Unfiltered Story #184523

(Customer enters. She has three children under the age of 8 with her, and goes up to order while they go out to the kid play area.)

Coworker: Hi, what can I get for you?

Customer: (orders a long list of food, including a kid’s meal)

Coworker: What drink did you want with the kids meal?

Customer: I want a smoothie.

Coworker: Which flavour did you want, #1 or #2?

Customer: I’m not sure, can I pay for this all and then go check and come back?

Coworker: Yeah, no problem.

(She pays and heads outside. Coworker hasn’t put through the smoothie on the order, because it’s impossible for us to put through a smoothie of unspecified size and flavour on the system, so it hasn’t been paid for.)

Customer: Okay, she wanted a small #1 flavour with the meal.

Coworker: Awesome, I’ll make sure that gets on the meal. That’ll just be (price).

Customer: I already paid for it.

Coworker: No you didn’t, sorry. I didn’t put through the smoothie with what you paid for before, because I had to know what flavour it was to give you a price. But if you pay for it now it’ll equal out the same.

Customer: Well you made me think I’d paid for it! I’m not paying for it a second time.

Coworker: I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to mislead you. But you haven’t paid for it, so I can’t give it to you with the other food unless you do. You can check your receipt if you like.

Customer: I already threw it out. Get your manager!

(My coworker brings the manager over. Our manager on duty is a tiny woman who is less than 5 feet tall. She also has a slight accent, since she is from the Phillipines. The much taller customer makes a big deal of leaning over towards her to be taller and in her face when she arrives.)

Customer: She’s trying to charge me twice for the drink. This is absolutely unacceptable service. Are you even managing these kids here?

(At this point, quite a few of us have started coming closer to the front counter to see what’s happening since the woman is acting very threatening.)

Manager: I’m sorry, but she didn’t put through the drink before, so you haven’t been charged for it yet. I’m sorry about the confusion.

Customer: Then why did I pay full price for [kids meal] before?

Manager: She gave you the drink discount on your coffee, because it just gives you a set amount off. The total will be the same, after you pay for your smoothie.

Customer: Well this is just ridiculous! I want my coffee right now! (leans in close to coworker and tells her an order very very slowly)

(Coworker comes over to where I am working, since I am the barista.)

Coworker: She wants a small long black, with a shot of milk, hot.

(Since she specifies ‘hot’ I put a small amount of milk, since I can’t increase the water temperature beyond what the machine puts out. I take it over to her at the front counter.)

Customer: What is this? I asked for a shot of milk. Does this look like a shot of milk?!

Me: I’m sorry, did you want more or less milk?

Customer; (rolling her eyes) A shot of milk is 30ml of milk. Is this 30ml of milk? No. It’s barely a drop of milk. God, I can’t believe they call you a barista.

(I go away, and remake her coffee to bring it back. When I return, the woman is still arguing one-sidedly).

Customer: She spoke to me completely disrespectfully! I was led to believe that I had paid for it already!

Manager: Yes, I’m sorry about that.

Customer: Yeah, sure you are. Do you even speak English, huh?

Me: I have your coffee Ma’am.

(She tries it, and apparently finds it okay, because she thanks me and goes back to lecturing the manager. After about five more minutes of her telling the manager that she’s not managing well, and probably doesn’t speak English well enough to be a manager, she goes away and eats with her kids.

Twenty minutes later, she returns to the manager.)

Customer: Look, I’m sorry. I’m not an angry person, I don’t go off at shop staff. But that girl was totally out of line.

Manager: I appreciate the apology, thank you.

Customer: Seriously, if you’re the manager you need to act like the manager. The way she spoke to me was totally unacceptable, she didn’t make it clear at all.

Manager: I will make sure to-

Customer: And how was I to know the flavour anyway? You guys don’t even have a big menu board, it just flicks up on the screens!

Manager: We can’t control that, it’s the corporate decision.

Customer: I understand, but it’s silly the way you’ve all handled this. I got upset because all your staff was listening in on us, and standing around us. Do you think it’s acceptable for them to come and involve themselves? You’re meant to be in charge, you’re meant to stop them.

Manager: Yes, I’m sorry that it was handled badly-

Coworker: I am not an angry person, I’m not a bad person, I’m not mean to shop staff so I don’t want to come out of this feeling like I’m a bad person. You can see why I’m upset, can’t you? You see why this was unacceptable?

Manager: Yes, absolutely.

(Finally, after about ten minutes of assuaging her guilt, the customer went back to her kids. The manager left to pull herself together, as she was nearly in tears from the customer trying to intimidate her before and again then.)