Who is "us" here? Abusive customers? I can't fathom someone coming into a store being nice as expected and a retail over fucking them over just because.
I worked as a tech guy in a store for about three years, more than 15 years ago. I had a lot of autonomy in deciding what I could and couldn't do, what I would charge, whether I would waive charged, etc.
At some point you just get jaded. You have this nice guy and it's all fine and you even go beyond what you need to do for them (sometimes even taking things home because they really needed it at 9am in the morning) and they're so thankful. And then they show up three days later even though you TOLD THEM you would take in home in the evening so they could have it by 9am the next day and they will shout at you over the €40 we agreed on like you just punched them in the face.
Then there are the people who will physically threaten and even assault you... Had a few cases of that too.
For those (profoundly) negative interaction you may have had a whole bunch of positive interactions, but negative interactions just register so much stronger. When you drive or cycle to work you may encounter hundreds or even thousands of other cars, but you only remember that one asshole.
It's been a long time since I worked there, and I've had some time to reflect on things and my attitude when I worked there, and I'm also a bit older now. But if you're in the thick of it in your 20s ... yeah, it's complicated. If you're not careful you get jaded, start treating everyone like a potential asshole, and after a few years it becomes harder and harder to really care like you probably should and did when you first started.
And for what it's worth, I do miss that job sometimes; I could really help regular folks in a very direct and satisfying way that I rarely do as a software developer.
I don’t know, but if it were me being subjected to that, all customers would likely start looking the same and I’d probably not be sympathetic to giving them the benefit of the doubt. I definitely could be wrong but I suspect there are a lot of tired retail workers out there.
