Be Careful Of Who Knows Whom…

(I’m on some VERY strong pain meds, so I’m in a blissful daze. My boyfriend is with me since he drives and is much more coherent than me. We go to a popular fast food chain for food. They’ve recently installed self-serve kiosks, which we prefer to use as the employees of this store seem to never get our order right. We start ordering on it.)

Employee: “Oh, I can help you here!”

Boyfriend: “We’ll just use this, thanks!”

Employee: “Are you sure? This way you don’t have to deal with the machine!”

Boyfriend: “We’re sure.”

(Ordering takes a minute, as I can’t figure out what I want. I probably spend a good five minutes just staring at the menu, but we finally place our order. My boyfriend gets me to a table and we wait for our food, since they’ve started bringing it to the table. After a few minutes, we see the cashier start over with our tray. She SLAMS it down on the table, barely missing my hand.)

Cashier: “You f****** druggies coming in and wasting our time. Probably gonna leave a mess here and make us clean it up.”

(She then calmly walks back to the register. My boyfriend sits in shocked silence for a minute and then goes up to the counter.)

Boyfriend: “Manager. Now.”

Cashier: “Nope. I don’t have to.”

Boyfriend: “Really?” *turns to the kitchen* “CAN I GET A MANAGER UP HERE, PLEASE?!”

(A man not in the basic uniform comes over, looking annoyed.)

Manager: “What’s wrong?”

Boyfriend: “Apparently, your cashier. She nearly slammed our food down on my girlfriend’s hand simply because she was a ‘druggie.’”

Manager: “So?”

Boyfriend: “…so, you’re okay with your employee nearly harming someone over a false assumption and then berating her for it?”

Manager: “We get too many drug users in here. If she scares a few off, good!”

Boyfriend: “My girlfriend is not a drug user. You know what? I think I’ll call [Owner].”

(It turns out, my boyfriend knows the owner of the franchise through some work connections. Sure enough, he dials the number and puts it on speaker.)

Boyfriend: “Sorry to bother you outside of work hours, [Owner].”

Owner: “Oh, that’s no problem. What’s up, [Boyfriend]?”

Boyfriend: “Well, I’m at [location], and I’m having an issue with your staff.”

(He repeats the incident, including the manager’s reaction. The franchise owner is silent for a second.)

Owner: “[Manager], is this true?”

Manager: “Well, they are a problem! He’s probably covering for her!”

Owner: “I know for a fact he isn’t. Now, you’re gonna refund their entire order. I’ll be over in a bit to deal with you.”

(The manager gave him a refund, glaring at us the whole time. We ended up leaving with our food, since I was anxious about being there. Next time we went in, there was an entirely new crew working. We never had a problem after that.)