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I Will Never Again Buy Anything At Boots. Ever!

August 27, 2009

I’ll Never Again Buy Anything At Boots The Chemist. They Deserve To Go Down Alexander Nekrassov writes: Let me tell you what happened with me at a large Boots chemist, in the West End of London recently. On Regent Street, to be exact. I was doing  a radio show that day and arrived at Broadcasting House rather early.

I came into Boots, around lunch time, to have a photograph scanned and put on a DVD. I started to have a bad feeling about it the moment I laid my eyes on the shop assistant behind the photo counter. He did not look good: wrinkled narrow brow, unhealthy bloodshot eyes and bad teeth. And he kept his left hand stuck deep in his trouser pocket, probably playing with himself.

It’s OK, I thought. You shouldn’t judge people by their appearances. He might be a good man.

Besides, I didn’t really need anything special. I just wanted one photograph to be put on a DVD. No big deal, nothing of any complexity. So I asked the man whether he could transfer my photo on to a DVD relatively quickly, as I did not that much time before my show would start.

The man was rude to me the moment I enquired about the possibility of scanning my photo. He looked at me in a way that implied that he was way too busy to attend to my needs. And he continued to keep his left hand deep in his trouser pocket as he took my photograph from me with his right hand. His bloodshot eyes looked absolutely lifeless, as if he was high on something.

He went to the scanning and printing machine but I could see that he had absolutely no idea of how to operate it. He put the photo into the scanning tray, pushed some buttons, but nothing happened. He then picked up the internal phone, dialled a number and said: ‘Joe, do you know how to put photos on DVDs…?’

It was then that an edgy looking customer came up to the counter and started asking the shop assistant about his mobile phone camera. I pointed out to him that I was being served at that moment and was rather in a hurry.

The man suddenly turned very aggressive. ‘Don’t you talk to me like that,’ he hissed, hatred distorting his face. ‘You f..king prick. You f..k!’

I was taken aback. I looked at his ugly mug and the words of my instructor from the times I had been a military cadet flashed through my mind: ‘If attacked unexpectedly, hit your enemy in the Adam’s apple. One sharp blow would be enough. Then just walk away, and may be, just may be, the paramedics would be able to save him.’

But then I brushed the thought away, horrified at the idea that I could even think of killing a man in broad daylight, in a Boots, in the centre of London. My friends would have not approved of it, I can tell you that. They do not like violence.

‘Why are you swearing at me?’ I said, calmly, looking the punk straight in his colourless eyes. ‘What’s wrong with you?’

‘And what the f..k are you going to do about it?’ the disgusting man hissed. ‘What’s you’re gonna do about it?’
I smiled, remembering the face of my instructor.

‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘I’m not going to do anything at all.’

I signalled to the shop assistant, who was still playing with himself with his left hand and pretending that nothing was happening, to give me back my photograph. He handed it to me and I walked away.

Now, you might say that it was no big deal, that these things happen. But let me tell you something: if you have punks like that guy, who played with himself, working in Boots and customers like that disgusting foul mouthed dickhead coming in, then I would have nothing to do with them, Boots that is, anymore.

Boots are already bad enough, with their inflated prices and bad level of service. But to be treated like that by the staff and offended for nothing by some lowlife, who obviously felt quite at home there, was way beyond all acceptable behaviour.

I will never again buy anything in Boots. I will never actually walk into any Boots from now on. Because who knows what might happen if I encounter some more unprovoked rudeness. I just might be tempted to use my military instructor’s advice. And someone might get seriously hurt.

By the way, if things continue as they are, Boots will pay the price for hiring lowlifes to work for them and cutting corners. Because that is the price you usually pay for being taken over by the money men, who do not really know how to run a business. Asset stripping, yes, running businesses – no.

From now on I’m going to use the services of a pharmacy called Bliss, on Marble Arch, which is open till midnight and has another branch off Cromwell Road. They look after me well and are always polite and give good advice.

– End –

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Category: Life In The UK  · 20 Comments »
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20 Responses to “I Will Never Again Buy Anything At Boots. Ever!”

