This will be a somewhat short post unless I evolve into some rage machine mid-post.

Hollywood Video does not offer delivery services. Apparently, people think that we do. I’m going to make this clear: WE WILL NOT DELIVER YOUR FUCKING RENTALS. Are we called Netflix? Nope. Are we called Blockbuster Online? Nope. WE ARE HOLLYWOOD VIDEO. AND YOUR FUCKING ENTERTAINMENT IS GUARANTEED, DAMN IT.

SO NO, DO NOT CALL ME ASKING ME TO HAVE A COWORKER DELIVER YOUR RENTAL. NO, DO NOT ASK ME IF WE CAN PICK UP YOUR RENTALS. STOP BEING A LAZY FUCK AND PICK UP/RETURN YOUR OWN MOVIE YOURSELF. JASON DRIVES 55 MILES EVERYDAY TO AND FROM WORK. SO DON’T EVEN START.

Disclaimer: This is in no way against the employees of Game Crazy, but the upper management. You may now continue.

Damn you upper management, give my Game Crazy their god damn expansion! This photograph above is a perfect example of why we need our expansion. The GC is so fucking small that when stupid adolescents and smelly old nerds come in, they start to flow into my store. Not only does this make me angry, but it scares away customers. And how exactly am I supposed to make the day if there’s creepy people in my store?

It’s also annoying as hell to have Game Crazys product ALL. OVER. MY. WALLS. Yes, MY walls. It is MY store. Technically it is Jason’s store, but it is MY store. I am the Assistant Manager. I am power hungry and everything is mine. *ahem* Anyways. People come in and try to buy their product on my side when they’re not open, and they yell at ME because THEY are CLOSED.

So c’mon, Don Douglas, push some mother fucking buttons and get us our expansion. And hey, it’s hilarious when I set my ringtones the same as yours. LOL.

God, these people didn’t start to show up until Powerplay came into the battlefield, I swear to GAWD.

So this lady had just returned five films, and was renting five more. At this point, without tax, she has already spent $47.90. With tax, that’s $51.60. Now, before I continue ranting about this woman, let me elaborate on the offer I made her (an offer I thought she couldn’t refuse).

The Diamond Power Play plan is offered at a flat rate of $40. With $40 ($43.03 with tax or whatever), she could have three films out at a time [on her Power Play], and could pay full price for any additional rentals that she wanted at that time [in addition to the three she had out]. The plan offers her UNLIMITED rentals [under the flat rate], including two games out at a time. There are NO due dates on these movies, and she didn’t need to make a commitment; she could’ve paid for one month with cash and seen how she liked it. If she didn’t like it, fine, if she did, great.

She refused to sign up for the Powerplay plan. Why, you might ask? Because she lives on Turnpike and Hollister. Now, let me tell you that Turnpike and Hollister is closer to work than my house, and my house is like, not even five miles away. Her house is about 3.4 miles away, while mine is.. 4.1 miles away. THATS ALMOST A WHOLE ADDITIONAL MILE. BITCH NEEDS TO STOP COMPLAINING. Who cares if she spent more on gas? She’d be saving hundreds of dollars on rentals!

BITCH!

So uh, pic unrelated. I typed unaware into google images, and this is the most irrelevant photo I could find. So uh, there you go.

Onto talking about Customer Type #8: The Unaware. The people that are unaware that no, I do not work for corporate, and no, I have NO control over what the company decides to do.

Today a customer was ranting about Power Play. Power Play is our new program that is replacing MVP based on a point system. It’s a good deal for everyone (including people that don’t rent), except for people that use the Basic MVP that costs $14.99. The Basic MVP allows you to take out three movies at a time for five days at a base fee of $14.99, and can be any movie as long as it doesn’t have a “hot,” shelf liner under it. Converting to Power Play is going to be extremley difficult for the Basic customers, seeing as how it doesn’t offer as many points as they want.

This woman yelled at me for about twenty minutes about how I need to do something about this, and how it’s stupid. I had to remind her hundreds of times that I have absolutely no control over this, and that it’s the company’s decision, not mine. I offered her the guest relations phone number numerous times, but she continued to talk to me like it was my fault that Power Play didn’t suit her needs.

Eventually I cut her off and said, “I CAN’T DO ANYTHING ABOUT THIS, ALL I CAN DO IS GIVE YOU THE GUEST RELATIONS NUMBER,” and she accepeted my offer. As she walked out the door, she yelled, “THIS IS A FUCKING RECESSION!”

