Finally doing Interior Styling Stuff

 I'm back at work and for the initial few days, I was writing out blog post about how this job is horrible and how I am not doing what I have been hired to do, that I want to leave soon because the job just feels so pointless, but I never posted any of the post because they are too ranty and probably not something I would like to come back in a few years time to re-read again.

Just as I was at that peak of being unhappy with my job, I suddenly get a call-in customer requesting for Interior Styling services, which is extremely rare in the company, literally the only time a customer actually requested for that service on their own since I joined the company. so I took it.

Funny enough, at that same time, I was informed that the company was going to hold some Interior Styling competition whereby the Sales Staff and Interior Stylist can all submit an Interior Styling Proposals that they had done for clients in the past and the winner can stand a chance to win an iPad. 

So the fact that I was able to finally do what I was hired to do and also have something to submit for the competition was like killing 2 birds with 1 stone. 

I was quite happy doing the Proposal because for the past few months, I have just been feeling like an over-glorified Sales Associate, a lot is expected out of me, but I just cannot perform because I am not being given what is needed to perform, which are customers who require Interior Styling services. I do not have the social skills to actively approach a hundred customers and only come back with 2 to 3 who are genuinely interested in the service, my fellow newbie colleague has been doing that since the start and up to date, he only has 3 to 4 customers who are genuinely interested. He is someone who has an extroverted personality, can start conversations with customers very easily, and the fact that he actually feels drained from talking to so many customers just to get 3 to 4 Interior Styling Project is telling of how much this service is really needed in the company, which is pretty much not at all.

Anyways, I completed the Proposal within 5 days, which is 2 days earlier than what I had promised the customer, I did all the mood board for him, an un-rendered 3D drawing for him because my office laptop doesn't have the rendering software installed, collated the price of everything and to be very honest, even I myself was impressed at how the Proposal turned out because I have never done this level of proposing back as an Interior Designer.  I send the Proposal to the client, not really expecting him to reply to be honest because he was after all just a call in, and my main goal for preparing the Proposal was really to take part in the competition, but then 15 minutes later, the customer actually calls me up and goes...

Customer : Hi Tim, I just received your file. What is that may I ask?

Me : That is the Interior Styling Proposal I have prepared for your space.

Customer : Oh, I didn't see my name on the proposal so I didn't know it was prepared for me.

Me : I didn't add your name into it, but it is based on your floorplan if you look through the pages.

Customer : Yeah, okay, the whole thing is quite impressive, I can see you prepared a lot of things for me butyour 3D drawings, I am looking at them and I just cannot accept it.

.... and at that point, because I have been getting paid a regular salary by my company for the past 4 months, I undermined myself and readily accepted his criticism of the drawings, thinking that this was what the company paid me for. 

So I told him I will help him render the drawings out and he starts discussing with me about how the company can throw in a few freebies for him when he finally gets his furniture, which is probably not going happen until the end of 2022 earliest. 

When I shared this exchange with my colleagues, the In House Designer got very upset for me that the customer had the audacity to actually give this kind of feedback, I felt really shitty after I realize that because it is true, he is not a paying customer at this point, he isn't entitled to anything more than I was giving to him, and it was already quite a fair bit of styling service.

It was fucking stupid for me to agree to do the render because whether or not the company pays me, the customer is still getting a free service, and you just don't look a gift horse in the mouth. If I was still back in ID4 and a prospective customer had said this to me, I would have instantly shut them down.

I am not going to drop the customer yet, and I actually rendered the drawings already, but it's for the competition than him, so I am just going to make the customer slowly wait because I don't see the rush since the the house has not even been built up yet.

Really don't know what the fuck my deal is with all this customer that I offer Interior Styling Services to, the first lady I ever offered this service to back in September was just straight up entitled and unappreciative, left such a bad taste in my mouth that anytime I see a customer of her race step into the store, I don't even want to approach them, not that I am approaching any customers regularly but I make an extra effort to actively avoid them completely. And now I have this entitled guy, granted the way he talks to me is  ALOT friendlier than that other lady, but still, entitled is entitled.

I now have another Interior Styling Proposal to work on because another customer actually came into the store a few days ago and requested for the service, he and his partner had the sincerity to actually physically drop by the store for a consultation service, so that was actually nice and I hope their sincerity is consistent. 

8th Cycle - It's Over

My reservist is over, nothing much to report for this cycle to be honest, it's pretty much just a rinse and repeat of what I have been doing for the past few high keys, except this time, I actually rented a car for the 2 weeks.

Doing the 6 hour sentry duty almost everyday for the past 2 weeks have not been fun, reporting to camp at odd hours of the night or way to early in the morning has not been fun, renting a car for the past 2 weeks and being able to drive to camp and back from camp however is probably the best decision I made, travelling takes half the time and I actually get to drive. 

One of my ICT mates who got thrown into the ulu camp didn't actually drive a car, and he shared with me on the last day when we were doing our out-pro that he actually had difficulty finding a cab after the end of one of his duty. When I was in the same situation as him back in March, it took me about 20 minutes to look for a Grab, but because this time round, we were also made to do the graveyard shift, which is when I assumed he had difficulty finding the Grab, he was actually stranded right outside the camp for 45 minutes, and no one could drive him out because there was no one else in camp who were on their way out, everyone who can leave had already left in the evening.

 

I can't emphasis how happy I rented the car, even though the total damage was about $1000 including the petrol top ups, it was worth it and definitely something I will do again for my remaining 2 cycles. I have since returned the car, didn't manage to fully utilize it on the 2nd last day because I just didn't need to go anywhere with it after I had outpro-ed in the morning, I attempted to take it for a spin at 4.30pm, but then at about 4.45pm, the roads started getting crowded and I just didn't want to be stuck in the peak hour traffic, so I just drove back home.

The goal of the drive was to use up the petrol because I only had to return it at 70% and mine was full, I also topped up the cashcard that the rental company had loaned me because their cashcard machine was the old one that could only read the cards with the chip, so my credit card couldn't work with it. When they pass the card to me, it only had 65 cents, when I returned the car however, there was about $6 in it, so you're welcome.

Overall, this cycle had it's ups and downs, but the only thing I am going to remember this cycle for is the fact that I rented a car for it. 

Song of the Moment

Eleven - Ive

Cycle 8 - Day ? (Live Update from Duty)

I'm gonna just blog from camp in the middle of my duty right now because I am bored, there is about 90 minutes left before I am free and the active soldier that I'm doing my duty with has a stick up his ass.

When I started my duty earlier this evening at about 6pm, I had a quick chat with the ICT whom I was taking over and we started talking about how we are being taken advantage of this cycle because the active soldiers didn't seem to have any manpower issue for us to be covering so much of their duties. We were really having a nice chat until the active soldier that I am currently stuck with chimes in and goes...

"Sir, its already 6pm, your duty has ended, you can leave now."

... to my ICT friend, which was unnecessary because my friend is very aware he can leave, the moment I arrived, he knows he can leave, we have been doing this shit longer than the active, the reason he is staying is because we are having a conversation. 

But upon hearing that comment, my ICT friend just nodded his head and made his way back to return his rifle and as he was leaving, he kept making hand gestures of how "up there" the active was, to which I just shake my head at how unlucky I was to be paired up this fella and then proceed to start taking out all the items I had in my vest and laid them out on the table, items which includes snacks, phone and my portable charger.

The goal tonight was to just watch Netflix and Disney Plus until the duty ended because its going to be pretty quiet. I was planning to strike a conversation with the active solider midway through the duty and we can have at least have an hour of chatting before we went about to do out own stuff again as that is how it usually goes, but after he chased my ICT mate away, I just didn't feel very talkative because he didn't seem very approachable.

So I did what I had set out to do from the start and started watching my show, there was a new episode of Hawkeye out and I figured I will just stream that. At the start, the active would glance over once in a while and I thought maybe he was interested to watch the show as well, I didn't offer initially because they were just quick glances and not really the lingering type, but after 10 minutes, and this was right after he came back from the main gate that he had to open for an outgoing car, he suddenly approaches me and goes...