  1. Jenny on March 20th, 2009 11:36 am

    How can you complain that their prices are too high and then complain that the customers are low life? Boots are not in control of who comes into their shops, surely all they could do to deter this ‘lowlife’ is to put their prices up?
    I agree that the shop worker is their fault but what can they really do about their customers?

  2. Dora Jane on May 17th, 2009 6:48 pm

    I think she was on about a member of staff, as a hard working member of the boots team i would like to say sorry, i do hope that if you are this upset you will please report this guy. However i would like you to understand that not every store is the same. i work in a tiny little store and i give brilliant service because i like to give customers to have a personal experience even though we are a chain. I have had my fare share of customer abuse and sometimes you find it hard to maintain a completely emotionless work ethic. Maybe he miss heard you, i am not saying by any means that this is an expectable behavior but please don’t right every store off. i have to still come in every day regardless is a customer’s behavior and know one day is ever the same. Again am sorry on his behalf because know-one should be treated that way regardless. As for the pricing you may think that but the boots card is a really money saver getting 4p for every pound you spend in our store it feels like free money. I hope you have another go.

  3. nameless on August 10th, 2009 2:20 pm

    I think you have the full right not to go in any store ever again.If I was you i would have done the same thing.it happens all the time and everywhere.Customer services has become crap in the last couple of years.No one cares about the customers or their needs.altough there are some fussy customers who make life hell at work as a retail.i work myself for Boots and when I go other stores i do not find the same level of services as in my store.in the mean time some people are free and have nothing else to do but argue with the staff.hope u find better experience elsewhere.and if you are not satisfied about the service anywhere never go there again..

  4. Chris Poston on August 16th, 2009 6:11 pm

    I have just returned from a four day break mear Dartmouth and the weather was very good, so good that my wife quickly got sunburnt as she is very fair skinned, so a quick call into Boots, Dartmouth to purchase some Aloa Vera soothing gel at £5.99 a bottle + two reduced items at £1.10 each totalling £8.19. The till totalled this up to £12.49 !!!!! and when we brought it to the attention of a more senior female assistant she tried to do an adjustment and gave me back £2.75, ( still short ) – I again pointed out this was still incorrect and the shortfall was £4.40, where I was confronted with a matronly sarcastic ” You have to pay for these things you know ” . By which time the queue was growing in numbers and I turned to apologise to them. The elder sales assistant continued to be rude, difficult, and eventually counted out and gave me the £4.40 shortfall after my continued ( polite ) protest that the bar code/till was incorrect. I hope this eventually gets read as I don’t usually complain but this episode of sales/customer interface leaves me disgusted. I feel a letter of complaint to Boots head office is justified but question if any action would be taken.
    Remember to check your receipts people !!!!!!!!

  5. Stark on August 27th, 2009 11:45 am

    Copy of email to custmer servise, Boots. Can’t be delivered.

    Yesterday evening , 26 August,09, I went out of my way to go to yourshop in Victoria Station,0811 the number, I think . After a lengthy wait I was first served by someone who did not know where or what Canesten was.I pointed it out on the shelf behind him. There were 4 different types and I wanted the original cream ,which I knew from previous experience, worked.He asked another member of staff and then I began to be insulted . Had I used it before ? What did I want it for ? The name of this ,I think Somali, girl was Naima. I answered that no prescription was necessary and I did not want to explain what it was for. ‘ Alright’ she said’ I’m not serving you’ I again repeated that no precription was necessary. As a mattter of fact I had a rash that I did not want to discuss with a shop assistant in public with people around me. She reluctantly fetched an embarrassed pharmacist , who gave me what I wanted after asking me if I’d ever seen a doctor. Canesten is a product for skin complaints , a cream. Quite apart from her right to ask me, what did she think I was going to do with it? Smoke it ? I am 65 years old,. I have a family. I have had books published. I suffer from a chronic illness and I have high blood pressure, which was not improved by my duel with your vile mannered staff. I don’t fit the profile of a teenage substance abuser exactly.
    I would like to know what you will do by way of apology and to prevent other innocent clients being mauled in this way by this person and what you intend to say to this member of staff.
    Needless to say , you have lost a client for good. I’ll never go to a Boots again.

