Earlier this week, my phone rang. It was not an angry customer calling. Worse — it was an angry would-be customer calling, a woman who I am sure will never shop at our store.

Here’s what happened:

She called our store to discover if we carried Doggie Diapers. My cashier said, “Absolutely! We do carry Doggie Diapers.” The would-be customer, thrilled, asked another question: “Can you tell me how much they are?”

Here’s what my crew member said:

“I’m at the register and it’s really busy right now, so I can’t tell you that right now.”

That was the extent of the call — leaving our would-be caller furious!

In an ideal world, our crew member might still have been busy. It happens. However, he could have said, “I’m really busy at the register right now, but if you give me your name and number, I’ll call you right back with that information in just a minute.”

Chances are, the would-be customer would have been a LOT happier with that answer!

Who was at fault in this scenario?

It was my fault. Clearly, I should have provided training on this issue: this is EXACTLY the reason I’m working on an employee training manual. There is one thing every retailer needs, and that’s a common sense training manual that spells out When X happens, you do Y!

For all the bosses or managers who might be reading this, I want you to know one thing: when our employees make a bone-headed blunder like the one you just read about, it’s not malicious. They’re not trying to hurt your store. They just didn’t have the proper answer to the situation readily at hand.

It’s our job to make sure they have the answers in place. We have to spell it out: when you’re faced with this situation, you need to take these actions. This should be part of every employee manual!

In fact, if you want to make covering this type of topic a fun part of your employee training, you should test newly trained employees on the concept. When they pass the test, give them a prize. Make it fun. This is something we can do that the larger retailers simply can’t!