To conclude this topic, I have nothing else to say except for the fact that I’m trying to convince my District Manager to have an after-hours district party. Haha.

For some reason, people think that customer service representatives and really anyone who works in retail, is LEGALLY BLIND. Sorry folks, but we are not legally blind, and we can see and notice every fucking thing that you do. Just like you, we are humans (some of us genetically modified to excel in certain areas), and we all have two eyeballs just like you do.

When you do the following, we can fucking see you:

- hide in the corner to steal a movie

- take concessions and put them in random places in the store*

- not want a movie and put it in some stupid place**

- drop shit and walk away***

* There’s no point to doing this. You grab your concessions when you’re about to ring up your shit. It makes it seem like you are doing this on purpose.

** Because it’s that hard to hold onto it and give it to us up front if you don’t want it. It’s the job of my minions to put it back anyways.

*** OUR LINOLEUM FLOORS MAKE EVERYTHING HEARD. YOU DROP A LEAF, WE HEAR IT.

Contrary to popular belief, we are very much so different from Blockbuster. So to clear up and confusion, here it goes:

- Blockbuster employees are aloud to be rude

- After seven days, they automatically sell you the rental, [and rumor has it that] they won’t refund it when you return it

- Some Blockbusters are franchised

- Blockbusters smell funny due to shitty carpets

- Blockbuster will play movies on their screens before they come out, resulting into fail

- Blockbuster cannot look up movies for you, and their shit is so disorganized (I think my mother would have a fit if she saw the Goleta one.)

- Their video game section thing is shit; Game Crazy shits on them

- Blockbuster’s back office is ugly (yeah, I looked inside.)

- Blockbuster employees ask too many questions

- Blockbuster employees have no sense of humor

Now, here are the two PROS to Blockbuster:

- More concessions

- They rent PSP and DS games

Have a bad experience at Blockbuster? Call their corporate offices and complain. Have a GREAT experience at Hollywood Video? Call 1-8-Speak-To-Us and tell them what store and which associate made your day. Have a bad experience at Hollywood Video? Tell the store manager and mouth the words “write that fucker up,” as you walk out the door.

You’re probably asking yourself, “why the fuck is she calling a type of customers The Hilary Clintons?” Well, if you know me, you know what I absofuckinglutely hate Hilary Rodham Clinton. Now, if you know me real well, you’ll know that I hate her mostly because of one reason:

She’s an indecisive bitch.

We’ve got a few situations of the Hilary. My favorite one is the Hilary that brings up about anywhere from six to fifteen different movies up to the cash wrap. Like The Wanderer, they usually attack when there’s a line and my GSR is on lunch. And the entire time before the customer opens their mouth I’m thinking, “yes, this’ll boost up my rentals per transaction.”

WRONG.

The Hilary takes five minutes asking me about each and every movie they’ve brought up. I give my opinion on them, most of them positive, and then proceed to move on. That is, until they scoot fourteen out of the fifteen movies aside. Either that or they just push them onto my side of the cash wrap and obnoxiously yell, “I DON’T WANT THESE.”

But wait! That’s not all! As I’m about to slide the bankcard through the.. ..thing you slide bankcards through.. they go, “wait, no that’s not the movie I want,” and then proceed to dig through the stack of movies they had and pick a different one. They rinse, lather, and repeat this one about three times.

I think the worst Hilary that I had was one that brought up a movie, paid for it, and as I’m about to hand them their change they go, “you know, never mind, I don’t want it anymore.” So less than thirty seconds after the completed transaction, I had to refund it and hand them back their $20. And of COURSE there was a line and I was all by myself on a Friday night.

I feel that after dealing with Hilaries that I have wasted precious time, good input, and good customer service. So yes, I will help you pick a movie. But don’t change your mind three times and throw the movies you don’t want at me. It’s quite politically incorrect of you.

Ah yes, one of my personal favorites: the wanderer. What goes on through the head of a wanderer, I always wonder. Do their brains just stop? Are they really that clueless? Are they zoned out 85% of the time? What the hell is it?

