Well that was the worst service I've had in a while

[Chazzie]

Shortly before work I visited a McD's. I had a very simple order, one sandwich, one sweet tea. I was informed they were out of sweet tea. No biggie, I'll have a large Dr. Pepper then. While Front Counter (who appeared to be a shift leader) was making my drink, Drive Thru is calling out at her, saying "you should totally bring Nicole back!"
"No, I don't want to get fired!"
"You won't get fired!"
"Yes I will if I let her step back into this place."

I'm sort of like Ooookayy? And receive my drink. Front Counter, instead of turning around to get my sandwich off the heater and hand it to me, disappears into the back. And I know most McD's involve people staying strictly to their stations, so I don't blame Drive Thru for not quickly grabbing my order and sending me on my way. A girl is next to me at front counter and calls out to Drive Thru, "Gotta love it, right?"

Drive Thru answers, "This is why I'm leaving."

At this point, since I work in the food industry, this is dialogue I'm used to hearing... but never in front of a customer. Front Counter returns with the giant bucket of sweet tea and starts to pour it into the container. There is a ton of sugar at the bottom of the bucket and she scrapes it out and stirs it. She looks up at me and goes "Are you sure you don't want your sweet tea?? I'll just give it to you." And I answered it's fine, I really don't need two large drinks.

Eventually she got my sandwich to me and sent me on my way, but the whole thing took way longer than it could have and was extremely unprofessional. Must have been a rough Saturday.

[ADeMartino]

I'll agree that a conversation like this is inappropriate in front of a customer. However, don't blame THEM. This is a management issue. Management has failed to keep morale up in the store, and these people are burned the f*ck out. They don't have much to care about any more. It's hard to care about the company or the store when you're treated like just another cog in the machine. And complaining to management isn't going to help here, because management's response will be to 'find and punish' rather than address the real problem, which is probably their lack of providing incentives and recognition to their employees.

[Chazzie]

Yeah, that's essentially why I didn't bother reporting it. I don't know if the front counter person was a shift leader or a manager (possibly assistant manager if she has the power to bring back former employees), but yeah I'll agree that they sounded burned out. I was just kind of surprised.

[smileyeagle1021]

I still would hold it a little against the employees... yeah, it's management's fault that they are burnt out, but a professional doesn't involve a customer in a dispute with management. Also, as kind of a related unrelated note... if they are desperately trying to get out, it is best to always be on the very best behavior, because you never know which customer that is watching you being less than professional is the person who may be responsible for making hiring decisions at a place that you'd like to go.

[Kogarashi]

I'm with smileyeagle. I learned that lesson the hard way. I had a job at a craft store right after getting married, and managed to make the gaffe of commenting to a coworker about a customer calling about returning a non-returnable (and we informed them of that when they bought it) item, while other customers were within earshot. I got a stern talking-to from management, and while they didn't outright say it, I have a sneaky suspicion that that gaffe was the primary reason why I wasn't hired back after being let go because "they'd hired too many seasonal employees." Seeing as I was there still during the season and, while being reassured that I would be contacted if they suddenly had need of the extra employees, had never been called while there were brand new seasonal faces I'd never seen before working.