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This is my first outcry against sucky customers on this board, so here goes!
About four years ago I was working this mid-level Italian restaurant (cloth napkins, but a take-out counter all its own, which is where I was stationed). It had been a pretty slow day, no one had really called or placed a take-out order, most customers were just dining in. About halfway through my shift, the place was still dead and I get a call. Excited at the break in monotony, I answer with the last threads of enthusiasm I would ever exhibit at a job. I take the order (a stuffed pizza, essentially no different save for the fact that the ingredients are all stuffed between two sheets of dough) and wait. A woman comes in to pick it up and the moment I looked at her I knew she meant that my day was about to go from boring to hassled. She had that air about her, she was about two inches shorter than I but she was still managing to look down her nose at me. But I stay polite and wish her a good day though she said nothing to me, and I watch her walk to her car, get in, tear the box open and begin to shove pizza in her mouth. I watched her eat half the pizza before she stopped, closed the box, got back out of her car and began to walk back towards the door. Crap. I braced myself as she burst through the door.
SC: THIS CHEESE ISN'T REAL!
Me: Um...excuse me ma'am?
SC: My cheese...IT ISN'T REAL! I KNOW HOW CHEESE BAKES AND IT DOESN'T BAKE LIKE THIS!"
I glanced back at the pizza cook (behind the take-out counter, you can see the pizza kitchen and watch them cook), and watch him cower a little. He was very good at his job and took real pride in it, and I could feel my temper starting to simmer as I watched his expression drop. I turned back to the pizza beast.
Me: I assure you ma'am, the cheese is 100% real. I've seen the package it comes in, I've watch them shred it...
SC: I want a manager, you don't know what you're talking about.
Twitch. Okay. That's fine. I'll let C (I'll call him that) take care of her. Because the thing about C was, that he took crap from no one. I walked to the bar where he was wiping down the counter.
Me: I need you up front before I slap this woman. She says the cheese isn't real.
C: Excuse me?
Me: Exactly.
So I follow C back to the counter where he first kind of just stares at the woman, then takes it where I left off.
C: So our cheese isn't real, huh?
SC: NO! I WANT MY MONEY BACK! I know how cheese bakes and it ISN'T LIKE THIS!
C: Well how do you suppose cheese bakes, then? What's different about this cheese than how real cheese bakes?
SC: -stares-
C: Do you have your receipt?
SC: -continues to stare-
C: Your receipt.
SC: It's in my car.
C: Then get it.
She walked out and C turned and stared at me. He shook his head a little, proclaimed that things like that woman just weren't real, and I told him how I watched her eat half the pizza in her car in front of the restaurant. That made him really mad. I stepped back as she walked back inside and slammed her receipt on the counter. C looked at it, yanked the money from the register and handed it to her.
SC: This isn't all my change, I paid more than this!
C: -recounts the money- That's the amount on your receipt, see? -dangles it in front of her-
SC: That isn't all of it!"
C's eye twitched.
C: Get out. You have your money, get out. And don't come back until you have an example of how real cheese bakes, then, heck, I'll give you my paycheck if it's any different.
She started to open her mouth again.
C: LEAVE NOW.
People did that more often than people who haven't worked food services realize. Eat half or all of their meal then want some sort of special service or refund because "they didn't like it." It's amazing how cheap people are (and lazy, considering they have to go out and can't just cook their own food, which would cost less to begin with).
About four years ago I was working this mid-level Italian restaurant (cloth napkins, but a take-out counter all its own, which is where I was stationed). It had been a pretty slow day, no one had really called or placed a take-out order, most customers were just dining in. About halfway through my shift, the place was still dead and I get a call. Excited at the break in monotony, I answer with the last threads of enthusiasm I would ever exhibit at a job. I take the order (a stuffed pizza, essentially no different save for the fact that the ingredients are all stuffed between two sheets of dough) and wait. A woman comes in to pick it up and the moment I looked at her I knew she meant that my day was about to go from boring to hassled. She had that air about her, she was about two inches shorter than I but she was still managing to look down her nose at me. But I stay polite and wish her a good day though she said nothing to me, and I watch her walk to her car, get in, tear the box open and begin to shove pizza in her mouth. I watched her eat half the pizza before she stopped, closed the box, got back out of her car and began to walk back towards the door. Crap. I braced myself as she burst through the door.
SC: THIS CHEESE ISN'T REAL!
Me: Um...excuse me ma'am?
SC: My cheese...IT ISN'T REAL! I KNOW HOW CHEESE BAKES AND IT DOESN'T BAKE LIKE THIS!"
I glanced back at the pizza cook (behind the take-out counter, you can see the pizza kitchen and watch them cook), and watch him cower a little. He was very good at his job and took real pride in it, and I could feel my temper starting to simmer as I watched his expression drop. I turned back to the pizza beast.
Me: I assure you ma'am, the cheese is 100% real. I've seen the package it comes in, I've watch them shred it...
SC: I want a manager, you don't know what you're talking about.
Twitch. Okay. That's fine. I'll let C (I'll call him that) take care of her. Because the thing about C was, that he took crap from no one. I walked to the bar where he was wiping down the counter.
Me: I need you up front before I slap this woman. She says the cheese isn't real.
C: Excuse me?
Me: Exactly.
So I follow C back to the counter where he first kind of just stares at the woman, then takes it where I left off.
C: So our cheese isn't real, huh?
SC: NO! I WANT MY MONEY BACK! I know how cheese bakes and it ISN'T LIKE THIS!
C: Well how do you suppose cheese bakes, then? What's different about this cheese than how real cheese bakes?
SC: -stares-
C: Do you have your receipt?
SC: -continues to stare-
C: Your receipt.
SC: It's in my car.
C: Then get it.
She walked out and C turned and stared at me. He shook his head a little, proclaimed that things like that woman just weren't real, and I told him how I watched her eat half the pizza in her car in front of the restaurant. That made him really mad. I stepped back as she walked back inside and slammed her receipt on the counter. C looked at it, yanked the money from the register and handed it to her.
SC: This isn't all my change, I paid more than this!
C: -recounts the money- That's the amount on your receipt, see? -dangles it in front of her-
SC: That isn't all of it!"
C's eye twitched.
C: Get out. You have your money, get out. And don't come back until you have an example of how real cheese bakes, then, heck, I'll give you my paycheck if it's any different.
She started to open her mouth again.
C: LEAVE NOW.
People did that more often than people who haven't worked food services realize. Eat half or all of their meal then want some sort of special service or refund because "they didn't like it." It's amazing how cheap people are (and lazy, considering they have to go out and can't just cook their own food, which would cost less to begin with).
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