    As I left , she called after me the sarcastic greeting of bad mannered staff, who haven’t had their way, all over the English speaking world-’Have a nice evening’.

    PS

  6. anonymous on August 30th, 2009 1:33 pm

    just to say sorry to everyone who has had a bad experience in boots stores.
    i myself work in a boots store and i can understand that some staff members can be rude and arrogant, but i will have to say please dont let it put you off all stores, we are not all like that. at the end of the day the customer is the MOST IMPORTANT person in the shop, it is the customer that gives us a job and it is the customer who pays our wages, and its lovely to see and speak to different people everyday!
    yes we get the occasional rude customer but it comes with the job title im afraid.
    please dont think all staff in different stores are the same, i think you will be surprised, try the smaller branches we have a little more time to spend with you.

  7. Matt Payne on September 28th, 2009 9:36 am

    Although I can’t say that all Boots are rubbish, because as stated a lot are run by upstanding people just trying to make a living. Although I still go to Boots for a couple of items I know get most of what I need from echemist. They’re a really reliable online chemist that have cheap delivery costs. Although they can’t put photos onto DVD’s they’ll pretty much satisfy every other need you might have.

  8. anne fenn on November 17th, 2009 9:37 pm

    Sorry to hear about your experience in the London store, it does sound disturbing and not something anyone should go through.
    I am a Photographic Consultant for Boots and know we do not offer images saved to Dvd.
    We can save a jpeg. to a non-rewritable CD only.
    It is very hit and miss quality wise and customer service in the photo side of Boots due to the lack of training for Photographic, personnally I was appointed 10 years ago when Boots had Kodak as a franchise.
    The Kodak training was second to none,we could tell if the chemistry was off, strip a printer or processer down to worn equipment and have the Lab running after a few hours.
    Boots took the most productive labs, one of which was mine….and has undermined everything which a photo service and customer care should be.
    For the last 2 years I have asked my managers in my store to train the staff on photo, it is not like selling a bottle of shampoo, it is a memorie.
    So there are a few of good trained photo out there, 3 I know of, but trust your photos to Boots?
    No.

  9. farzin malik on January 5th, 2010 10:26 am

    yeh your sales assistant are very rude to their customer and security guards are violent towards thin girls. Your staffing need to be sorted out properly. i am discusted on the way they treat there customers

  10. ANONYMOUS on January 7th, 2010 8:28 pm

    it looks like you’ve had a bad experience, but i’ve worked in Boots for about a year and a half now, and they really do focus on delivering good customer service. In my store though it doesn’t work out to well because the managers show no support to members towards staff anymore (due to a recent managerial change).
    As for the last comment, the security guards aren’t from Boots, they’re from a seperate company, and i think it’s disgraceful that after one bad experience you tar all the sales assistants and security guards with the same brush. I am pretty sure by the way some of you have described a situation you have gone beyond testing the patience of the sales assistant who has continued to be as polite. I remember standing next to a sales assistant who was being hurled racial abuse from a customer for absolutely no reason and yet the sales assistant continued serving her and said “well she’s entitled to be as small-minded as she wants to be” afterward but had continued serving her like any other customer.

  11. ANONYMOUS on January 7th, 2010 8:33 pm

    oh and as for the Canesten story, whether or not a prescription is required, the Healthcare Assistants do need to ask you those questions for a Pharmacy item. If you didn’t wish to discuss it with her, you could have asked to speak to her in a more private place, or been asked to be referred to another member of staff.

  12. ANONYMOUS on January 7th, 2010 8:37 pm

    I think your arrogance in believing that you’re better educated than her, even though clearly you didn’t realize the legal requirements she was trying to adhere to will have come across in the way you spoke to her. Perhaps you will receive an excellent level of service if you are more open-minded to her questions. She was asking you to make sure that you were taking the most effective treatment for what you had, and to give you advice on the best way to use it.

