Customer Service?

On my errand to Walgreens yesterday to pick up Diet Dr. Pepper at the great price of 5/$11 for my dear husband, I witnessed an “incident.”  There was an older lady in front of me to check out, and she put her items up on the counter to pay for them.  Not much, just 6 cans of vegetables and a couple of Easter candies.  As the young checker was ringing them up, the lady said, “Now I have this coupon for the vegetables so they are 50 cents each.”

Poor unsuspecting Walgreens girl looked at the fine print in the coupon/ad, and said, “Oh, it says here that there’s a limit of 2 of each kind on these cans.”

“I know.  But I don’t want the peas.  I can’t eat peas,” said the older lady.

“Right.  But you can only get TWO of each kind,” says the checker.

“Well, I can’t eat peas; they make me sick.  Are you telling me I have to get peas in order to get the sale price?” says the older lady, starting to raise her voice.  And may I just point out that 50 cents for a can of vegetables isn’t a screaming deal, folks?  I stock up myself when they are 3 or 4 for a dollar.

“Ok, Ma’am,” says the poor girl, “you don’t have to get peas, but you can only get TWO of each of these at the sale price.”   She really was trying to get it through to her about that limit of 2.
“Well, I can’t EAT PEAS! I’m not going to buy peas!  I’ve never had a problem with this before! I’m not going to get any of these if you can’t honor the sale price,” she huffed. She went on and on, probably saying the word “Peas” 4 or 5 more times, then said, “I’ll just pay for these things.  We seem to be having a problem COMMUNICATING!”  Then she paid for her candy items, and it looked like she was leaving.  We were all a bit relieved until she turned and said in about the rudest voice I could imagine, “Can I have my AD back in case I want to get anything else?”

‘You mean the special ad that is there in the shopping cart or in the front of the store for anyone to pick up?’  I thought but didn’t say it, of course.  After the rude lady (who I actually know from a former ward, but won’t go into further details about her identity) left, I turned to the frazzled girl and said, “Wow, that was awkward.”  I told her that it wasn’t her fault and not to worry about it or let it ruin her day.  She just about broke into tears and told me that that was her worst customer experience yet. I paid for my few things, using the coupons and NOT complaining about peas or any such thing, hoping that the poor salesgirl won’t be scarred for life.