There’s a few ways to identify a wanderer. They usually come around Friday and Saturday nights, when the store is at it’s busiest. They come up to your register, you get their phone number, ring them up, and finish the transaction. Bam, just like that. They don’t come out of their normal human disguise until the very end: when the words, “I’ll meet you at the door,” come out of your mouth. That’s when it seems like time just starts to go really slow for them, and nobody else. They take their sweet ass time to get to the door, they pick everything up and look at it, and then they walk around the H-fixture and stare at you, back at the fixture, and sluggishly make their way to the door, while in the background, customers are screaming at you for not being quick enough with each transaction.

The customer is always right?

No, not in this case.

The other type of wanderer is when you  show them exactly where something is, and they still don’t get it. A wanderer is at the register and you tell them, “with your purchase of three rentals today, you get a free two liter of soda,” and you point directly behind them, at the mountain—let me repeat that, MOUNTAIN ABOUT FOUR AND A HALF FEET HIGH—of two liter sodas. What do they do? Completely disregard your finger pointing the correct direction, and stare at the pepsi machine with small twelve ounce bottles of pepsi products.

Hold it.

You said two liter soda.

They said, “free two liter soda? Awesome.”

How did they think two liter meant twelve ounces?

You people, I swear. One of these days I’m going to install a button behind the cash wrap, and when I press it, you fall into a pit of sharks. 

Every store has them. Every establishment has them. Hell, even every family has them. Those old, greasy looking creepers. Ah yes, the creeper customer has been a favorite of the people in retail for quite sometime.

How do you spot a creeper? Well, this entry shall help you a little bit.

Signs of a Creepy McCreeperson:

- Old (35+)

- Talks in a low, soft voice

- Looks at your chest (if you’re a guy, your ass/crotch area)

- Keeps throwing compliments at you

- Gives you their business card (this has happened on several occasions)

- Has greasy hair

- Has very thick glasses

- Asks to have you walk around the store with them

If they are under the age of 35, clean, and somewhat attractive, this is a false alarm. This person is just trying to harmlessly flirt with you. Now, to deal with the Creepy McCreepersons, you must take the following steps:

- Cross your arms

- Don’t show any emotion

- Be quick and short

But most creepers never get up. Have a creeper? Congrats, they’re never going to go away.

There’s nothing worse than a know-it-all than a know-it-all customer. People come up to the counter thinking they know everything, and then they question me like I’ve never worked for this establishment in my life. My favorite is when I tell them, “I’m sorry, it’s company policy,” and they have the balls to ask, “why?”

Why is it company policy? Seeing as how I am theoretically at the bottom of the totem pole in this company, I wouldn’t know why. Do I look like a corporate worker to you? Does this look like the corporate office? No, not quite. Here’s a few examples of the Infamous Why’s Guys in action.

[the sensor goes off as they walk in]

Me: Excuse me, are you returning those?

Customer: Yes.

Me: Can I return them here please?

Customer: Why?

Me: It’s an LP issue and company policy that unlocked movies are not carried throughout the store.

Customer: And why is that?

Me: I don’t know, but I can give you the guest relations number if you’d like to ask them.

Customer: [throws movies at me.]

Some people are quite unreasonable, I swear. There are somethings that shouldn’t even be questioned.

Me: [holds bankcard] Can I see your ID please?

Customer: Why?

Me: To prevent identity theft. If you don’t have an ID, than I’m going to have to take a different form of payment.

Customer: [shoves ID in face and it takes ten minutes for my eyes to adjust.] HERE YOU GO.

I think my favorite one was the one today, where it was around 11:00am, and I was still alone because my mid came in at 1:30. There was a guy I was setting a membership up for, an old lady behind him, and a kid banging on candy behind her (I swear, after I wrote Customer Type #2, they all started swarming in). I finish the membership application, and send him on his way. The old lady approaches the counter and throws the movies violently on the counter.

Old lady: I just don’t understand.

Me: Excuse me ma’am?

Old lady: They [nods towards Game Crazy] have three employees, and you have one. Why is that?

FIRST OF ALL. It took me TWO minutes IF EVEN to set up that man’s account. That bitch has nothing to complain about. 

Me: We don’t have as much labor to blow on employees coming in earlier than they should. My mid shift comes in at 1:30.

Old lady: Why?

Me: We don’t make nearly as much revenue as Game Crazy does.

Old lady: Why?

Me: Movies don’t cost $500 while a single PS3 does.

I think the old ones are the worst. Our bathroom was out of order and some old guy yelled at me and said, “don’t give me that fucking bullshit!” It was quite interesting and I wanted to punch him. You Santa Barbarbians need to pull the tampon out of your ass before walking into my store.