Woo! I was on FIRE!

Well, not literally, though if I was on fire at work, I probably would've died, seeing as we don't have a fire extinguisher. (I'm sure that's breaking some sort of fire/OHS regulations).

Nah, we had a catalogue sale which started today, and I worked 1-9. It was great. I was early, was in a good mood and very pleasant and customer focused today. I served as many customers as I could, more than I would've bothered to on an angry day, but I was so pumped and cheery and up-selling and everything! It was amazing. It was like a high. I was so proud of myself. Hey, I know this is supposed to be my job- friendly, efficient, helpful, offering product knowledge and technical info and all that, serving multiple customers, all whilst completing store tasks as well...but hey, we're all human. And today, I was SUPERhuman! We even managed to placate the angry customers.

So only two things happened today:

A man was going to buy $200 or so of clothes and shoes, but two pairs he'd picked out weren't reduced. We sometimes only reduce selected colours of a single style, but others will be full price. These particular styles of shoes came in 3 colours, and only 2 were reduced. Upon getting to the POS and scanning them, Gina, who had been serving the couple, found that they were not reduced. One style had been tagged with the incorrect price, a $30 difference. The other style wasn't tagged wrong, just an incorrect assumption had been made. So with our system of price errors, which is somewhat complicated, we were to charge him the full price, and head office would refund the difference.

But things just are never that simple, are they. It was getting quite busy at that stage, and the customer, upon finding the shoes not to be reduced, not surprisingly, was angry. Oops, that was our fault for tagging the display shoe wrong. So we tried to attempt the procedure, like many The Company likes to institute, which is of course prolonged and painful. We've recently had a new POS system installed, and of course, no one bothered to train us on everything thoroughly, so we're still ironing out a few glitches. While we fiddled with trying to complete the process on the computer or manually (yes, paper) he was getting increasingly frustrated, as was his wife, who also wanted some stock which we'd sold out of. She asked if we could call Howlong for the item, as she could pick it up there. We were flat out busy, and I was sure most other stores, especially Howlong, was as well. But not wanting to irritate them further, we called. So this is both me and Gina serving them now, trying to sort out the kerfuffle. Well, like I thought, Howlong didn't pick up because they were busy. Too. Oops. She wasn't impressed.

So after some time, I managed to get hold of an authority and we were able to process the form, but because of how long we took, I was expecting the couple to be furious. Gina and I were both very apologetic, honest and straightforward, and I was rushedly serving other customers as well. Well, managed to complete the sale, chucked in some freebies, and hey, angry customer left well, not exactly happy, but satisfied customer! I was impressed. But no time to bask in our glory...too busy, gotta go and keep serving!

And then! Later in the evening, maybe around 8 or so, I lost track after my 3:30PM dinner break (yes, really now)... it'd quitened down a bit. I was serving the only customer in the store, gentleman mid 40s, early 50s? He was trying on some shoes, I'd just started to help him with them when 2 early 20s skinny try hard guys sauntered in, as if they owned the place. I'm lacing the shoes for the lovely man, when

"Hey, is there anyone here?" one of the punks calls out self-importantly.

I was kneeling down, out of line of sight, so of course it looks like the store is deserted. I get up, and reply nicely,

"Yep, I'll just be with you in a minute". I continue lacing the shoes for the gentleman, and he noticed how impatient and rude the other two were, and being understanding, told me to go and see to them, he'd be fine trying on the shoes. I apologised and thanked him and told him I'd be back in a sec.

"Sorry to keep you waiting, how can I help you?" I greeted Angry Try Hards sweetly. I'd felt a twinge of annoyance at them, but that quickly dissipated when I saw they were looking at women's jeans.

"Yeah, I'm a size 32, but I don't know how these sizes fit" Our women's jeans are folded, stickered with the sizes- 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, etc. Men's sizes go by inches: 30, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, etc.

"Yup, these are the women's jeans, the men's jeans are just down the back here," I can't help snickering inwardly as I lead them to the back of the store, in the MEN'S section, where the reduced men's jeans are.

"Do you have any that are like this kind of fitting, and light coloured?"

"No, sorry, I'm afraid these are the lightest ones we've got, and they're all a straight leg" I reply apologetically. I was just about to offer assistance with different styles when Punk#2 interjects

"No, that's s!%@. It's not what we're after," They mutter amongst themselves, disgusted that we didn't have what they were after, "No, let's get out of here"

"Yeah, sorry about that." I call out after them. They storm out, unimpressed.

Hey buddy, whaddya expect? Our company's target demographic (at the moment!), as one customer succinctly put it are "middle aged to almost dead" Hahah! I can't believe they said that and The Company published it... And the fact that they didn't realise they were in the women's section, with a buxom female mannequin, wearing female clothing right next to the jeans they were looking at, doesn't say much about their intelligence.

So, I stride back to the gentleman trying on the shoes, and almost say "see, it only took a sec", but he's already taking it off and packing it back up. Happy with the shoes, he has already decided to take them. Wow! and he didn't even finish lacing up the shoe that I'd half done. Didn't even bother trying them both on. I liked this guy. He made me smile. Made things easier, was polite, understanding and a real pleasure to serve.

And it just got better after that! Customers until 8:45, but that's because I pushed the sales and really built them up, promoting the sale items and great bargains. What a legend. So no late customers! I can't say, despite my happy mood, I'd have welcomed someone coming in at 8:58. I closed at 9, no major problems cashing up, store not in a major mess, considering how busy I was, alone from 4-9, and I was outta there by 9:20 (oh well, can't have it all) and home before 10. Great! No traffic, no road rage, today was one of the best days at work in a while. If every day was like this and I was as happy and enthusisastic, I'd have no problems handling becoming a manager... but I've still got my degree to finish!