Wouldn't it be great if you could just "fire" your problematic tenants? Sadly, while you can reserve the right to refuse rental to a customer, it's difficult to get someone out once they're already in, especially your gripe has nothing to do with the payment of rent. But a self-storage manager in Fremont, Calif., was recently able to use a facility promotion to oust a troublemaker. The story is great for a Friday-afternoon chuckle, which I'm sure many of us could use.

Earlier this week, I learned about a website called Not Always Right, dedicated to "funny and stupid customer quotes." The site is an outlet for employees of retail and service-oriented businesses to share their stories about dealing with the public. Someone posted a link to the site on Twitter because of a submission titled, "The Fine Art of Firing a Customer." It describes a conversation between a self-storage manager and one of his customers:

Customer: “Hi, I saw on your website that you have storage for $100, but I’m paying $130.”

Manager: “Yeah, that’s a promotional rate.”

Customer: “Well, can I get that rate?”

Manager: “I can’t just change people’s rates. It’s only for new customers to that space.”

Customer: “Well, can I just move into that storage?”

Manager: “You can’t just move it from one storage to the other and get the new rate. You would have to have everything out because I can’t vacate it until it’s empty.”

Customer: “That’s fine. I’ll move this Saturday.”

(The customer moves out the following Saturday, gets everything loaded into their truck then stops by the office.)

Customer: “Alright, I moved everything out of my storage.”

Manager: “That’s great. Now, get out.”

Customer: “What? Can I get that other storage?”

Manager: “Well, I looked at your past history with the company and you’ve been consistently late and rude to other customers. I’m afraid we’re going to deny the new rental. My manager wouldn’t let me evict you but you moved out yourself, so everything’s good.”

Customer: “But I have all my things taken off the property! Where am I going to put them?”

Manager: “Anywhere but here.”

To be fair, I should point out that the conversation was reported by a friend, not the facility manager himself. But to me, the manager comes across just as poorly as the tenant. I doubt if many of you would speak to your customers—even the bad ones—this way. Even still, it's a great story/fantasy. If only.

Who would you love to fire at your facility? Share your tenant horror stories in this blog, or better yet, add a thread to this section at Self-Storage Talk: Tales From the Trenches.

Hope your weekend is hassle-free.