The holidays are now over, as is the busiest selling season of the year, and left in its wake are examples of both good and bad in the field of sales, and customer service. The positive side of me wants to start with something good, but I can't get this particular situation out of my head, so that's where we will begin.

It's late on the Friday before Christmas and there's one specific gift that I have in mind for a friend and because of my schedule, this is the only time I have to get this done. I spend close to three hours going from store to store and everyone is sold out. It should be noted that every store that did not have the item could not have been nicer or more professional. Their salespeople offered to help by calling other stores and so on, so that's a positive.

I finally find a store that has what I'm looking for via a phone call by one of those professional salespeople, and I drive the 45 minutes to go get it. As excited as I was, that quickly disappeared the minute I walked into the store.

The salespeople were rude and seemed to be completely annoyed that I was bothering them so late. I told them that I was there to buy the item that another store called about and one salesperson said, "We know, that's why we are still here." I was there well before closing, so I have no idea where that comment came from. I then asked if they could show me where the item was and one of the salespeople pointed in a general direction, and said, "Over there." Had this not been a gift and had I not been in a time crunch, there's no way I would have purchased a thing from these guys.

We all understand that there are times when a salesperson simply does not want to be at work or deal with people, especially when it's the end of a long day at the end of a long holiday season. However that lack of customer service and rudeness is inexcusable.

If a salesperson is at work and it's still business hours, then it's fair for any customer to expect to be treated with courtesy and professionalism.

FINAO - Brad Huisken