NCCC Can Eat It

I haven’t been in a very creative frame of mind lately. While I’d love to tell you about my trip to El Nido last week, I’m really not in the mood. I’ve posted many pictures on my FaceBook account that effectively sum up how my mini-vacation turned out. In the future I may write a short blog on some of the funnier things that happened in El Nido, but this isn’t that blog. This blog will chronicle the death of my NCCC love affair.

When I first arrived in Puerto, NCCC was my home away from home. It was the place I did all my shopping. If I needed bread, NCCC provided. If I needed Sonnix, NCCC was there. If I needed cheering up, the 3:00 pm NCCC all female line-dancers would get the job done. Plus, there was always the NCCC jingle to hum.

Well fuck all that now.

I was riding the bus back from El Nido on Wednesday when I noticed that the sound in my right earphone was significantly stronger than in my left. I figured that the earphones must have been damaged somehow during the travel. When I arrived home I tried them in my computer and they seemed to work fine. Just to be sure I went to NCCC and bought a new pair of genuine ‘!pod’ earphones. The clerk assured me that I could return them within seven days for a full refund. This information pleased me and the transaction was completed. I brought the earphones home, plugged them in, and realized immediately that, not only was the sound quality significantly shittier than the official iPod earphones, but that the same problem was occurring. I guess there must be some problem with the audio port on my iPod (Ha, won’t fatty be pissed when he kicks the shit out of a foreigner for a broken iPod), but that’s not really important. What is important is the absolute bullshit that transpired when I went to return the earphones.

I go to customer service and get a ticket that I need to bring to Counter 19. So far so good. The Counter 19 lady calls over her supervisor (by ringing a goddamn cowbell I should add) and points me to the end of the counter to wait with some Filipino dude. The supervisor comes over and begins talking to the guy in Tagalog. I can barely speak any Tagalog, but from my point of view it seemed as if dude (let’s call him Franklin) was trying to return two packages of curtain holders and the supervisor (let’s call her Snarly) was doing everything in her power to stop this. After five long minutes of frenzied gibberish Franklin was finally returned his 45 pesos and it was my turn. I should have realized that things would only get worse.

Snarly turned to me, all fake smiles and fake teeth, and asked me what I needed. This is when someone must have turned on the hidden cameras and started filming ‘Just for Laughs: Gags’ clips for 2009.

Snarly: “How can I help you sir?”

Me: “Yeah, hey. I bought these earphones here yesterday and I want to return them”.

Snarly: “What is the problem sir? Are the earphones broken?”

Me: “Uh, no no, the earphones are fine. See, I bought them because I thought my earphones were broken, but it turns out they aren’t, so I don’t need these anymore. I’d like a refund”.

Snarly: “If they aren’t defective then why are you returning them?”

Me: “Because I don’t need them. I thought my earphones, my own pair, were broken. It turns out my iPod is broken and the earphones, mine, are fine. I’m returning these because I don’t need or want them. I’d like a refund”.

(At this point the gravity of the situation hit Snarly like a kick in the face. She was going to have to take cash out of the register and place it in my hand. This was unacceptable. The fake smile transformed into a genuine frown.)

Snarly: “Ssssssssss, ohhhh. *long pause* Maybe you could just exchange these for something else? Maybe another pair of earphones?”

Me: “*sigh* I don’t need another pair of earphones. My iPod is broken, not my earphones. I don’t need anything else. I just want my money back”.

Snarly: “But maybe, sir, there is something in Men’s Accessories that you would like in exchange?”

This didn’t piss me off as much as it made me laugh. It was a ridiculous question. If I wanted something from Men’s Accessories wouldn’t I have those items in my goddamn hand? The earphones were 320 pesos. So I’m going to go buy three belts and a dinner ascot am I? Jesus Christ. I thought I was shopping at a department store, not a flea market.

Me: “No”.

Snarly: “What about in electronics? You could get a few CDs maybe?”

At this point I was thinking, “Is this bitch for real?” so I gave her a good, cold look. I decided then and there that this bitch was most definitely real, too real, and that this was going to get worse before it got better. I have to admire her tenacity, but seriously, CDs? “Yes, I’d love the REO Speedwagon: Greatest Hits as sung by the Tagalog Allstars CD please; 320 pesos worth. Yeah, just fill this bag”.

Me: “I do not want CDs. I do want a refund”.

Snarly: “Oh my. Oh my, oh my”.

Snarly kept looking at my receipt, thoroughly searching for a loophole in my purchase contract. She was getting desperate and stalling. If she gave me that money, the game would be over. The president of NCCC would be legally obligated to cane her in the town square.

The desperation and complete disregard for customer service was amusing up to this point. I mean, it was a little bit of a pain in the ass to have to argue with a grown woman when I should have been in and out in five minutes, but only a little. However this changed in a matter of seconds.

After finishing her receipt check she began to repackage the earphones, grumbling to a coworker in Tagalog the whole time. Times like these are when I wish I understood Tagalog and could call people out. You don’t even understand how satisfied that would make me. Anyway, in the middle of repackaging she glances up at me without moving her head and says:

“These better not be defective”.

At first I was stunned into silence. How the hell do you respond to that? The more I thought about it, and the more I realized that that statement made absolutely no goddamn sense, the more I got mad. So let me get this straight: by her logic, returning a defective item is worse than returning a non-defective item? So let’s say you buy a new toaster. You get home to have a delicious slice of toast, pop in a piece of bread, and the device blows up in your fucking face. You put out the fire, sweep your eyebrows off the table, and try to return the half-melted piece of shit but, woooooops, the toaster was defective. Wuh-oh, no refund for you. Shouldn’t an item that’s defective be an even better reason to return it? And why did she say it so threateningly anyway? Did I really look like a goddamn crook?

This woman was clearly insane, and there was no reasoning with her.

After she said that to me, and I got pretty mad, she didn’t say another word to me. This is very unfortunate because I took the next 40 seconds working on a speech that would’ve been ridiculously cathartic.

“I’ve been coming to this store for the past 5 months to do all my shopping. I buy all my food here. I buy all my toiletries here. This shitty shirt I’m wearing, I bought it here. These Sonnix, that fell the fuck apart I should add, I bought right over there. And now, you’re standing here, giving me a pile of shit because I want to return one item? Well fuck you and fuck the whole goddamn store. Oh, and your shitty line-dancing employees look like complete assholes too”.

Well maybe the speech wasn't that good, or very clever, but I would’ve loved to spit it at her anyway. I’m a pretty patient guy in general, but this really put me over the edge for some reason. In my experience the customer is practically never right, but this was ridiculous. No respect at all.

So, that’s all that basically happened. I took my cash, signed some sheet, and mentally flipped her the bird. I have to say, this experience has sullied my whole NCCC perspective. It’s a sad day.