Political Weirdos

Nope. Here's how talking to them like a human works:

"C'mon man! Where did you buy that thing? Here? Get me a receipt, or at least pull one off the shelf, then I can help. C'mon, give me something to work with here!"

See how I put it back on them to take action and took control of the conversation? "You do a thing, I'll try to help from there. Quid pro quo, super simple stuff.

YMMV depending on the store's policies and the customer, but you get the idea. Do not ever back down on bullies, call them out while offering options. A hard "NO" is always a fail.

My first tech support job, had a guy going off on me about a thing, think it was where we had genuinely done him wrong. I'm new, I'm stunned, not used to being talked to like that.

"Wait a minute! Sounds like we "fucked up whatever", and I got ideas on fixing that, but are you mad at me personally?"

And then I shut the fuck up, let him struggle. (Didn't plan this, just spurted it out.)

"Well... no... it's just a very frustrating situation."

"I'd be mad if I was you. So look, let's start over and nail this down. I have a couple of ideas, but I need to get the story straight."

I'm empathizing, I'm listening, and I'm not pretending to do so. I really am. Customers smell fear disingenuous bullshit almost more so than fear.