I work for a place that is SUPPOSED to be called Varsity Shop. We are an off-shoot of University Bookstore, and that's what our kiosk signs say, "University Bookstore." So we answer the phone "University Bookstore, Weewoo speaking!"
We have tried for the last three years to get our name changed to Varsity Shop. If you look in the little mall directory, we're listed as Varsity Shop. But our BOOTHS still say University Bookstore. When the mall switched booth styles and we got new signs, we asked if ours would say VS instead of UBS. They never got back to us, and when the new ones came.. They said UBS. That's issue number 1. That beef's with Simon Malls and their management's inability to fix a simple thing like a sign without telling us that we will have to pay for new signs ($150!! Dah!)
Number 2 is far more annoying. THE PHONE.
Our phone number... This is fun. I'll make up one with the same first three numbers, because it's mostly important. We'll say it's 877-9009. Please notice that the first three numbers as some toll free numbers.
If you drop the 1 from at least THREE toll free numbers, you get us. The most common number is ADT. People panicking because they're trying to call ADT because they tripped the alarm and they REALLY don't want to pay for a false police call. They range from people hanging up and calling back over and over again, thinking that the automated system is fucked up (and I understand why they make the same mistake over and over- when you panic, you do the same thing OVER AND OVER, and it makes you more panicky.), or they freak out at me because I'm not ADT. Mostly, they listen when I say "dial 1 first, please."
The second number is actually a local number. Heavenly Ham has 877-9090 (well, not really. But following the pattern.). Before Easter and before Thanksgiving, we start getting calls for them. People are annoying when they're ordering their hams and turkeys and they get mad at ME and ask me "ARE YOU SURE?" and crap like that. It turned out that a couple of years ago, to add to badness, HH put out a flier with OUR number on it instead of theirs. And waited for three or four weeks to send out a new one. So we got calls NONSTOP for HH, and we would give them the right number. Hell, we called to them and complained, because their stupid flier caused it so we couldn't freaking run credit cards, we had so many calls. The clerk we talked to apologized, but we never got any sort of apology from the corporate or anything. Angersome.
Anyway, the last and suckiest thing- THE PHONE BOOK.
We sell university hoodies and stuff. Despite the fact that our name has "bookstore" in it, we do not have any books. We had a coffee table book once. And a schedule book. That's it.
We are STILL listed, after four years, in the yellow pages as UBS, under BOOKSTORES. We have tried to get moved to Athletic Apparel for the last four years. Every year they say "yeah, we're totally moving you!" and every October, in comes the phone book, and there's our number, under bookstores. We have talked to SO MANY SUPERVISORS about this, and it's NEVER FIXED. We took out our big pretty ad because of it. We refuse to give them any money whatsoever until they fix it. Bare minimum for us.
Until then, we have to field nonstop calls of "Do you have The Davinci Code?" "Do you have a book by Sylvia Plath?" "Do you have a children's section?" all day long. If we didn't need the line for our credit card machine, I SWEAR we would just take it out. But we need it. Stupid SBC. Stupid Heavenly Ham. Stupid ADT.
That's my story. Grr. There's customers suck AND bad service in it. And it rambled. Sorry about that.