I AM the Manager

I love it when an annoyed customer demands to talk to my manager and I can reply, "I AM the manager." "Oh," they say, usually in a quieter, docile voice. Some then take what I say as fact, while others, after recovering from the initial shock, demand to talk to someone higher up. Fine, here's our corporate office number, but since I'm just following company policy, they're not going to do anything. Depending on how demanding or rude the person is, sometimes I give the 1-800 number, while other times I make them pay the long distance charges. When given the long distance number, most customers insist that we MUST have a 1-800 number. "No," I reply, "that's the only customer service number we have."