Sometimes, all a server needs is a little bit of satisfying karma to make dealing with an awful customer worthwhile. No matter how big the temper tantrum may be, sometimes the universe is really on the employee’s side.
This sever tells his story about the time when he was able to give this rude customer a piece of his mind!
“Today I bring you a tale of vouchers and gift certificates. The following story includes idiot customers trying to use two 10% off meals vouchers on the same bill. And balls of steel to tell them no.
Roll back to January ’11, we offered vouchers to customers for 10% off their meals, to be used before January 31st 2011. It clearly states on the vouchers that they were for one food bill only and one per customer, they also have no monetary value.
Now, every time I offered someone one of these vouchers, I always told them the rules so they knew. Most people were fine and remembered…some didn’t.
Cue a table of 4 that were booked in, had their meals and drinks, everything was fine for them. Here’s the kicker, they were friends of the boss (bossman told me himself he knew them personally). Now I’m pretty sure all of you fellow servers know how entitled customers can be when they know the bossman/woman. These people were no different.
They come up to my little desk to pay their bill, ask what their total is, I tell them and hand over their copy of the bill so they can see for themselves. Instead of nicely putting the voucher in my hand, they toss 2 vouchers in my general direction without so much as a ‘oh, by the way I have a voucher’. For some inexplicable reason my temper is pretty short these days (must be the years of dealing with idiots), and I may have been a little bit rude back to them.
Me: ‘I’m sorry sir, but you can only use one of these vouchers, it does clearly state on the bottom one per food bill’ (I had moved slightly backwards at this point nearer the telephone as the guy’s face had gone from happy to ‘you freaking what?!’ in seconds)
Customer: ‘But we’ve come as couples and we want to pay separately with these vouchers. You should have made us separate bills!’
Me: ‘I’m sorry, but because you did not tell me when you first came in that you wanted separate bills, I did not write out separate bills, I do not write out separate bills unless I am asked. I’m not a mind reader. Now I will accept one, and only one voucher. You will have to pay the rest of the bill in money.’
Customer: ‘Well I don’t like your attitude. I know Bossman he said I could use both of them, and he will not be happy that you will not accept our second voucher.’
Me: ‘Go right on ahead with that, I’ll just go get him.’ (he was in the kitchen, I went and explained the situation to him and he said to just keep telling them only one voucher)
Me: ‘Bossman has told me he has not said anything of the sort, and that you can use one of the vouchers, as I have repeatedly told you. So please hurry up and pay, you’re holding up the restaurant, I have customers waiting to be served which I cannot do at the moment.’
Idiot: * Muttering away under his breath – something about ‘stupid idiot girl, doesn’t know what she’s doing’ *
I ignore his muttering and steady stream of swears, make him fork over the money and voucher for the bill (I had deducted the 10%), I see him trying to make a grab for both of the vouchers back, so I grabbed one of the vouchers and scrawled in huge black letters VOID. Gave him a sickly sweet ‘I secretly want to kill you’ smile, handed him back the still valid voucher, put the money in the till and went to serve my customers.
As I was serving customers, I thought he was finally gone, he shouted from the doorway ‘I’m not giving you a tip, you’re a stupid uneducated cow’.
I tried to resist the urge to shout back, it failed.
Me: ‘I’m not uneducated, I have 7 GCSE’s (General Certificate of Secondary Education) from A to C, and 5 A Levels, and I’m going to Oxford.’
His face dropped.”
Sweet, sweet Karma.
