Ok, so after the last time I was shouted at in front of a shop full of people for being a drug addict, D and I have understandably avoided going to any branch of Boots unless it’s absolutely necessary.

Boots and Asda both sell very cheap antihistamines, which D needs cause he has crazy allergies which need continuous dealing-with (all verified by a real live doctor, no self-diagnosis happening here). Asda is a car journey away. Boots is a 5 minute walk away. So sometimes, Boots is where D gets his antihistamines.

Never again.

He went into our local branch of Boots earlier to buy painkillers for on-going dental work (that applies to both of us) and because I’m crap at remembering to reorder my prescriptions. Upon approaching the counter and ordering aspirin and codeine tablets, he was informed by the educationally-sub-normal 12 year-old behind the counter that since he was ‘in here buying painkillers every week’ he would have to be referred to the pharmacist.

The pharmacist did his best to look busy and hide until D actually called him over and explained that no, he wasn’t even in that branch once a week, never mind buying painkillers. The only time he goes in there is to buy antihistamines, and that isn’t even on a weekly basis cause we usually go to Asda and tend to get more than a week’s worth of antihistamines at a time. Hell, we almost never actually BUY painkillers from anywhere since I get them on prescription (which I do not get filled at Boots, for obvious reasons).

It seems that this is simply how the bottom-dwelling scum who work in Boots treat people. They accuse them of being (oh my god!) regular customers and while they manage to remember seeing a person in the shop more times that the person has actually been in the shop, they take wild artistic license with their accusations about what the person actually buys.

After D explained that the painkillers were for on-going dental work, the dumbfuck pharmacist told him to get painkillers from the dentist. Seriously. He then told him to go to his doctor about needing painkillers following dental work. Seriously.

Has anyone out there ever gone to their doctor and said “I’ve been having dental work done and need painkillers which I can easily buy in a shop, but I would like a prescription for them any way”? Exactly.

And following that steady stream of verbal crap was the condescending lecture that seems to flow like raw sewage from the mouths of the faulty robots who spend their days behind the counter of Boots, alienating their customers. Then he sold D a packet of paracetamol and codeine after some half-assed mumblings about aspirin. Cause the ASPIRIN is the issue.

ALL this was done at a great volume in the middle of a crowded shop. This approach seems to be company policy. Amusingly, Boots are currently running a TV advert about how many different kinds of painkillers they sell over-the-counter and how it’s not that women deal with pain better than men, they just remember to buy painkilers.

The advert actually shows a (weak pathetic forgetful useless) man with a headache and an office full of women handing him the huge range of painkillers they all kept in their desks.

Hypocritical bullshit motherfuckers. I have now ordered my repeat prescription and will never EVER be buying anything from any branch of Boots ever again. From now on, I would crawl over broken glass while listening to the soundtrack of High School Musical to get to a different chemist.

In honour of an astounding track record of hitting customer service rock bottom and keeping on digging, I would like to give a second Go Fuck Yourself award to Boots the chemist, staffed entirely by judgmental cunts who probably sit in the back room of the pharmacy during their lunch break feverishly masturbating over imaginary scenarios in which they reprimand people for wanting to spend money in their store.

And on special occasions, they make photo-fit pictures of what they imagine to be stereotypical drug seekers, roll up the pictures and fuck each other in the ass with them while gasping out the magic words…
“We…see…you…in…here…every…WEEEEEK!”.

Lucky me. The phone rang and when I answered I was not-so-fucking-delighted to find that the person (and I use that term loosely) on the other end was one of the professional bullies at LBM phoning on behalf of Orange.

When I repeatedly explained (slowly, without using any big words) to the ‘person’ on the phone that I STILL didn’t have any desire to talk to them and STILL wanted my details removed from their database, I was shouted at until I gave up and put the phone down.

Since there was no way to contact LBM without handing over more contact details I attempted to pursue Orange for some kind of resolution. Orange has no corporate phone numbers listed anywhere so I called the business support line as they seemed the most likely to know where to refer me to for help.

According to an obnoxious man in Orange’s business sales department, the only way to contact Orange to make a complaint is in writing. There is no way that I can speak to someone about the issue.

He told me to contact LBM and when I explained that this was impossible without handing over more personal contact details, he suggested that I register an email address solely for the purpose of making a complaint. Seriously. Hear that dull thudding sound? That’s me banging my head off the wall.

Orange are basically paying another company to harass people on their behalf so that no-one anywhere ever has to actually take responsibility for what is happening. If you want to read other people’s unfavourable feedback about the fucknuts that populate the world of ball-suck that is LBM, check this out.

With any luck, Consumer Direct and Watchdog will be able to help, or at least point me in the direction of someone who can.