DNA Or Pay

(I am a manager at a mom-and-pop Chinese restaurant. A group of three ladies comes in, sits down, and places their orders. Fast forward to when they’ve finished their meals and want their bill.)

Customer: “I want to talk to a manager. There’s a hair in my food!”

(I go to check and see that all three of them have finished their meals.)

Me:  “I’m sorry, ma’am, what was wrong with your meal?”

Customer: *shows me a blonde hair* “I found this in my rice! What are you going to do about it?”

(Considering NO ONE on staff has blonde hair and they actually ate everything, I apologize and offer her 50% off her meal, even though I’ve been doing this long enough to see through this scam.)

Customer: “WHAT?! THAT’S IT! We usually get ALL our meals for free!”

Me: “I see you’ve done this before. I’ll tell you what, ma’am. My daughter works as a forensic scientist for the police department. Let me call her to come and get this hair and run a DNA test on it. We will compare it to the DNA you’ve left on your coffee cup. If it’s not a match, I will give you free lunch every day for life. If it’s a match, we will waste our judicial system’s time and we will have you charged with fraud. What will it be, ma’am?”

(They paid in full. And my daughter is not a forensic scientist; she’s a veterinarian technician. I don’t particularly like scammers.)

This story is part of our Small Business roundup!

Read the next story in this roundup!

Read the Small Business roundup!