Buying my netbook in Currys was definitely an experience. My boyfriend and I were down in Southampton for the weekend to see my Aunt and Uncle, we arrived early on Friday morning so we decided to go to the shopping centre and have a mooch around.
I had been after a netbook for a while and have been saving up over the summer so that I could have it for Semester 1, Year 3. While we were walking around West Quay, we noticed a Currys Digital, so we went in and lo-and-behold there was the one that I was after (the one I'm writing this on), although it was £10 more expensive than on Amazon, I was sure it was the correct spec that I wanted and therefore there would be no need for returns.
However, after about 10 minutes of standing around with Chris, someone eventually came over to us to sell a 3D TV; which we most definitely we not buying.
The sales man was waffling on about RAM upgrades and how they can blow up the computer if you're not careful - er, excuse me, I've built a desktop, and know how to install a bigger stick of RAM without frying all of the components; don't talk to us like we're stupid.
After all of that, we said we'd think about it and come back later - which we did, as we had decided to buy it now.
We went back and stood around for a while, after about 10 minutes we went to the checkout and said that we would like to buy X netbook, we know exactly which one we want, therefore please just go and get it from the back and we'll pay and go, ok? NO. The checkout guy couldn't do that, he needed a sales person to get the netbook for us, so he said to a sales person that we would like to be served, he whitters on about he's serving 2 people already (individually). So we stood around for another 20-30 minutes waiting.
That sales person who had 2 people to serve already, walked past us! And then started a new sale with someone else, who had just walked in! ARGH. Then a little mousey girl walked over and finally started to work for her wage - which we made her do. We kicked up a real fuss, questioned her about all of the spec, the price, and tried (unsuccessfully) to get a free protective case thrown in because of the atrocious service.
What a stressful experience! So we marched straight over to Hotel Chocolat and bought a bar of cookie chocolate to calm down (and get change for the car park).
In addition to my theory that will follow, we went to Prezzo in Southampton a couple of weeks previous to this more recent visit; we had booked a table, which due to getting lost we were about 10 minutes late, the hostess decided that she'd make us wait for a table, when there was already a table for two empty. And then she only gave us 45 minutes to eat (which included our waiting for a table), needless to say we were very rushed; ate and left very promptly, which did not leave a nice atmosphere for our "romantic" evening out (we then went to watch Transformers 3, how romantic... I did enjoy it though so mustn't complain lol).
The theory: because we are students, we 1) must have no money to spend on new computers and nice dinners, 2) must have no knowledge of common courtesy and manners, 3) must respect those who are serving us (we do respect them, but also expect a certain level of professionalism).
However of course, it might not be the "student" label, I'd imagine for some people it would be a combination of "student" and age, because we are 20, not in our 30's, paying tax and a mortgage we must be lower beings than those mentioned above.
I think this attitude is outrageous and those people who do think like this should take a good hard look at themselves and the world around them. In the current economic climate, without students graduating and working hard (majority of the time for minimum wage), the country would be a much worse place than it is now. Without people like us buying fancy dinners and new computers, those people wouldn't have jobs. So really you should treat each customer, regardless of their age, race, gender, sexuality as equals, and your jealousy or prejudice is irrelevant and unwanted.
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