"Do you know what you duties are? As the sentry, you are supposed to follow me at all times and protect me with your rifle."

...I was a bit stunned and just looked at him for a while, he wasn't rude when he said it, it was almost instructional and firm, but he was also actively avoiding eye contact. The active commanders don't talk to an ICT that way but here I was, being spoken to about how I should he doing my duties by a newbie who just joined the camp for a little over a month with a rank of a Private no less, I carry the rank of a Corporal. 

In terms of hierarchy, I am about 2 ranks above him, throw in the fact that I am also an ICT, he is pretty much at the bottom.

So I just went Okay and he goes and sit back down on his chair, which is facing this giant fan, a position he would stay in for the entire duration of the duty period unless there were outgoing and incoming vehicles,  it was really weird. I wasn't angry when he said that to me to want to cuss him out, but I was definitely annoyed enough to write a rant text to my friend.

I mean the fact that he think I, an ICT who spends 95% of my time as a civilian, would have the confidence to open fire at an Intruder, to protect him is fucking hilarious, chances are I might actually end up shooting him by accident. I'm very sure even the active soldiers would freeze up if they are suddenly required to open fire at another human being, what makes him think I could do that. 

He doesn't understand that all this is really just for show, a show that I don't really want to put up for a bunch of Bangladeshi workers leaving the camp, because those were the personnel's who were leaving the camp prior to him coming up to me and schooling me about my duty as a sentry. 

Anyways, I went back to watching my Show and I did get up and followed him a bit whenever he was opening the gantry for the cars because that is technically what I am suppose to do and something I would have eventually started doing regardless or whether he "schooled" me about it or not. The reason I didn't do it at the start was because the outgoing vehicles were all contractor lorries, and I didn't think it was necessary to "put on a show" for a bunch of Bangladeshi workers because at the end of the day, that is what it really is, we are just putting up a show, and the truth is, when the higher ups sees our ICT pass, they would usually close one eye if we are not performing up to the highest standard.

We don't talk for a while but then I notice he was literally just sitting in front of the fan and not even using his phone, so I decided to approach him, offered him a mentos to try and spark a conversation, asked him how long he has been in the base hoping we can start chatting because he was going to be my life line if I needed to use the toilet as he was the one with the walkie talkie required to request for a replacement, but this guy turns down my mentos offer and then just gives me the driest response, clearly not interested to talk, and the tone he replied back with sounded like I had offended him.

I tried, it didn't work, so I just gave up and left him alone for the entirety of the duty, I ranted to my friend and also to my ICT mate whom I replaced earlier and the general consensus was that the active soldier needed a good reprimanding and just be ignored for the entirety of the duty, I wasn't really keen to ask him to go fuck himself because I don't really want any feeling of hostility in the air, but I did ignore him for the rest of the duty.

I will say though, watching him do his duty is very fascinating because he is constantly giving 100% all the fucking time, do full checks on every single incoming vehicle, even though the outgoing traffic is starting to pile up, and doing all the traffic hand signals with fully straightened arms every single time.

If he was part of my platoon 9 years ago, he would definitely be an outcast because he is so fucking rigid and by the book and I feel like he doesn't have any people skill. I will have another duty at midnight tomorrow and it is still with his group, so I really hope I won't be so unlucky to be stuck with him again.





UPDATE:

After sharing my experience with the other active soldiers that I was assigned to do my other duties with about this Social Retard, it turns out that the Social Retard is pretty much the Platoon's weirdo and no one really talks to him very much. 

Some of the newer guys from the other Platoon who were in the same training batch as the SR also knows who the guy after I just share with them the initials on his uniform. One of my ICT mates actually managed to start a conversation with the SR and he learnt that SR wanted to become a commander after BMT. I really cannot imagine him going through command school and coming out as a Lieutenant, the guy has no social skills at all, he has no people skills, how the hell does he expect to lead a bunch of men under him with that rigid personality of his?

8th Cycle - Day 2

Reporting time today was slightly later than yesterday, so I had a bit more time at home to watch some Youtube before I drove to camp.

I was actually worried that I might be late, because we were suppose to report at 8.45am but I was still on the road at 8.30am, but when I finally reach the camp at 8.43am, there were only 2 other guys there, my friend being one of them. 

We only had a full attendance an hour later.

Today was the same as yesterday, but with some practical training, so we had a few familiarization lessons and one of the active sergeant today was way too "up there", the way he was acting all firm towards us Reservist Personnel was a bit unnecessary. My friend surmised that he probably just graduated from Command School, that's why he is so serious because everyone in camp knows that Reservist Personnel's are usually treated with very very little regimentation when we go back. 

We still behave ourselves and adhere to the standard rules and regulations of the army, but the way we are being spoken to by the commanders has always been very cordial, akin to talking to an equal as opposed to a superior talking to his underlings. Unless we really fuck up, they will never show us their intimidating "commander" side, that side is usually saved for BMT recruits or when we are going through our Vocational trainings as privates.

Anyways, after that familiarization training, we did more waiting before lunch was served and after lunch, more waiting before the next training started, by which time it was already getting a bit late, so the final round of training was more like a very quick run through, and once everything was done, we were released.

Nothing too significant happened today, the only thing that was sort of a bummer is that one of our manpower got relocated to the main camp, so now everyone in the remote camp has more duty to cover, it sucks that that one guy got moved to the main camp but at the same time, I also understand why he would prefer to be at the main camp, because he doesn't drive. 

Oh well, the main event will start tomorrow, not looking forward to my sentry duties that I will have to do for the next 1.5 weeks, luckily I have a car now, so I don't have to worry about not being able to Grab to and fro from camp.

8th Cycle - Day 1

Today is the official start of my 8th ICT Cycle and for this cycle, I decided to rent a car for the next 2 weeks, just for the convenience of it really. 

This is the first time I will actually have a car for the entire duration of my reservist and I am pretty sure I am going to be spoiled by this experience, that being said, the car itself isn't really a great car, I got the cheapest one from the fleet of cars the rental services provides and I pretty much got what I paid for, there is just no power to the car, it takes a while to pick up speed, so when I am on the highway, I feel like I am hogging traffic. 

Nonetheless, a car is still a car and it was able to get me to camp today with no issue. 

Day 1 of my 8th cycle is the same as with my previous few cycles, just a whole day of waiting for things to happen. I was actually the very first one to arrive today and I was quite surprise at how little people got called up this time.

My friend whom I always go through my reservist with arrives a few minutes later and we both pretty much just told each other that we wanted to go to the remote camp, this is honestly the main reason why I rented a car, aside from the sheer convenience of it all, because I wanted to be assigned at the more remote airbase I was thrown to during my last cycle, it's just so much better there because of how quiet it is, my main issue at that time was that I didn't drive and it was very very difficult to call a cab there, but now that I have resolved that issue with my car, I really really wanted to be assigned there. 

So we go register ourselves and weirdly enough, the group wasn't separated like the last time, everyone was together, and I figured maybe they will ask us later, but when we went to the assembly area, the commander suddenly went..

"Separate yourselves based on the color of the sticker on your pass."

... and that was when I noticed my friend and I had different colors, this meant that only 1 of us was going to get what we wanted. I was a bit bumped out that we were going to be separated again, but I was more concern about which colour was going to be the one going to the remote camp. 

The passes were given out at random and usually it is not given at random, the ones who didn't drive wouldn't want to be thrown into the remote camp, they would always ask us if we drove, and usually only the ones who drive are thrown into the remote camp (not always because they threw me there despite me telling them I didn't drive the last time) so they clearly missed out a very important step. 

Anyways, after waiting in the assembly area for a while, we were asked to move to a small room because there were less than 40 of us in total and the hall we were in was clearly too big, and once we were all settled down, the commander tells us which color will go which camp and my color was unfortunately in the main camp, but after that revelation, he suddenly asks...

"How many of you wants to go to the remote camp? Best for those who drive."

