(no subject)

[pearwaldorf]

Finally, somebody (normy) who agrees with me about forced cheerfulness in the service industry. (Of course, I work in the service industry, and the next person who asks me to smile is going to get a snappy "Fuck you"...)

Comments

[asilvahalo.livejournal.com]

I cannot stand being told to smile, either. What's their deal anyway? Ever notice no one ever tells boys to smile?

[mydarkstar.livejournal.com]

But Ang, dear, don't you know that women never have lives or problems of their own, things that might cause them to not have a vacuous grin on their faces at all times? If you do, there's something wrong with you! Let men do the thinking! We're here to look pretty!

Grrr.

I've been getting the "hey! smile!" guys a lot less frequently since I flat out stopped making eye contact, unless absolutely necessary, with men I don't know. The more aloof you look, the less likely they are to have the nerve to try to talk to you. Try it, it works!

(I am so bitter bitter bitter)

[mydarkstar.livejournal.com]

I've never gotten the stupid obsession with smiling, either; anyone with a brain knows that cashiers smile because they're afraid they'll be fired if they don't, not because they're naturally friendly or particularly care about you. So why are businesses so fixated on perpetuating an environment of false cheer? Being forced to constantly act warm and happy when you're not takes a toll on your psyche if you have to do it long enough.

People tell me I'm too picky, but you couldn't pay me enough to work retail again. I'm too attached to the ability to put customers on penalty hold if they piss me off too much, and I'm not good enough at consistently acting friendly to strangers in person; it's easier to fake over the phone. And yet, the average burnout rate for over-the-phone techs is 18 months. Gah.

[sonatine.livejournal.com]

anyone with a brain knows that cashiers smile because they're afraid they'll be fired if they don't, not because they're naturally friendly or particularly care about you

Unfortunately, most of my customers don't have brains. This guy said to me, "I'm a frequent customer here [never mind that I honestly had never seen him before in my life], why don't you smile?" Fucker. It's my job to tell him where shit is and to help him pick out vitamins. I'll do that, but I don't have to smile while I do it.

I'm too attached to the ability to put customers on penalty hold if they piss me off too much

::wistful sigh:: I wish clerks had a way to do that. Well, I suppose I could recommend to them tincture of belladonna, but we don't have that. ^.^ Maybe some Swiss Kriss laxative would convince them differently. What exactly is a penalty hold, anyways?

[mydarkstar.livejournal.com]

This guy said to me, "I'm a frequent customer here [never mind that I honestly had never seen him before in my life], why don't you smile?"

Makes me wonder if the real reason cashiers and such are required to smile is because the people who run big businesses are sleazy men who can't get women to smile at them unless the women have no choice. Yuck. And what does the fact that he's supposedly a frequent customer have to do with anything? Sounds like he was oh-so-subtly trying to threaten you. "Smile for me or get fired, bitch!"

Have I mentioned that I hate men? I really do. Grrr.

What exactly is a penalty hold, anyways?

Most common in tech support, which tends overwhelmingly to have a very strong "us vs. the idiot customers" environment, a penalty hold is simply when a phone rep puts the customer on hold for no reason other than to punish them for being a moron/jerk/moronic jerk. We don't tell them we're doing this, of course, just say something like "please hold while I look up some information," which is tech code for "hope you like Barry Manilow, asshole." (My last job was notorious for godawful hold music.) Then the tech leaves them there, sometimes for as long as ten minutes, though that's only in cases of extreme rudeness or stupidity. Which is why it always pays to be exceedingly polite to techs.

I always find it kind of funny when I see people on my friends list mentioning how, when they have major computer issues, they keep having to call tech support to tell them how incompetant they are, and then complain about how long they have to sit on hold. We can't control how long it takes to get through to a tech to begin with, but if you get a tech and they keep putting you on hold, more often than not it's because you're pissing them off by bitching incessantly about things they have no control over, not because the tech or the company sucks. It's our little passive-aggressive form of revenge.