By now, you all know that I am bad with technology, and yet the irony is I opt for shopping online in almost all the cases. I know there is always a risk attached to buying things which I haven’t seen, and yet I voluntarily want to buy things online or in a supermarket, and evade any store shopping.

The reason is very simple, not only do I get to see innumerable products but also I get to avoid people.

Why do I want to avoid people at the small stores? The reason is simple again. I will relate to you my recent encounters.

1#
I ordered food from a nearest restaurant. We usually order from there, and there has been never a problem. But this time the delivery man seemed new in the area. (he seemed to me a person new to a job itself). Our building is being renovated and hence the apartment name was erased, so he couldn’t find the building. He instantly called the landline number, on which my mom was talking to someone. He might have asked the guard, and came upstairs, but he was already in a mood.

I had kept the door open seeing the restaurant bike downstairs, so that he didn’t have any more trouble finding the house. (And I was hungry too.) but as soon as he came in view he shouted, “Is it your parcel?” When I said yes, he literally started fighting with me. “Can’t you put up a name on your building? Even your house has no number. (That is why I kept the door open!) and then you have to keep your phone busy too. Why can’t you talk some time else. I had so difficulty finding your house. I had to talk to your guard to find out if this is the place.”

That is when I lost it, and the angry me retorted, “That is your problem!!” I took my package, paid him, and banged the door before he could finish his sarcastic ‘thank you’.

Honestly, our building is located at the centre, it is easily located, and even a blind man will find his way to it. And if asking a guard downstairs was so much of a trouble, you could have taken up some other job.

Correct me if I am wrong, don’t you think customer service is a part of any business. Okay, I agree there was a bit of a problem for him, and our phone was busy too. But what about keeping some amount of patience? How can you just shout at a customer which was equally polite to you at the beginning?

2#

I went to the market to find a matching blouse for my skirt, and there is only one shop nearby where I could get the ready-made ethnic blouse that I wanted. And as I went there and told him what I was looking for, he sat there staring at me, sipping his tea.

“What do you want?”

I repeated what I wanted.

And then without even looking at his stock, without so much as a glance behind him, he refused and ordered another cup of tea.

It could be that he really didn’t have the blouse, or the colour, or the material, but just the way he said it, was not at all professional.

3#

I needed to buy some groceries, nothing too much so I went to the shop just down the road from where I stay, instead of the superstore.

There was no customer inside, except for me. And the two staff were just sitting and chit chatting in there Monday gala time, the owner doing his prayer to the God’s to the bless him with… more customers, more money, and I don’t know what else could be in his wish-list.

I started telling them the things that I needed and one of them lazily dragged himself inside while the other one was constantly editing his picture on snapchat. It took him more than 15 minutes to grab a packet of oats, a bottle of jam, some bread, and a small packet of milk. After the long 15 minutes the owner did the billing, and swiped my card with the same lazy and mundane humour. Even tearing the slip off the machine took him more than 15 seconds.

I was just glad to grab the things and leave when the other customer came in asking for a bottle of Vaseline.

The supermarket would have been a better option, I thought.

*

I know that even small stores need to earn their share, they are also handy, but if this is the case, then I am happy browsing for some time, exploring more products and wait a little time for the delivery.

I am not sure why I am posting this here, but where I work if we had done any of the above things, or been even a little rude to our customers, I would have been simply thrown out. I am not saying that customers are always right, but there is a certain professional decorum that has to be followed.