Using your CHL effectively

[E10]

Let's think - what does a CHL (or now, LTC) say about us, beyond the fact that we may be armed?

We're not felons. No felony convictions, lifetime.
We've not been convicted of a Class A or B misdemeanor for the time we've had our licenses plus 5 years.
We've not been convicted of criminal mischief rising to the level of a felony for that time plus 10 years.
We're not spouse or child abusers.
We're not addicted to drugs or alcohol.
We're not gang members.
We pay our taxes (state and local, anyway - IRS can take a flyin' leap).
We pay our child support (those of us so obligated).
We, as a group, have a far, far, lower conviction rate for all crimes than the general public, and even lower than that of the law enforcement community, which is also excellently low.

In short, we're responsible, law-abiding, tax-paying citizens or legal resident aliens. A driver license says nothing about any of that stuff. Even one convicted of DWI can get a driver license again, eventually.

So we do deserve respect, and deserve to be welcome in all business establishments. I have the utmost respect for any fellow license holder I happen to meet. Brothers and sisters in arms, if you will. All that, and we get to carry guns, too.

[tomtexan]

May I present a different take on this story? I am not trying to offend anyone, just give some food for thought.
The OP says that the confrontation "escalated" and that he had to be "calmed down." I've been there, too, we all have.
BUT...under those circumstances I don't want anyone seeing my license or my gun. I don't want to give them ammunition to say "there's another one of those hothead gun carriers that we have to be afraid of."
I always tell my students, and I hopefully practice it myself, that someone with a gun should be the calmest person in the room. And we should portray ourselves to others that way.
Just my two cents worth.

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[jt88]

Imho if you were arguing and getting upset i wouldnt have shown a chl. It just seems like a scare tactic. And yiu said their attitude changed after that. Imho its like you saying "i have a gun obviously im upset you need to exchange my coffee pot" why not just go unconcealed and decide to open carry mid conversation? I disagree with your tactic. Show them a drivers license instead. Bad move.

Yep. The fact that he says he needed to be "calmed down" says it all. I would like to hear the store's side of the story here. I'm willing to bet that they were just trying to deal with a difficult customer and took the CHL as a subtle threat.

[Texsquatch]

I'm sure the OP was trying to be humorous (hopefully) but this can easily be taken as a story of intimidating the Walmart employee because the mere hint that the customer was armed made them more helpful.

We all know that our posts are being read by others who are drooling for comments to use against us. I would expect better behavior from a forum member given the context of what we discuss here.

[puma guy]

Imho if you were arguing and getting upset i wouldnt have shown a chl. It just seems like a scare tactic. And yiu said their attitude changed after that. Imho its like you saying "i have a gun obviously im upset you need to exchange my coffee pot" why not just go unconcealed and decide to open carry mid conversation? I disagree with your tactic. Show them a drivers license instead. Bad move.

Yep. The fact that he says he needed to be "calmed down" says it all. I would like to hear the store's side of the story here. I'm willing to bet that they were just trying to deal with a difficult customer and took the CHL as a subtle threat.

I agree you get much better service being calm and courteous. BUT I have run into some doofuses at WalMart that could get one's ire stirred. They used to put the battery receipts in little pouches on the side and they disintegrated in no time. I returned a car battery that was nine months old and the "manager" refused to warrant the battery because the receipt was dust, even after I showed her both the date code sticker and the manufacture date stamped on the battery. She actually said there's no way to verify that I didn't purchase it before that! I was able to keep calm anyway which was very hard. They record the battery info and date of sale in their system nowadays.

[Smokey]

I accidentally handed my LTC to a hotel clerk in California. I only noticed afterwards because my driver's license was not in its usual spot. I was thinking "oh great" to myself. The clerk didn't look at me funny or even really notice. I was kind of disappointed.

[Maxwell]

if I had a photo ID (I guess that somehow people without a photo ID cannot have coffee pot failures).

This is actually a fraud-prevention practice to keep one person from returning too much merchandise without receipts.

If I understand it right (from my retail experience), it works something like this: someone can get an item illegally (steal it, use a stolen credit card, etc.) then return it for a gift card. Then they either (a) sell the gift card or (b) use the gift card to buy other merchandise, which they then return with the receipt and get cash instead of another gift card (some places).

EDIT: I searched after posting and was reminded that it's also sometimes even if you have a receipt to prevent habitual "renting" -- buying an item, using it, and returning it. AND I learned there's a service that businesses use to track this.

This is 100% correct. It is a fraud prevention practice. It may be annoying to those of us that are honest but you'd be surprised at how many people say "never mind" when asked for ID without a receipt. And to be very honest, after years in retail, fraud and theft prevention does help keep prices down.

[DonFromTexas]

Well, the consensus seems to be that I should have not used the CHL for ID. Some read a LOT into the post, probably because I was not as clear as I could have been. (by the way, I was NOT carrying at the time)
There was no shouting or screaming, just a customer that was saying he should not be expected to have memorized the sales clerks name or register number from 5 months prior, AFTER having been assured that the exchange would be without problems on the phone an hour before. This gal was determined that she was NOT going to exchange the item under any circumstances, probably had found her workload was far less if she could think up enough excuses to not make the exchange! Her tone in asking for ID I believe was NOT for ID, but in the hope she could use that catch 22 to avoid the paperwork. My use of the CHL was never intended to intimidate the clerk or anyone, but to toss in an unconventional ID to see her reaction. I was fully expecting her to refuse the CHL, and ask for something else.
My surprise from the result was the reason for posting, simply to share what happened, not to encourage the use of the CHL for anything other than its intended purpose.
Their process for the exchange seemed very work intensive, when they could have pulled that information up on the computer and confirmed that I had in fact bought the item there.
As a retired combat US Army officer, I do tend to look at someone carrying a handgun in an entirely different light than most people I think.