games off of the 29.99. I'm pretty sure that is what this guy was doing and was busted doing it...
Jim @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
this is a fake, right?
Geoff @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
Thsi story made it to this blog simply because this is a BLOG. Blogs aren't CNN. They're sites where us bloggers can post things that we find interesting and comment on them.
Hence the editorial comments on the truly newsworthy posts.
People need to remember that bloggers aren't news journalists. We're freelance writers.
Want to go to a website with only real news? Make your own blog.
That said, I want to re-write the POS software I wrote for my company to include customer comments. We get a lot of customers that could use comments.
Unless you've ever worked retail or food-service for more than a year, you'd never understand.
Midnight @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
Stupid plea by employees messing around to get into the media. This has been done in th past and it always comes out to be fake
Banzai @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
I work at BlockBuster. Technically the customer should never have seen this. You have to fill out a form and send it to corporate to get them to give you a printout of your account history. This isn't used most of the time if the costomer just asks for like the stuff the got last week so they can make sure they returned it all.
Also it was done as a COM (comment) which doesn't show up when you bring up the account on the computer, but it gets read by corporate to make sure there isn't anything shady going on.
WRN (warnings) are what show up blinking when you bring up an account.
And as you can see he added a WRN so that anyone ringing him up would see that the manager on duty was the only one to trade with him.
This employee did absolutely nothing wrong with the comment, he saw something happen and he commented it, which is what we're told to do. The idiot part was a little uncalled for, but I've seen much worse on WRNs. The only thing that shouldn't have happened what the customer getting his hands on his account history.
james @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
#37 - I thought the "double-dipping" that you mentioned was the whole point; at least, that's how it was described to me by the employees of blockbuster. crap, i hope they didn't write something about me being an idiot and taking advantage of them.
IMandIR @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
It is just comments on an account that are being abused. When I worked at blockbuster we had them for deaf customers so new people wouldn't yell at them to get their attention or on people that have had too many credits. One person at the store I was at use to add. "Cirt-a-fied hot by xxxxxxxx" on accounts hummm attractive ladies rented from.
and #40 I use to print them out all the time for people that wanted them. No red tape by me.
miscblogger @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
this is soooo hillarious!!!
Jarg0n @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
Grabbed for another forum this is the blockbuster in question:
1.Peoria/36th
3547 South Peoria
Tulsa, OK 74105
(918) 743-4116
Dylan @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
This store even looks evil from outerspace.
Check out the Sat image from google:
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=3547+S+Peoria+Ave,+Tulsa,+OK+74105&spn=0.004726,0.011579&t=k&hl=en
hehe.
------------
-sig
Stop Feeding the cable Pig. Give Dish a Try!
http://www.anrdoezrs.net/k3116ar-xrzEGNJHMNMEGFILIGMH
Dylan @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
This store even looks evil from outerspace.
Check out the Sat image from google:
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=3547+S+Peoria+Ave,+Tulsa,+OK+74105&spn=0.004726,0.011579&t=k&hl=en
hehe.
------------
-sig
Stop Feeding the cable Pig. Give Dish a Try!
http://www.anrdoezrs.net/k3116ar-xrzEGNJHMNMEGFILIGMH
oltranzista (A IDIOT CUSTOMER OF BLOCKBUSTER!!!) :D @ Dec 18th 2005 9:42PM
A lot of people are making a bigger deal of this than i really am. Its pretty funny to see my "kicks n giggles" thread from teamxbox make it to this site and digg.com LOL!
i originally posted the teamxbox thread at the ihateblockbuster forums to see if i could possibly get some tips on the best way to file a complaint since the manager was in on the bad service and i didn't know how to get to the next 'higher up' person.
Anyhow I saw some people questioning why i ordered two copies of the same game. Well my wife and I BOTH play games and so we have two xboxes and I was planning on buying twoXbox 360's at launch along with two copies of PDZ.
A little history with me and this store:
i traded in a few games to put their credit on pre-orders of Perfect Dark but at the time the employee couldn't figure out how apply it to a 360 game and put the money on a gift card for me (didn't request a gift card by the way but whatever). a couple days later i brought in a couple other games to trade in for credit towards the Perfect Dark Zero games because I was told if i came back later they would have it figured out with the whole 360 preorders. so they applied the gift card credit and trade in credit to the games and gave me receipts for them that i made damn sure to keep since the second person seemed to have even more of a problem doing it??? I actually tried to call it all off and get my newly traded in games back but they said that wasn't possible?? (wtf?) so I just made sure to keep my receipts, thank GOD!