The Human NPC

A client walked through my door today, he immediately rushed towards the customer service counter and leaned against it, getting himself comfortable before I showed up. As I greeted him, he mumbles a 'hello' back and places his hand over his face displaying the signs of a headache. His following words are "we have a problem here!"

He goes on in a fit of rage, ranting on about how some parts of the system isn't working out for him. All of his troubles are towards the internet portion of the service. He rambles on, overpronouncing the word stupid a few times and offers these wonderful words of wisdom to fixing all online errors "its like just changing two lines of codes or something!". This man is late in his 40s, if not early in his fifties. After he's done with his speech stating that if nothing is fixed he will no longer be a member of our store, he goes to the machines to rent a movie, but can't figure out the proper way to put in his cards even with clearly indicated arrows printed on the top of the membership card.

This incident brings me to what everyone who worked in the service sector can relate to: 'The Human NPC'. An outlet for many consummer's anger are store clerks. A customer walks in, already angry, looking for a clerk to bully around. The client isn't looking for answers, or problem solving, but merely someone to vent anger upon. After all, these are simply clerks! Dispensible, replacable, no-need-for-education people who aren't that important. This sort of violence mirrors what several people consider inappropriate in video games: Soulest slaughter served digitaly. Yet, this sort of behavior is accepted in society. A disgruntled client is what we call them.

The man walked away no more informed then he wanted to have in the first place. He had yelled and satisfied his anger just a bit. No solutions were needed, just a good ear. I was left will a little smile as I witnessed stupidity at its best.