I am writing this letter following a spate of ‘unpleasant’ incidents which can be described as at best poor customer service and at worst offensive behaviour, thus resulting in my disillusionment in British customer service. Having read several angry rants in several papers/magazines, I have to say I have often wondered if the way these people were treated was any reflection on there personality. So before writing this I approached several of my close friends and colleagues and asked if (in their opinion) I would come across as being an awkward customer, and they all reassured me that I present as an amicable and thoroughly agreeable individual, (yey). So then why, WHY when I go to my local spar in Swansea or Wilkinson or many other stores am I greeted by perma-tanned bleach blonde hair fake nailed chewing-gum scoffing aggressors whose only ambition in life appears to be a first place victory in a Vicky pollard lookalike contest?! Now please don’t misunderstand me, I’m not one for judging a book by it’s cover, but when you turn up at a store, bright eyed and bushy tailed ready to spend some of your hard earned cash in one of the few places your able to, it’s hard to swallow the tennis ball of distain left in ones mouth by the resentful looking youth standing behind the counter auditing me with her eyes as she displays the oral motions of a chudding cow and glares at me with a hollow stare reminiscent of a scene from Stephen Kings ‘Misery’. Even more disturbing than this is the feeling that somehow I must deserve this level of psychological abuse, and I’m not alone!! As I look back at the queue behind me, I see many more soles lost in various modes of contemplation, ever approaching the snapping jaws at the end of the production line. This is not isolated to supermarkets. A bus, bowling complexes, childrens stores and the latest incident was in a local cinema where I was the first person in the seating area and all the lights were still on. I was taking my coat off and sitting down I pulled out my phone to turn it on silent and was immediately swooped upon by a young member of the mobile phone police who told me in no uncertain terms that if I didn’t switch off my phone I would be ‘ejected’ from the venue! She then retreated to the corner of the theatre where she continued to ogle me for the next 20 minutes before leaving to polish her fangs. I feel the constant need whilst writing this to justify my own actions in all of this! I am not a withered old man who spends his life complaining. In fact I am 26 years old I have two children and I work for a criminal justice organisation that provides support to those with life controlling difficulties. I present my clients with a smiling face and am particularly adept at dealing with difficult situations, be it aggression, depression, or any other concern, I would never dream of dealing with any of my clients the way I am sometimes dealt with by staff at some venues. My complaint then if you will is more of an observation. An observation of the injustice we are confronted with as a nation, when there are projected figures of 3.3million unemployed in the UK for 2010 one would expect the current workforce to be grateful of the opportunity to work! Taking money and putting it in a till is not doing a job. Customer service is about giving the customer a service, not a headache! Correct me if I’m wrong but surely in the current economic climate, if someone clearly doesn’t want to be doing their job…GIVE IT TO SOMEONE WHO DOES!!