Gahh..so what's the point?

[DoomPuppy]

The point is probably to make me absolutely crazy but I'll ask anyway.  I have a sim that owns Papaya Regime in Bluewater and she is the only sim running the store at the moment.  When I had Brandi Broke visit her store, not only was there some random townie working there but my sim was acting like a complete tard..going up and down the elevator, I guess hoping it would crash and smash her to bits..yeah right but anyway.  Neither one of the sims would check anyone out at the register, so customers were just throwing down their bags and leaving.  WTF? Why have the damn shop if I can't take anyone to visit it? Anyone else had this problem? 

[radiophonic]

I don't have that shop or hood but I know that you need to assign employees to those tasks if you want to visit the lot as a customer. A single manager won't run the place by his/her self.

[Ancient Sim]

I worked this out as well.  What I do is make the owner/staff selectable and instruct them to man the register or whatever, otherwise they just wander around looking for things to clean.

I also noticed that if my visiting Sims buy things, when I go back their with the owner they've mysteriously reappeared, they don't need to be restocked.  I haven't remembered to check yet whether they get the money for what's sold, but they certainly don't get the customer loyalty.  I've had Sims visit and buy stuff and not even appear in the customer panel when I've gone back with the owner.

[PlayLives]

When I've taken my sims to another playable's store to buy something, they will go to the register on their own. Then the playable sim who owns the store (though I'm not controlling them) will ring them up. Just let your sim stand at the register for a moment, eventually the other sim will ring them up.
I haven't played the owner's lot yet, so I don't know if he gained customer loyalty or if the stock is really out. I know that while at the store, restock markers came up whenever someone purchased something and the owner (who I wasn't controlling at the moment) would try to restock the items, but b/c there wasn't anything in his inventory, a messgage came up saying he couldn't. He also went to make more robots on his own.

[radiophonic]

I'm fairly certain that it just functions as a normal community lot when you're the customer. No bells, no whistles, however those jobs need to be assigned otherwise it's just a nonsense lot where the owner tries to commit suicide by breaking the elevator.

[sanmonroe]

I worked this out as well.  What I do is make the owner/staff selectable and instruct them to man the register or whatever, otherwise they just wander around looking for things to clean.

I also noticed that if my visiting Sims buy things, when I go back their with the owner they've mysteriously reappeared, they don't need to be restocked.  I haven't remembered to check yet whether they get the money for what's sold, but they certainly don't get the customer loyalty.  I've had Sims visit and buy stuff and not even appear in the customer panel when I've gone back with the owner.

Employees do earn badges though.

This is annoying since I don't like to pay people for badges other than the one job I give them. When I visit a lot the owner or manager moves everyone around.

[J. M. Pescado]

Well, I have an "ignore reassign" prototype currently in the OFB test directory that causes all reassign orders issued by non-selectable sims to be ignored. That should prevent attempts to reassign your men.

As for "paying for irrelevant badges", I have that in testing also, that makes irrelevant badges and skills not count towards the "fair wage". Since if they don't improve the ability of your employee to work, why should they expect you to pay for it?

[MyFireElf]

I don't have that shop or hood but I know that you need to assign employees to those tasks if you want to visit the lot as a customer. A single manager won't run the place by his/her self.

I've visited several shops run by playable sims - a salon, a flower shop, and a clothing store among them - all with multiple employees assigned to specific tasks. However, whenever I visit the shop with a different sim, no one is where they're supposed to be; no one is manning the cash register, everyone is out of uniform, and all of the employees are shopping instead of selling/restocking/etc...

I just don't get it. 

[DoomPuppy]

Feh..well at least I'm not alone in this.  I suppose JM has to fix Maxis screw ups once more or wait for a bloody unreliable patch  .  Thanks for replying to my thread guys.