... and everyone looked at each other for a while, I knew another ICT also wanted to go to the remote camp as well because we were assigned there the last cycle and we both felt like it was better there, he didn't raise up his hands and I figured it was because no one else was doing that, so I slowly raised my hands up and after that, a few more raised theirs as well and I am very happy to announce that I got assigned to the remote camp with my friend.

 The fact that I have a car for this ICT makes me very happy.

So we took our lunch after a pre-recorded briefing and it's amazing how the commander can still be so long winded in the pre-recorded briefing, people were pretty much bored out of our minds hearing the commander just constantly going off tangent in the briefing and then this boredom continued after lunch as well, where everyone was made to watch 8 mandatory training videos back to back, they didn't give us any break in between to rest our mind, every time one training video was over, they will just play the next one and the next one, and the next one, by the second video, all of us pretty much just switched off because all of us have watched the videos multiple times, every time we get called back, we have to sit through the video.

This lasted for a good 2 to 3 hours and after which, because we still had some time left, we were just left waiting for another hour and a half before we were release because there was nothing else planned and it was too early to actually dismiss us. 

It took me just 40 minutes to reach home today, it was very very nice. 

Shit Stain Returns

So I was ranting to my colleagues about the shitty experience I had with the shit stain two days ago at work today and just as my colleagues were asking me who the customer was and what his name is, shit stain actually walked into the store. Impeccable timing, so what I did was point towards shit stain and just said to them...

"There he is!"

...,as he walked in, and he saw me pointing at him so he knew I was talking about him to my colleagues, anyways, after I pointed at him, I just rolled my eyes and then walked away because I really didn't want to have to deal with him.

I don't really know what happened after that, I knew he came down looking for the salesperson who had originally assisted him with his purchase, who wasn't in today, but I didn't stay close long enough to understand more about what he said afterwards. 

Turns out my supervisor had spoken to him before, so they knew each other to a certain extent, and from what I understand from my colleague who was also present, apparently shit stain wanted to lodge a complaint because I was very "arrogant".

I wasn't "arrogant", I was just done being needlessly berated by an unreasonable costumer and chose to disengage. The way I chose to disengage was unprofessional, but unlike his initial hostility towards me and my colleague, I do not think it was uncalled for. 

Anyways, I shall wait and see if he actually chooses to complaint because I am extremely curious how he will explain the situation to the company, he better don't leave any details out because leaving the most important detail out will be the only way to paint himself as the victim.

2 Shit Stains, Back to Back, in 1 Day

 Today was not a good day at work.

An hour before I was about to close the store with my colleague, this  middle aged guy came into the shop, walked up to the counter where me and my colleague were, took out his phone and showed us a photo of a floor lamp he had gotten from us which was still in the box, unassembled.

The particular model is a very big floor lamp and he was essentially asking my colleague to arrange for someone on our side to go down to his place to assemble the lamp for him, and because my colleague was actually busy with his work, I decided to assist the customer, so I took a quick look at the photos and asked the customer...

"Did you get the lights delivered to your place?...."

... because if it was delivered, it would have been assembled by the delivery team, and that was going to be what I was going to say next, but before I could actually say it, the customer goes...

"Common sense lah, the lights are so big, of course I got it delivered, use your brains!"

.... which surprised me because he didn't sound annoyed or upset during the initial exchange, but the way he said "use your brains" was extremely condescending and it was clear this guy was not very happy and is now resorting to speaking down to me in an attempt to release his pent up frustration.

I am not here for you to vent your frustration on, I am here TRYING to help you, so if you think I am actually going to just stand there and let you talk to me like that, you are fucking wrong.

I was already pissed off when he said it to me the first time, so when he repeated that a second time, I was fucking livid and told him very angrily...

"I  AM JUST ASKING YOU IF YOU HAD THE LIGHTS DELIVERED TO UNDERSTAND THE SITUATION!"

... and this was when my colleague stepped in and repeatedly told the customer...

"He is just trying to help."

....because he could tell I was obviously pissed off at the fuck face. It is fucking ridiculous for you to be taking a piss at someone who is trying to offer assistant, and this piece of shit customer decided to repeat himself again for the third time...

"Please use your brain."

... I could feel my whole face getting hot and my hands started shaking because I was getting really really really fucking angry, so I glared at the customer and then proceeded to roll my eyes at him and turned away, I am not going to help you if you are going to be ending every sentence with "use your brains", plus if I actually continue to engage with this shit stain, I am pretty sure I will start hurling vulgarities at him.

As I turned my back to him and return to do what I was doing, which was basically nothing important, I can hear the customer exclaim to my colleague...

"This kind of attitude how to help people?"

... I can't express how much I wanted to turn back to the guy and just tell him to go fuck off, the fucking audacity of this piece of shit had, you used such a condescending tone to speak to someone who is genuinely trying to help you, and you expect the person to still talk to you nicely? Dumb fuck. I was in no way coming across as rude when I asked him the initial question, so there was ABSOLUTELY no reason for him to be so fucking rude to me at all. 

This fuck face then continued using this condescending tone when my colleague took over and OH MY GAWD, I just really want to punch this fucker in the face, my colleague was so patient and kept attempting to get his name and contact number and he just said extremely annoyed and impatiently for him to...

"Just go find my invoice number, Just get my Invoice Number and get your customer service to arrange for me."

... Yeah sure, because my colleague would automatically know what the fuck your invoice number is based on the item you got, I mean for fuck sake, the company has thousands of invoices, maybe you should use your brain and some common sense instead, stupid fuck. As my colleague was writing down his particular, dumb fuck decided to walk the showroom floor and I would have loved to chase him out and ask him to fuck off, but thankfully, he eventually does fuck off and I expressed amazement at my colleague's ability to keep his cool, to which he tells me he almost wanted to scold the customer as well because of how unreasonable he was being the entire time.

You can be rich, have all the money in the world, but if have you zero class, no amount of cash can cover up the fact that you are still just a piece of shit that has just been covered in gold foil.

Anyways, after this fucker left, a family came into the store, and because I was still feeling very angry from the last exchange, I really didn't have the mood to go entertain them until the wife came up to request for some help, she directs me to a print we had and asked me how much it was, so I told her I had to double check, couldn't actually find the price, and asked my colleague if that print was even for sales, to which he said it was and helped me check our price list as well.

We took a bit longer and the wife got really impatient, so she very annoyingly told me...

"Can you just text me the price, I can't be waiting for you, I have to go for dinner."

THEN GO FOR YOUR FUCKING DINNER YOU FUCKING CUNT! Just my fucking luck to get one unpleasant customer after another, this bitch was really pissing me off as well, but at least she wasn't as out-rightly unpleasant as the other guy, she is just being a paggro bitch. 

So I took down PaggroBitch's number, managed to finally find the price and decided to text her with the customer service handphone because I didn't want to save her number in my own company's phone and most importantly, I didn't want her to have my number as well. She can be someone else's problem. She did reply to the text with an "Ok", so I will give her points of actually having the decency to reply to the message, a "Thanks" would be nice, but one cannot expect too much from a cunt. 

Anyways, I truly felt the "downgrade" of my job as I was being berated by the customer today, the joys of being in retail, what a fucking fantastic way to end my Monday, add this to the list of reason for me to quit the job

Sour Deal

 Today was not a good day at work.

I had a family that I had been keeping in touch with for the past 3 weeks, coming into the store today, finally ready to purchase a $37,000 storage cabinet they had been eyeing on, this was their third visit to the store and they were suppose to drop by next week to enjoy some discounts from the Year End Sales, but the wife was so excited to get the item she asked her husband and son to drop by today to confirm the purchase, out of goodwill, I extended the Year End Sales discount to her.

Prior to this third meeting, the first two meetings I had with them were always friendly, I had a very nice banter with the wife and the whole family was just really great to talk to, during those meetings, I also shared with them that our items will have a waiting period of about 4 to 5 months because they are built to order from Italy and shipped over, and with the current shipping issues due to covid, there could potentially be delays, so this was something that they have been aware of since the start.

