I have found on the whole that it is somewhat cheaper to buy my white electrical goods here than in France. Having shopped around Waterford, I have found that in one particular store, where the prices are much as the others, there is a very pleasant and efficient saleslady who looks after my needs with courtesy so I have tended to go back there.
From her, over the last twelve months, I have bought quite a lot of stuff both for home and away.
Yesterday I went in to try and buy an extractor for the French cooker.
I immediately discovered that it was my friends day off.
The shop was empty of customers.
Two salesladies were behind the counter doing something to two tills.
One of them looked up at me as I stood waiting for attention and said “I’ll be a few minutes”.
“OK” said I (my dander starting to rise) “then I will come back in a few minutes, “and walked out of the shop.
A few minutes later back I came.
Still fiddling with the till the one turned to the other and said “Will you deal with this gentleman”
Other says “Can’t you see I’m busy ” but then reluctantly leaves her till and says “How can I help you”
I’m afraid at this stage the dander was up so I very rudely said “I want to buy something ! Can I do that here?”
She then fairly reluctantly dealt with me but we discovered that the item I wanted was not available so I left the shop.
Later I went to another electrical shop where the young salesman, having discovered that the hood I wanted was no longer made, spent about a half hour on the internet and the phone trying to discover a suitable alternative.
I thanked him profusely for going the extra mile and vowed never to return to the store I had visited in the morning again.

I furthermore detirmined that I was going to name names and blog about the two stores.

This morning I got a call from my friend in store one, the lady who had been out the day before, wanting to know if everything was alright.

I’m afraid I told her that I felt my treatment the day before was not acceptable.
“If ” I said “tills have to be reconciled , this should be done behind closed doors”

My friend was horrified and extremely apologetic.
Ten minutes later I got another phone call, this time from the manager of store one.
He was very upset and extremely apologetic, asked me to go through what had happened, said they had no business to be at the tills anyway and was disgusted with the way I had been treated.

I promise you he gained a whole heap of brownie points from me.
I decided to not name names after all in the blog.

I imagine there are two ladies in his store now vowing vengeance on yours truly.