We hear about customers who flip out all the time, but what about fast food workers who flip out?

[DFW]

22. The closest I came to something like this, I was the one who flipped

There is a franchise chain of health food stores in Germany called “Reform Haus.” I used to visit the one in our town regularly. About three years after the conversion to the Euro, I was buying some things there, and gave the woman at the cashier a €100 bill. She suddenly started screaming at me for trying to pass off a fake bill on her, said she had been duped before, and wasn’t going to let me get away with it. Since when I need cash here, I get it from foreign exchange dealers who get their paper money directly from the country’s central bank, I was rather sure I had handed her a genuine bill. She further started yelling that the signature on my €100 note did not exist.

About six months before, the head of the European Central Bank had changed from Wim Duisenberg of the Netherlands to Jean-Claude Trichet of France. The bills with the new signature had been in circulation for many months, something any person working retail should have known from day one. She then came out with phrase that betrayed her: “I don’t know in what country you get your money from, but you are not passing off your counterfeit money on ME!!” I.e., “you dirty foreigner, your attempt to deceive me won’t work!” I was more boiling mad than I had ever been at a retail sales person. Since overt Nazi slogans are still forbidden by law in Germany, I went down to the nearby police station and swore out a formal complaint, something I have never done. I then sent an email to the head office of the Reform Haus franchise, which prides itself on its organic/health oriented product line. I said I did not appreciate being yelled at with Nazi-like slogans, especially in a store least likely to hire people harboring such sentiments. I got a nearly immediate (in Germany!) horrified response, apologizing profusely, and asking for details (when, which store, which employee).

This was a Saturday morning. The next Monday, I went to a local bank, and picked up a flyer, there for the taking in every branch, explaining the two signatures that had been on all Euro bills for half a year or more. I grabbed one, and, seeing the disagreeable woman at the cashier of the store, walked in and handed her one, saying maybe this would help her avoid unpleasant incidents in the future. She stuck her nose into the air and said the matter “had been cleared up.” In other words, she had gotten a visit from the cops, plus been informed by her employer, and still considered me to be the offending party. I just answered that the matter was far from being “cleared up.” The story made the rounds in my town, and I have never set foot in the shop again. If asked why, I unhesitatingly say because I don’t like being insulted by Neo-Nazis. Most people are shocked. In THAT store? Yep, in that store. I don’t even know if she still works there. My time is too valuable to me to waste my time finding out.