Anyways, they drop by the store today and had a chat with me about the storage cabinet they wanted to get, so I ran through the different leather options they could select from with them and advised them on which leather they should pick for easy maintenance, the wife was so excited about the options and kept asking me for advice on the colors, I could tell she really wanted the storage cabinet and we proceeded to have a really good and long chat about a few other items she thought could work with her space.

Nothing was cheap, everything is crazy expensive and she clearly wasn't going to shell out another $10,000 for a side table she probably wasn't really very interested in, so we went back to the storage cabinet and once all the customization options had been confirmed, I then excused myself to go prepare the Invoice for the customers, I requested for them to take a walk first around the mall first because it will take a while for me to prepare the invoice, in fact I told them to give me half an hour, but they insisted to just stay and laze around the showroom, so I left them on their own and as predicted, I took a bloody half an hour just to prepare the invoice for 1 Storage Cabinet because that is how inefficient, unnecessarily complicated and outdated our Invoice system is, and this was after my supervisor assisted me, if I had been alone I would have taken so much longer. 

It takes less time for me to prepare a renovation quotation back in ID4, and a renovation quote is a lot more extensive than an invoice for a single furniture item. It's fucking ridiculous how inefficient the system is.

When I was finally done and printed out the invoice for the customer to confirm that everything was in order, the mother jokingly told me I took 26 minutes to prepare the invoice because she had been counting the minutes, the son then takes a look at the invoice to vet through and pointed out that the waiting date is reflected as "3 to 4 months" instead of "4 to 5 months" that I had shared with them, a typo my supervisor had made when he was helping me with the Invoice, I apologized to them for the typo and told them I will update it to reflect the correct waiting period.

They then proceed make the initial deposit payment, which amounted to $21,000.

The mother then brings up the 4 to 5 months waiting period and ask me what would the company do if the product doesn't arrive after 5 months. The correct answer would be nothing, we can't do anything because if there is a delay, it is something that is beyond our control, but my dumbass decided to say...

"Oh, if it delays, we can loan you one of our storage cabinets first. We have an incoming shipment that we can probably loan to you guys if we end up facing a delay."

....because that was what a few of my colleagues had done when their customer's order got delayed, tables were loaned, sofas were loaned, chairs were loaned. I figured if they could loan those items, then I could probably loan a storage cabinet as well.

As I went back to prepare the receipt for them and I decided to tell my colleagues about the customers request, but to my surprise, they told me the loan was not going to be possible because the item had a marble top and those are prone to getting damaged during deliveries if not protected properly.

It sucks when I had to break the news to the customers, but to be honest, I didn't think this was going to be a make or break for them, they already knew early on that the waiting time is 4 to 5 months, and this option to loan them a temporary cabinet was only brought up today. I mean the Mother clearly wanted to get the storage cabinet, the fact that she came back so many times is prove of that. If I can't loan them a temporary piece, they can just use an existing piece they already have first to tide them over.

Well, I was wrong, because they kept pressing me to add that as one of the terms in the invoice and they were relentless. I kept apologizing and telling them I had misspoke, that it was not possible, but they kept insisting, the mother than brings up the typo I had made earlier and kept saying things like...

"We have to wait an additional 1 month, your waiting period you put 3 to 4 months, but now you say 4 to 5 months, if it doesn't arrive in 5 months then how?"

... which was really irritating because I told them from the start it is 4 to 5 months, I didn't add an additional month into the waiting period, and also, it is not up to me to control whether there is a delay or not, I know the furniture brand will built the item in time, but it's the shipping that could delay and this is not up to me or my company to decide if they will be delayed due to covid, I can't guarantee anything. Eventually, I told them to give me a day to check with my boss to see if the arrangement for the loan was possible, to which the wife then gives me an ultimatum...

"You help us check, we came back to look for you because we like you and your service is good, but if this is something that is not possible, then I will want a full refund instead. You help me check."

... and they went on their way. If she had told me this before they paid the deposit, I would have been a lot more firm and just told her she either take it or leave it, but because she had already made the deposit, I had to placate her instead.

I shared this with my supervisor and his advice was for me to just issue the refund because the customers were clearly being difficult and he would rather not have their sales if that is the case, which I personally agree with, I mean this has been the way I work at ID4 as well, if the customer is being difficult, then I don't want to work with them. I am not desperate to earn a little over two thousand dollars in commission for your project but have to deal with your antics for 4 months, in this case, I am not even going to be getting any commission from selling you the $30,000 storage cabinet.

Out of courtesy for the customer, I decided to message my boss anyways and as expected, he told me it was not going to be possible to loan them the items, but told me to let them know if the item doesn't get delivered within 5 months, then they will be able to get a full refund, which I personally thin isn't a good deal.

It's like me queuing up to buy lunch and the store tells me that the waiting time is 30 minutes, so I wait in line and after 30 minutes when I ask the store how much longer do I have to wait before it's my turn and they tell me to wait another 10 minutes, I would rather wait that additional 10 minutes, because why the fuck would I choose to exit the queue after I have already been queueing up for 30 minutes.

So I break the news to the customer via text and essentially told them about my boss' offer and also shared my suggestion, which is to void the order immediately, the husband accidentally butt dials me, so I was able to hear the wife very angrily exclaiming something along the lines of...

"IF HE CANNOT AGREE TO THE TERMS, THEN ASK FOR THE REFUND, CANCEL THE ORDER."

... I can understand why she was upset, if I had clarified this situation before I got them to make payment, things might have panned out a little differently, but because I only told them it was not possible after payment was made, the wife probably felt a little cheated.

The son then gives me a call a few minutes later and request for me to cancel the order, he was actually very apologetic about it so I also felt bad. I proceed to void the order and send a picture of the void receipt to the husband's phone, once again apologizing for the miscommunication,  he was also very nice and told me it was alright, that the mix up wasn't wholly my fault.

Anyways, this soured deal pretty much ruined my entire day, it just left a really bad taste in my mouth and I'm sure both father and son had to placate the mother after I void the order.

But the more I think about it, the harder it is to really grasp the entire situation because this purchase was something the wife clearly mulled over for a while, she clearly really like the item because she visited the store multiple times just to see the same item.

She knew about the waiting time for the past half a month ever since she visited the store.

She came in today with the intention to get the cabinet.

The "replacement loan" was not something that was promised to her during her first or second visit, this was only something that was brought up today, that means the promise of having a "replacement loan" was never a factor in her decision to get the storage cabinet.

It's like I have craving for Bubble Tea for the past week, so I drop by a Bubble Tea store to get said Bubble Tea and the cashier then tells me...

"Oh, we are giving away a free gift today with every purchase"

... and after I pay for the drink, the cashier tells me she has made a mistake and that there is no free gift.

Am I going to cancel the whole order because there was no free gift? 

No!

I came here to buy my bubble tea, so I am going to get my bubble tea, regardless of whether I get a free gift or not. When I came to the shop, my main goal was to get the bubble tea, I am not going to cancel the order just because the "free gift" that was promised to me was not honored. 

 I didn't come to get the bubble tea because of the free gift, I came to get bubble tea to satisfy my cravings, so why should the exclusion of a free gift that I only learned about recently affect my decision to get the drink?

Like the free gift, the loan replacement shouldn't have been a deal breaker for the Mother.

So I don't really understand her logic to cancel the order, maybe she did it out of spite and if it is out of spite, then it is her loss because her pride would probably prevent her from coming back to get the item from the store, but it's for the best because I don't have a lot of faith in my company to deliver the item on time to be honest, something will probably happen somewhere to delay the shipment and if this is her reaction to such a small non-issue, I can only imagine how much worst she will become if the item she ordered ends up getting delayed.

Meddlesome

I will admit I am pretty much 1 foot out of my current company's door at this moment in time and it really sucks that I am now on Jobstreet again looking for new jobs to apply for. 

