u/LostFlower42

I’m a lead in a smaller store in a city with more than a few Safeways (and other grocery stores). I enjoy being challenged a bit by my job so I asked corporate to put our item capacity at 100 per hour.

As I rarely actually run into that much demand, it has not been a problem. However, lately I’ve been having item counts exceeding 120 per hour. At least once a week, sometimes twice in one day.

I’m aware that flashes do not count towards item capacity. But today was 150 three different times.

(Tangent: With the ESL tags now a thing, the other departments promptly lost all but two of our scanners. I had eight originally.)

Today, my second scanner had once again disappeared. I was the only one who knew or could do DUG. Because even if I had a back up option they couldn’t do anything. The departments all claimed to not having the second scanner.

I’m trying to figure out how item capacity is calculated. The odd 300 piece order is fine but having five 30 piece orders due in an hour along side handoffs is a bit much.

One of the weird things I’m good at is dealing with problem customers.

Our story begins when I received a call from a lady trying to place an order and she insisted that I fix her app. I told her that her order did go through. It was, in fact, a different customer whose name was only two syllables off (go figure).

She came into the store to chew me out explaining she was housebound and could not take a cab regularly. Still we both had a love of Reese’s and she was grateful. My then store director approved how I handled the situation, explaining “this is our meanest customer.”

Customer figured out her app and would occasionally call just to talk. Weird but my store has gotten significantly busier since. There were no issues.

A few months ago, customer started placing orders specifically when I was working. okay… But her demands were getting more ridiculous. My current store director will not even let me mention her name (she’s a Harry Potter fan lol). However, given I’ve been able to talk customer down, we’ve tolerated it.

Recently she’s been making flash orders and calling me to say she only wants me to do her orders immediately after dropping the order. If you make a mistake, she will call you. If you out of stock or make a sub, she will call you within two seconds. “I don’t know how to check what you did” except with far more profanity.

Last week, I reached my breaking point when she was furious that I ended up canceling her order because the dasher was at the door and freight was running late. Ie, we only had Reese’s.

I tried to assure her that I’d call her when the freight got in but I’d also get in trouble for leaving a flash go on that long without fulfilling it. She proceeded to explain to me how she’ll starve to death for my not fulfilling her order (even though I couldn’t). Calling me. Every. Fifteen minutes. For two and a half hours.

I asked my director to take over but she was like, “nope”.

Later that day, I went home. Only to find out, customer replaced her order after cussing out my closer. She then cussed out our backup shopper (who did the order) and two PICs.

For those of you who have banned a customer, what was the outcome like?

Also feels good to get that out of my system 😮‍💨

So I’ve done DUG for a few years and am a lead. I consistently get 5 stars for my store. I, until today, had two “DO NOT SUB” customers who actually meant that. My newest one was actually very sweet about it but told me not to do it in future.

Just wondering how in a perfect world and without having to remember, we could keep track of such customers. Because, honestly, I’ve had more complaints out of “DO NOT SUB” customers not getting a sub than customers who are okay with subs not getting one.