  13. KATRINA STONE on January 12th, 2010 5:59 am

    I had a bad experience when buying canesten at boots also,being interigated and asked personal questions in a public place ..as a 55 yr old, I found the vile shop assistant had no idea about confidential issues ,I too will never put myself in that situation again.

  14. anne blake on February 23rd, 2010 2:34 pm

    i have been using the same local chemist for over 30 yrs . my severely

  15. Trish Allen on March 6th, 2010 10:59 am

    The shop assistants at Boots must have some idea of the uses of items like Canesten, and therefore did not need to dig so deeply, especially in front of other customers. I think some of the assistants enjoy watching people squirm as it gives them some kind of power complex. Frankly I would have simply walked out and avoided confrontation with someone who clearly had absolutely no people skills whatever and probably enjoyed the whole episode. If Boots continue to employ people with the customer care of an octopus, then expect nothing better.

    At the age of 17 I was interviewed for a temporary job on the counter at Boots, and it was drummed into me to be always courteous to the customer, no matter how difficult they might be and that they were always right. That advice stood me in very good stead then, and in all the years I was dealing with the public, nursing, but those were in the days when there were proper counters and good customer care. Have you noticed how much service improves in smaller shops which still have proper counters instead of these awful self service places, where you wander around aimlessly trying to find things that have been moved to other places and heaven help you if you dare to stop someone and ask. Don’t bother with Boots. There are plenty of better shops that are less expensive and want to keep you as a customer.

  16. prat on March 14th, 2010 1:39 am

    Accidents happens so you never drive ?
    plane crashes so you never Fly ?
    the same way some where ,some shop assistant dose something thing skill
    how is that fair to a say i never going to walk in all boots store …..

  17. reg briggs on May 19th, 2010 9:44 am

    You should come into Boots in Peterborough,plenty of staff walking round with clipboards BUT no one on the tills.do we the paying public matter anymore,I sincerely hope your profits collaspe and you shake out staff.

    The last 8 yes 8 times I have been to the photograpkic counter,i have had to shout for assistance

  18. Marion Green on July 11th, 2010 1:36 pm

    I took a CD to Boots in Dumfries on 10th July, 2010. The pretty assistant was most helpful, helping me select the photos I wanted, advised me on things I wasn’t sure of. I suggest you all come to Dumfries (for those of you who’s geography is not so good) that is in Dumfries & Galloway, Scotland.

  19. Allan Pearcey on August 7th, 2010 11:22 am

    My local chemist which until about a year ago was run by Lloyds, and run very well I may add was taken over by Boots. The word ‘disaster’ comes to mind.
    My wife and I have our monthly prescriptions from there and hardly a visit goes by without some trauma or other.
    Either – they say they haven’t received the notes from the doctor yet, (never happened when Lloyds were there) or we collect them, go in a couple of days later and despite having already received the medicines, are told “your prescriptions are ready”
    A week ago we asked for a bottle of Optrex only to be told that we have to see a doctor before they are allowed to sell it to us. So we went along to another local chemist and picked up a bottle off the shelf.
    The last straw came this morning when at 10.25am I called to collect our monthly prescriptions only to be met at the door by two young assistants who were stopping anyone entering. I was told that although our prescriptions were ready the fact that the pharmist had not turned up for work, I couldn’t be served. Now I realise that this wasn’t in anyway the fault of the two assistants, who were very polite and helpful, but it is a fact that since Boots took over the shop, the word ‘disaster’ seems to be very appropriate.

  20. Maria Wallace on September 7th, 2010 11:19 am

    I also have fallen foul of the rude staff employed by Boots. The one I took the abuse from was in Glasgow Sauchiehall Street, by the name of Maureen Davie.
    My mother had a prescription for 100 paracetemol handed in on 26th August, this ” CHARMING PERSON “. told me she could not get them untill her dosset box started again on 9th September, I explained they dont go int he box. She as much as said too bad. I said my mother has none, her reply, “WELL GET HER DOCTOR TO WRITE MORE THEN “.
    Her attitude was downright disgraceful to be working with the public, when I said so she said too bad.
    Not at all a good advert for Boots.

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