The past few weeks have just been extremely demoralizing for me personally because I was simply not performing at all and I honestly do believe that my sales for this month will actually be $0, which is a concern I shouldn't even be having because I did not apply for a sales position to begin with, I applied to be an Interior Stylist and it makes me very upset that I am feeling so inadequate for trying to do a job that was falsely advertised.

My fellow newbie colleague has really been killing it at work recently and a lot of the inadequacy I am feeling right now is because of his performance. The comparison  between our performances will be inevitable and it just sucks that I am going to have to compete against someone that I think has the potential to become the top sales person in the company against the current group of sales associates that we have. 

He is aware that I have been feeling the pressure because of him lately and he is trying to help me as well. which I really appreciate, but his method of helping today annoyed me quite a bit and if he does it again, I will have to ask him to stop doing it.

What essentially happened was I decided to approach a customer and asked if she needed any help, she then shares what she was looking for and we started having a conversation, as she was moving towards another section of the showroom, my colleague decided to interject and started talking to her, which was completely unnecessary and even though I knew he had good intentions, it was a bit rude to just suddenly hijack the conversation, which was exactly what he did when he went up to her and said...

"Oh, I am curious to learn what are you looking for, do you have a floorplan, I'm just asking because we offer styling services and my colleague Tim can help you with the space planning because he is a designer."

... why are you cutting in? Why are you speaking on my behalf, I can speak for myself. I feel that the general rule of thumb in sales is IF someone speaks to a customer first and engages in conversation with them, then you DO NOT interject unless you have been introduced into the conversation by the person who spoke to them first. 

I was really not happy when he did that and if I hadn't been wearing my mask, my annoyance would have shown on my face very clearly, and then he goes...

"You could leave your contact details with Tim and we can keep in touch?"

... like actually just keep quiet, you talking on my behalf just makes me look extremely inadequate, and at that point, I think the customer could sense that I was not very happy with my colleagues interjection, so she just went...

"Errr, it's okay, I will just talk to Tim directly."

... and then she came towards me and we started talking again. She asked a lot of technical questions that a normal customer would never ask, so that was how I kinda guess she was a mystery shopper. I did my best and introduced her to as much items as possible to try and score some points for the evaluation, and after she left, I just couldn't be fuck with the rest of the walk-ins anymore and just let my colleague handle them all, since he wants to talk to my customer, I shall let him talk to all the other customers.

I am honestly very curious what the mystery shopper will write about my colleague's interjection. I really hope she does write about it so it and my supervisor can highlight it to him because what he did was not even remotely helpful, it was meddlesome and just extremely rude and it could potentially even make me look bad. Even though his intention wasn't to steal, if this was a real customer and the customer ended up building more rapport with him, he would indirectly be stealing the customer from me because they will want to talk to him more than talk to me for future follow ups.

While I do acknowledge his knack for doing sales, I do not want to close a sales because he helped me, we both joined the company at the same time and this is really a matter of pride for me. If I accept his sales, then what does that make me, a pathetic newbie who has to rely on another newbie for sales?

Anyways, I will probably be bringing up my concerns about the position with my boss soon, the part where I was essentially hired for the wrong position, and then either be given a new set of responsibilities that is more aligned with the position I had applied for, or I could get fired.

The Stupid, The Dumb and the Cheapskate

So my company has recently started attempting to sell our furniture online through the official website, but for some reason, they did not properly update the entire catalogue before letting it go live, so a lot of the items were marked as $0. 

Any regular person with a functioning brain, upon looking at the brands that we carry and seeing that the items are marked as $0 would know that something isn't right, that the price is probably not properly reflected. Before I started working at the company, this was something that I noticed as well, back then, customers still couldn't get anything online and it mainly just functioned as an online catalogue, but a lot of items were marked as $0, and because I have a functioning brain, I knew immediately that they are obviously not $0, if I wanted to know how much those items cost, I will have to contact the store to check for them, I won't assume that just because they are $0, it's going to be free.

WELL! Today, I actually got not 1 but 2 brainless individuals who legitimately thought those items were actually free.

The first one drop an email to ask about the item he had ordered, my boss wanted me to contact the customer, so I reached out to him via Whatsapp, thinking he was going to want to know the price first before he commits to the purchase,  so I gave him the price as well as the availability of our stocks. This fucking dumbass actually calls me back and goes...

"I already ordered the item, why are you giving me the price and asking me to pay?"

...so I asked him if this was an existing order that he had already made payment for, thinking maybe he just wanted to check on the delivery for an item he had already purchased, to which he tells me he didn't pay for anything, which confused me and I told him that if he hasn't paid for anything, what was he talking about? He then tells me that he has already confirmed the order last night and that it was marked as $0, so he is calling to check when the delivery can be made.

Okay, so instead of calling to check whether the item is actually really for free, you are calling to check when the item can be delivered, that item that would usually cost $10,000, that you saw being indicated as $0 on our online shop.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

WHAT!?!?!?!?

THE LEVEL OF STUPID! THERE IS NO ONGOING PROMOTION ABOUT US GIVING AWAY FREE FURNITURE, SO WHY THE FUCK DID YOU NOT THINK THAT IT WOULD PROBABLY BE A GOOD IDEA TO DOUBLE CHECK WITH THE STORE FIRST BEFORE YOU MAKE THE STUPID FUCKING CALL.

I was really riled up during the call because this fucker was so fucking entitled, he told me he stayed up all night looking at the coffee tables we had before picking the one he wanted, like I am suppose to feel bad that you are sacrificing sleep to choose which "free item" you want, and then insinuated that he could sue if I don't deliver the item, because it was marked as $0 and he is expecting it to be free, calling it fraud if I don't agree to deliver it out him. 

I can't express how shocked I was at the level of stupidity and entitlement this fucking dumbass was exhibiting, and I was pissed off, so I was very firm and told him that if he doesn't make any payment, there won't be any delivery, I reiterated that our website was not properly updated so we are not actually giving anything out for free.  

The fact that I was even having a conversation with him about it just blew my fucking mind, this is the kind of moron that will fall for online scams because of how brain dead he is to not actually do any sort of fucking research.

IF SOMETHING IS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE, IT PROBABLY IS.

You Stupid Fuck.

Anyways, I later get another enquiry and it was the same thing, another $0 item, so I reach out to this other customer and shared the price of the sofa with her, I was contemplating whether to start the message of with a disclaimer of sorts, just to let her know that the item listed isn't actually free, but then thought to myself, it is just not possible for me to run into 2 fucking morons within 2 days, it's just not possible.

But it is possible and I did run into another brain dead individual.

She sends me a screenshot of our website with the item she wanted to get being reflected as $0, and then below that screenshot, she writes...

"This is on your website."

... you stupid stupid woman, stupid stupid lady, stupid stupid girl, just stupid, I mean no amount of stupid that I type can describe the level of stupidity she has, like just so fucking stupid. The fact that I actually manage to get in contact with 2 individuals who are just the personification of stupidity just really shows how many stupids there are in the world. 

Okay, at least this 2nd stupid didn't try and argue her case, so her stupidity has a certain limit, but that first stupid who tried to argue his case and then threaten me with a lawsuit is not only stupid, but a fucking cheapskate and definitely not part of our company's demographic.

The first stupid didn't just call me, he called my Customer Service to ask about his order before he called me, and after I pretty much scolded him on the phone because he was really getting on my nerves, he called my senior colleague to ask about the table. My senior colleague was a lot more patient and explained to him that the website was not fully updated yet, and apologize for the confusion, but the thing is, there is nothing to be confused about, it is EXTREMELY obvious that the prices are not updated.

Why the fuck would a high end luxury furniture store suddenly be giving out $10,000 - $20,000 away for free? 

Under Utilized

I go to work feeling extremely inadequate these days and I am not sure if I can last very long there, not because I could potentially get fired for underperforming, but just from the overwhelming sense of me just not doing well at all.

