[MultipleParadox]

I understand where you came from;

Not wanting to accept a return for whatever the reason, if the item is in good condition, is a really bad business practice.

About the discount thing, I don't see a big negative point here, as it's up to him. Then again, maybe he could have shown more respect though.

Concerning the ordering of items: this is kind of a grey area to me about customer service. You own a shop that doesn't do a shitload of business, margins on hi-priced items is low. You don't want to stock a lot of them but still want to offer good choices to your customers, so you list them on your website for them to order. If a customer wants item "x" he order it on the website, thus pay for it, then you do whatever is needed to have it shipped to him, everybody is happy. When customer wants you to order item "y" before actually paying for it, for him, you have choice to make obviously: you either do it, and thrust the customer to buy the item, accepting the risk of staying stuck with the item inducing loss of profits if he change his mind, or you just don't do it and ask the customer to oay upfront.

I'm pretty sure this is what hapened, or something close to this; now, who's at fault? The customer for asking the seller to buy an item and then pay for it? Or the seller for refusing to do so because he don't want to risk loosing money in the end, considering he might not be getting any request for that item in a potetially long time?

Personally I think both are in their rights. But in a situation like this, if the customer gets a no, I think he should just understand it's not a store policy to do so and go shop elsewhere for this item. As for the seller, he has some kind of "obligation" to refuse the request respectfully or offer some alternative, at least that's what every customer would expect.

Now if the problem is one of attitude, that's a different matter than being a crook or anything...

My 2cents from that story, it probably don't account for everything and I surely can't claim fully understanding the issue, but take what you will!