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The original was posted on /r/talesfromretail by /u/the_DARSH on 2025-07-20 09:43:38+00:00.

This happened years ago when I used to work at a cell phone store. A dad and two young boys came in and I ask how I can help them. Dad says they need to get a new phone for one of the boys, and points to the one. So I go, not thinking, “aw did you break your phone man?” and he goes “No, it got burned up when our house burned down.” And then, the other kid says, “Yeah, and our dog got burned up too.” Aaaaaaaand they both start crying. Dad is looking at me like “damn you.” I tried to salvage what I could out of the interaction and just made the rest of it as fast and easy as I could, no upsells. I felt terrible, I’m sure getting a new phone was the ONE thing that kid might’ve been excited about. I STILL feel bad about it, but at least I didn’t ask a fat lady when the baby was due like my coworker did.