I am not someone who aims to be the best, but I do not want to be the worst, I like to be somewhere in the middle, once in a while maybe crawl to the top a little to show that I am able to do well, but never stay at the top for too long because I do feel like there is a lot of pressure to maintain the No.1 position. Anyways, right now, I am at the bottom and I do not like the way the bottom of the barrel smells. Even though it hasn't really been 2 weeks into the new month yet, the pressure of not being able to close any sales yet is slowly but surely mounting on me

A lot of this pressure really comes from the fact that my fellow newbie colleague has already closed a sales this month and is very likely going to clinch a pretty big one within this week, even though there isn't any competition amongst us, having our performance be compared against each other will be inevitable because we did join the company around the same period. 

One thing I have noticed is that the sales team in my current company is a lot more aggressive than the sales team at ID4, or maybe the correct description would be that they have a lot more initiative , they will actively approach the customers much more frequently than I would. 

I don't like to approach customers and ask them if they need help because most of the time, they will just tell me they are looking around, so I am very passive and would rather wait for the ones who actually want to buy something to come to me, very much like how customers would come to me in ID4 because they need to talk to an ID, but this passive behavior doesn't really work in retail as it is a lot more fast pace than Interior Design.

When I was in ID4, everyone avoided having to serve new customers because we are all usually busy preparing proposals and quotations, or we are overloaded with current projects and don't have the time to sit down with a new customer for an hour or so to take their requirements, but because at my current company, the only thing we have to do is prepare quotations, my current group of colleagues will never be busy as my ex-interior design colleagues.

As an ID, the job only truly starts after you close a sales, because after that, that is when you have to prepare the full design proposals, schedule visits to the different supplier shops with the customer to choose the different materials, schedule work with the sub-cons, go do multiple site visits, and it's  going to be months of close knitted work with the client before you are actually done with the project.

As a Sales Associate (that's my position and I shall get to that later), you close the sales, and your job is done. You don't have to do any site visits, you don't have to be in constant contact with the customer, all you have to do is schedule a delivery date and usually on the day of the delivery, everything will be settled by the delivery team. Closing a sales in my current place doesn't come with a mountain of work and that's why my colleagues are more pro-active at approaching new customers because of it.

I like the work environment and I like the people there, but the nature of the job itself isn't something I signed up for and as the days go by, it is becoming more and more evident that I am probably not the right person for the job. 

To be clear, I applied for the role of an Interior Stylist, that was what the job was advertised as and that was what I went to be interviewed for. 

Unfortunately, for the past 6 weeks that I have been in the company, I have not done a single styling project for any clients, I have had maybe 2 colleagues come up to me to ask for colour matching advice and that is it, my main role is sales, and that is something that I really did not want to do because I am simply not good at doing sales.  

At the start, when my colleagues ask if I am an Interior Stylist or a Sales Associate, my supervisor will tell them I am the latter and not the former, because we already have a Stylist in the office and a second one would essentially be redundant, this was something that he had double checked with my boss at the start, whether I was hired as a Stylist or a Sales associate and sadly, the boss told him I was to focus on sales. 

Whenever I get asked if I am an Interior Stylist / Designer and my supervisor goes...

"He is not a designer, we already have a designer, he is here to do sales."

.... it hurts my pride because to be downgraded from an Interior Designer to an Interior Stylist was already bad enough for me, but then to be relegated to just a "Sales Associate" stings. 

I wanted to get a more creative role in the company, I want customers to come to me for styling service, to discuss what we can do with their space, I want to brainstorm ideas, but sadly, all I am doing now is approaching customers who do not want to be entertained, asking if they need help when they clearly don't, and when they do let me help, it's very basic questions like...

"Do you have any mirrors?"

"I am looking for a sofa."

"I am looking for a coffee table"

... to which I bring them to those items they are looking for, they look at the price, and usually if they are not scared off by the price, they will be when I tell them the time it takes to get a customized sofa in the colour they want in. 

Customers who are looking for single item pieces don't have half a year to wait for the furniture, they are usually there to look for an immediate replacement, and with the amount it cost per item, they are not going to want to settle for a display piece of a piece that is in a color they do not want. 

Sigh, I feel like a waste of space in the company and I feels like the company is wasting my experience as an Interior Designer.

When customers ask my senior colleagues about things like color matching and space planning, almost all of them struggle to assist the clients because they have no knowledge beyond the furniture size, price and material. And even if they do attempt to offer advice, it's usually a bit questionable. 

I came into this job knowing that my Interior Renovation knowledge will go to waste, but what I did not expect was for my Interior Design and Styling Knowledge to also go to waste and knowing that it is just makes me want to go back to Interior Design again, which is a really bad idea because I know I will not make any money in that industry.

The only thing I am looking forward to right now is for the current designer to actually RESIGN and have that spot be open, because I have spoken to him a few times and he has expressed his interest to go back into Interior Design again, which I believe will probably be early next year if he chooses to follow through with it. I am hoping that once he leaves, I will actually be considered to fill up his position, but should the company decide to look for another person to fill up that spot, then I will probably also just quit as well and find another interior design job, but this time, with a boutique interior design firm than a mass market one like ID4. 

Pang Seh Kia

 I thought I was very close to closing a $40,000 sales this week and was very happy that I could potentially break my sales egg early this month to get out from the $0 sales figure, but then the client suddenly stopped responding yesterday, which was suppose to be the day she told me she will make the purchase.

So this client, whom I shall call Christine, came into the store last week when we were quite close to closing, and because I no longer approach customers as much anymore due to the many rejections and awkward situations have faced, and my other colleague being more busy anticipating to close the store, we decided to just let her roam around the showroom on her own, thinking she was probably going to just leave the store after she has seen her fair share of furniture she probably can't afford.

Well, when she was done with her round, she actually reached out to me and ask me about the sofas we have on display, she pointed out a few she liked and inquired their availability, I honestly didn't think too much about it at first because she was really young and I doubt she could afford them, she also told me she had just moved to Singapore and had to get some furniture asap to fill her space up, that then made me think that she is probably still a bit confused about the currency exchange rate and might not have realized that the sofa she is getting is 20 times more expensive than a regular sofa from Courts.

Anyways, I get her contact information, prepare a quote for her and send it to her the next day, not expecting her to actually reply back like most customers do, and she didn't reply back until the following day.

She thanked me for the quote and told me she would get back to me again after she had taken some time to think about them.

Figured she probably wasn't, and that my exchange with her was going to end when I drop her a courtesy follow up text a few days later that she probably won't reply, just so I can tell my boss I did follow up but she didn't reply if he ends up asking about it.

Welp, she did reply a few days later and informed me she is interested to drop by the showroom again to look at more items, I then told her that I was not available on the day she wanted to drop by, to which she told me she will come over when I was around, I thought that was super nice and this when I started to take her more seriously. 

So we finally met again and she started sharing with me a few of the items she was interested in, I then asked her about where she was staying because if it was a condo and requires lift access, then getting a large sofa might not be possible as it wouldn't be able to fit into the lift, she was a bit disappointed, so I told her she could instead get a smaller sofa that we have in stock and a few armchair to fill up the space as well as introduce more sitting area, she was very receptive to the idea and told me she will probably purchase the items over the weekend, but she will need to go back and think about the items first.

The next day, she sends me a picture of her condo lift blueprint and ask me if the large sofa she wanted can fit into the lift, her exact message was...

"Could you check this blueprint, I assume the 3-seater can't fit..."

... I looked at the blueprint and it is pretty obvious it wouldn't fit, so I told her it won't and she doesn't respond after that. 

The next day, when I went back to work and my supervisor asked me if my customer was Korean because a Korean customer had called earlier and asked about whether her lift could fit a 3 seater sofa, I told him that she was was Korean but it couldn't have been her because she has direct contact with me, it doesn't make sense for her to call the office line directly, PLUS I have already informed her that the lift wouldn't fit the sofa.

I got really suspicious after that so I decided to drop Christine a text to ask her if she was still interested in the product because it was already Saturday and she told me she was going to purchase the items on Saturday.

No response.

And she didn't even bother to read the message, I was observing her profile throughout the day and she did appear online, but she didn't read the message, which made me believe that the Korean who called the office was indeed her.

So not only does she not have the basic courtesy to update me, apparently my messages are not even worth opening. She probably just deleted the chat when she received it because it has just been left at unread for the past 2 days and she was clearly online during those 2 days.

I really do not understand what is so difficult about simply saying...

"I am no longer interested in the product, but thank you for your help!" 

..., especially towards a sales person you have been having an exchange with for the past few days,  I would understand if it was a one time exchange of me sending them a quote and they don't reply, because most customers are entitled customers with no basic courtesy to drop a simple "Thanks", but I have been chatting with her for a while now, she even told me she was going to buy the items over the weekend, I think I deserve at least an update if you are not planning to get them anymore because I actually reserved those items for her, let me know you don't want it so I can release those items to my colleagues for them to sell! 

The thing is, I am not going to suddenly call you and try to hard sell you the items if you tell me you are no longer interested. No longer interested in the item, have the fucking courtesy to just say you are not interested, not just her, but with a few other customers as well, who just leave me at read or don't even bother to open the message, I am not a fucking spam text that you unwillingly subscribed to. 

I met this Interior Designer, or at least she claims she is one when she was asking for specials discount, who did this to me, didn't bother to reply to my follow up. Fucking ironic, as someone who also have to follow up with customers, I am sure she knows how irritating it can be to be left at read, yet she is are doing the exact same thing to me. 

Anyways, it's bloody rude and I am clearly very annoyed at Christine because she really got my hopes up but then decided to end it off by choosing to ignore my messages.

FINE! Then I will do my best to try and push the items she wants to other customers, so when she eventually decides to come back and get them, I can say to her face..

"Oh sorry, it's sold already, but I can order one for you if you'd like, it will just take 5 FUCKING MONTHS!"

... I'm way too petty.

Le' Ingrate

 A few weeks ago, I had the "joy" of serving a walk in customer. I wasn't really interested to serve her at first because she just looked really unfriendly, unfortunately for me, because my boss happened to be around that day, I really had no choice but to put on a show, so I went to talk to her.

True to my first judgement of her, she was a very haughty individual, I asked her what she was looking for and she told me she was trying to get some inspiration for her new place but was unsure what exactly she was looking for, I then introduced her to the different brands we carry and showed her one of our more affordable brands, she asks about the price for the sofa that we had on display and upon learning the price, tells me...

"That is so cheap."

...  not really sure how to feel about that, but alright, no viewing of the cheap stuff I guess, so I bring her to our main brand and to be very honest, I had nothing much to say because I didn't know what exactly she was looking for and the furniture we had on display were a lot of repeated pieces in different colors. In an attempt to keep the conversation going, I then ask her about her renovation for her place and she shares with me that it is still at the early stages and she hasn't actually found a contractor yet, and for some stupid fucking reason, I go...

"Oh, I use to be an Interior Designer, maybe you can share your floorplan with me and I can work out a space planning proposal for you!"

... the moment I said that, I instantly regretted it because I really do not want to go the extra mile for her. I requested for her phone number and was going to send her a text straightaway to give her my number, but then realized I had saved it in my personal phone instead of my work phone, so I excused myself to get my work phone to re-save her number and as was walking back with the phone to save her number, she just walks away from me, I thought maybe she just wanted to go and look at the other furniture, so I keyed her number in, wrote her name and as I was going to find her, I see her just walking out of the store.

Didn't say any goodbye, not a single word of thanks, she just walked out the store. I was so bloody confused, so I went to double check with my colleague if the customer who just left the store was the one I was talking to and they all told me that she is.

Like what the fuck? We haven't even completed our conversation yet and you just walk out.

I really did not want to drop her a text after that, but figured since I already told her I would, and she is the customer and knows where I work, I should in case she decides to complaint about me, so I did and she sends her floorplan over to me, she did drop a thanks in the message so there is that.

The floorplan she send was one of those shitty as fuck, low resolution type that she got off those property websites with the huge ass watermark, so it was pretty much useless and I had to go to the official developer website to get a better quality one. One of the many floorplans that I hated getting as an Interior Designer.

The amount of time I spend drawing out the plan in Autocad and then planning out the space was about a week, whilst it was nice to be doing space planning again, when I think about who I am doing it for, it just felt like such a waste of time because I was very sure this customer was probably going to take the proposal and never return again, she just looked like that type.

I send her the proposal a week after we met, she actually thanks me once again, which surprised me and then ask me to also collate the photos of the furniture I am proposing for her, I told her I will do it by the end of the day, no response to that. Prepare the images and actually send it to her 5 hours later, no word of thanks for that as well.

It really doesn't kill you to say "Thanks" multiple times a day, especially if it is a complimentary service you are not paying anything for. Show some gratitude!

Anyway, this ingrate doesn't bother to get back to me at all for an entire week, no updates of any kind, so I decided to drop her a text today and ask if she has any feedback, not because I actually wanted any actual feedback, I just wanted to remind her that I exist. She simply replies back about an hour later with...

"The scale doesn't look right"

... no you freeloading ingrate, you should have started the message with...

"THANKS FOR TAKING TIME TIME TO PREPARE THE PROPOSAL FOR ME BUT....."

... and then highlight the issue you have with the proposal I prepared for you FOR FREE! I know I was the one who offered to do the proposal, but any decent human would show some form of gratitude first before they point out the issues, holy fuck when I read her reply, I was so irritated I left her at read for probably an hour. 

GROSS! 

I eventually replied back and told her the scale is correct, and then question her about why she thinks it's off, she doesn't respond because of her qualities as an ingrate, but I think she thinks the scale is off  because the furniture looks too big in her space, but what the ingrate doesn't realize is that the furniture isn't the problem, the problem is the size of her house, it's too small for the furniture we sell.

This haughty ingrate came into the store flaunting her wealth and then it turns out she can't fit the furniture we sell in her house.

Anyways, if she doesn't bother to reply, I also won't be bothering to follow up anymore since I have never wanted to engage with her in the first place. If my boss ask me about it, at least I can share with him that I did my part and in fact even went above and beyond by preparing a proposal for her, I highly doubt he will take the customer's side.

I hope her renovation goes to shit, her pipes burst, her marble crack and everything that she buys ends up being defective, since she is so rich but can't fit any of our furniture in her house, she should have no problem paying to get those items fixed or just buy a new house altogether. This really isn't about her being rich or not, majority of the people of her race are just like that in general, super entitled, usually like to request for the most expensive things but don't actually have the budget, (as far as my experience as an ID goes), a lot of my ex-colleagues agrees with me, my past clients who work in the service line agrees with me, even my current boss has shared with me of the horrible experiences he has had with them and even told me they are not worth the sales because of how difficult they can get once the delivery has been made, like complaining about the smallest imperfections and than demanding an exchange or a refund.

Not going to indicate the race, iykyk. 

Dead as a fish...

I am quite an introverted person, so when I first engage with a customer, I try to be more extroverted to make the customers feel more comfortable, but if you not going to be returning the same energy that I am putting out,  then you can fuck off because I really cannot put the same level of energy out every time we meet and only be getting the bare minimum response from your side. 

I finally ran into a customer that I really connect with at work a few days back and it just brought me back to the days when I was doing Interior Design and would meet clients that I just cannot click with. 

The customers in question were a couple, at first, it was just the husband who came in, he sat at the sofas we had displayed at the front of the showroom and then started walking around a little, a few minutes later, his wife enters the showroom and joins him, they then walk back to the front of the showroom to test out the fabric sofa together and usually when I see them actually testing out the sofa and discussing amongst themselves, it usually means they are likely not just window shopping, so I decided to approach them to ask them if they needed help.

The husband was quite receptive, so I asked him if he had any furniture he was looking for and he told me he wanted to get a few sofas to fill up his space, along with a dining table, I decided to walk with them through the entire showroom to see if anything catches their fancy and I started the tour by bringing them towards a leather version of the sofa they had been seating on earlier for them to compare the difference, I suggested for them to sit on the sofa to test out the difference and this was when it got really uncomfortable for me.

Only the husband decided to try out the sofa, the wife on the other hand just stood beside the sofa, completely expressionless and I honestly didn't know what the fuck I was suppose to do with her, but I figured since the wife wasn't going to sit down, I will just talk to the husband and ask him about the comfort level of the sofa, usually, a normal customer will express that the leather is more comfortable and then I can start sharing the brands array of leather selection, but sadly, this customer wasn't normal because he didn't have much to say, and when I brought up about the array of leathers he could select from, the flow of the conversation just started to feel a bit forced, because it was like I was just dumping information that he didn't care for on him. 

This awkwardness lasted pretty much throughout the entire walkthrough, me asking them to test the sofas, the wife not actually sitting down to test them, but looking distracted and staring into space while the husband sits down for a while, barely shares any sort of feedback to me. I felt like I was talking to myself the entire time, at one point, the wife just decides to wander off on her own and just sits down on an armchair that was towards the back of the showroom, so the husband quickly walks through the first half of the showroom, pats on the sofas that he was passing by and I just tagged along behind him, once in while sharing with him the name of the sofa and what not, but also hoping he would start asking me questions because me spewing out information he probably doesn't care or wasn't reacting to was starting to get really awkward.

He eventually catches up with his wife and sits on the armchair across her, when the wife was around, I just didn't feel comfortable saying anything because I knew she was not going to respond, so I backed away a little and just observed them quietly, which was really fucking weird, the husband then decides to get up and walks further into the Showroom, I followed the husband because I ain't going to be entertaining the dead fish of a wife and watch her meld into the sofa as she stared into space, she was ignoring me the entire time I was doing the walkthrough, so she can rot on the armchair for all I care. 

Usually when a couple comes in, even if one of them is not speaking, they will at least show some sort of reaction by nodding their head or smiling, but this dead fish of a wife literally didn't do any of that, she was like one of those MMO Pets you can get that other people cannot interact with, like it's there but you can't do anything more than seeing it follow it's master around at the back.

Anyways, things didn't improve from there because it started to get very difficult to maintain a conversation with the husband, so I just stopped trying and walked through the remaining Showroom areas with him quietly, he didn't ask anything, just sat on the different sofas for 5 seconds, get up and then move into the next area. 

After his brisk walking session, he decides to walk the showroom another round, and this time, I maintained a wider distance from him, he catches up with his wife and they start talking amongst themselves, at this point, I got a little annoyed at the whole situation because I honestly can't stand the wife anymore, and since the husband wasn't asking any questions and they clearly were not interested in a guided tour, I decided to just fuck all and went back to my laptop and do my work, because why fucking bother?  

After a few minutes, I could see from my peripheral vision that they were heading out and I just couldn't be bothered to even acknowledge them. I would usually say goodbye to customers that I have attended to, but with them, I just didn't want to purely out of spite for the wife. 

First Sales. Fucked it up.

Today was my first weekend in the company Showroom and the weekend crowd somehow feels more approachable than the weekday crowds.

I was also able to close my first sales today, it was one of those in the right place, at the right time sort of situations and not a customer that I actually worked hard to follow up and finally clinched type. The customers knww what they wanted and they simply needed a sales person to confirm the purchase for them, I happen to be the sales person who was there so they came to me.

They got a study table and a chair for their daughter, the combined amount was about $6000, which is fucking nuts for just a table and chair. All the furniture in my own bedroom combined, along with my desktop set up, cost less than the table and chair, and the clients actually got it for their daughter so nonchalantly. I will never be able to understand the way rich people spend their money.

Anyways, I got one of my senior colleague to help me prepare the invoice and everything went great, I felt accomplished that I was finally able to close my first sales and happily went to grab my late lunch right after saying goodbye to the customers, everything was well and dandy and I was in a terrific mood, got my lunch and as I was on my way back to the Showroom to eat it, my colleague sends me a picture of the chair I had sold and asked me if I had quoted the client the correct item.

I told him the picture was the item the customer wanted, but if I had indicated and sold the wrong product in the invoice and he just went...

"Yes"

... I sold them the wrong fucking chair.

I sold them the green chair thinking it was the same as the orange chair. It's fucking not the same

I fucked my first Sales up and underquoted the item, this what was I had been bloody afraid of when I first join the company and saw the price list, I knew the items were going to be bloody expensive and if I underquoted an item, it could potentially lead to a loss of a few thousand dollars.

This isn't one of those things whereby I can absorb the additional charges like I usually would when I miscalculated my Renovation Quotations, I am earning a fixed salary, so if I fuck up and undersell an item, especially items from the store that sells luxury high end furniture, I am pretty much fucked.

My colleague then started calculating the pricing for me and told me to give the customer a call to let them know I had underquoted them, and that they will need to top up the additional amount, he calculated that they would need to top up about an additional $400 and I assume that was probably to cover the chair's cost price. If we were to calculate based on the selling price, I had underquoted $1,200 for the chair, against their $6000, it really is quite a bit of money.

I knew the customers weren't going to take this very well, but it had to be done, so I called the wife and naturally, she wasn't very happy, her tone was completely different from when I first met her earlier that day and I felt like shit to have to make that call, she kept talking to her husband while she was on the phone and after some time, just passed the phone to her husband and had him deal with me.

I tried to explain that the price had been misquoted and I will need them to do a top up, I really hated telling them that because if I were in their position, I would be pissed off as well, the husband than tells me that they have already made full payment and that if this was the agreed amount, the company should honor the price, he then goes on to question if this is how a company of my caliber works and the thing is, I completely agreed with him because it is not right to suddenly have them do a top up, if I could absorb the cost, I really would, but I can't because I am not making any commission from the sales, so there really isn't anyway for me to absorb the cost unless I request to have it taken out from my salary.

The initial call didn't really go anywhere, the customers just didn't want to pay, so I told my colleague that they will probably not pay up, and he tells me...

"Actually what they paid should be able to cover the cost, I just wanted them to feel bad. The price they paid is just barely enough to cover the cost, so we probably won't be earning anything from this sales."

... and that made me feel much better. I felt horrible towards the company, but at least I didn't have to make an awkward phone call back to the customer and demand for the top up. But I didn't really understand how the customer would feel bad after that call though because I think they only got more upset that I was calling to request for a Top-Up.

I called the customer back eventually and told him we will honor the original price, he thanks me and I slowly felt my appetite coming back afterwards. Still felt quite shitty throughout the day though because I actually fucked up my first sales and made it a profit-less one, and I could sense the customer was still a little upset even after I made that call back.

My boss actually dropped by the Showroom in the evening and I just had to break the news to him about that shitty sales. He was quite taken aback and when I told him that my senior colleague had assured me the price is able to cover the cost, my boss goes...

"He doesn't know how to calculate the cost price, there are still shipping and freight cost involved. Only I actually know the actual cost price for these items."

... and I just went "oh fuck" in my head because this meant that not only was the sales a profit-less one, it was probably at a loss. My boss then contemplates for a while and tells me he will allow the mistake this one time, after which he informs me to call the customer and try to guilt trip the shit out of them, which I probably will at a later date. 

I was so grateful, it was like a weight got lifted off my shoulder because now my boss knows and he was actually really nice about it, which means I no longer have to worry about the finance department calling me to question me, and even if they do, I can just tell them the boss knows.

Anyways, after that first sales, I actually felt more comfortable talking to the customers that were coming in, even though I fucked up, it gave me a confidence boost, that an also the walk-ins were just more reactive when I go up to them, I still had a few...

'Just looking." 

... and then move away reaction from those who were just window shopping, inevitable, but there were more who were actively asking me what the prices for some of the furniture were, what other materials they could choose from and the configurations they could get, it was nice to be able to actually have conversations with the walk-ins that last for more than 5 seconds. 

I will be working tomorrow as well, so we shall see how the crowd will be like on Sundays. Hopefully as good as today so I can close more sales soon and make up for today.