Please Sub This Employee For Someone Competent

I am third in line at a popular US sandwich shop. A man, [Customer #1], and a lady, [Customer #2], are in front of me. This particular place — not the chain, just this location — isn’t known for its speediness so I am very glad there isn’t a long line.

[Customer #1] orders a BMT. A new girl, [Employee #1], has to ask her manager what meats those are, but she eventually gets it.

Another employee, [Employee #2], a male in his twenties, skips [Customer #2] and asks what I want. I point to [Customer #2] and tell him to help her first. She orders two sandwiches; he gets the meat wrong on one of them and fixes it, all the time trying to get my attention and ask where I work, etc. He puts one of her sandwiches in the toaster and he starts working on mine.

[Customer #1] needs another sandwich, just a simple meatball and cheese, so the girl starts working on that. Finally, after it gets toasted, it gets moved up to in front of the veggies, but for some reason it’s not packed up and the customer just stands there waiting to pay. 

Meanwhile, [Customer #2]’s sandwich has been in the toaster way too long and is burned. She requests a replacement sandwich after the flirty guy just scrapes the charred blackness onto the sandwich. He keeps the meat and places fresh bread under the meat and tries to toast it. [Customer #2] again tells him no, that won’t work; she needs a completely new sandwich. He remakes it, messing up again on her meat order, finally gets it right, and puts hers and mine on the toaster tray.

I tell him to take mine off and he does, and then puts it back on. I tell him, “No, take mine off, and please finish both of their sandwiches before continuing to make mine.”

All this time, [Customer # 1]’s toasted meatball sandwich is still not wrapped up and is sitting — now cold — on the counter. [Customer #1] is finally able to pay and leave after new girl almost gives him one of [Customer #2]’s sandwiches.

I start thinking we’re finally getting somewhere. They start working on the veggies on mine, and [Employee #2] starts talking with the supervisor on duty who has stepped behind the till just to help the line move real quick — she was on her lunch — and he starts arguing with her on the best way to ring up [Customer #2].

That finally gets resolved while the rest of us customers stand around awkwardly and the supervisor leaves because she’s just fed up with how he was telling her off in front of everyone. When he gets to the last ingredient on my sandwich, oregano, and I’m excited to just get out of this place. The top of the container falls off and the entire contents of the jar are emptied onto my sandwich.

[Employee #2] tries to laugh it off and say, “Wasn’t that funny? I thought that was funny; don’t you think so? That’s never happened before. Jeez, that was hilarious.”

By this time, everyone in the line is rolling our eyes at each other and thinking, “Oh, my God, can this get any worse? Can you believe this?”

I go back to the beginning of the line to have my sandwich remade and I watch him carefully as he’s made at least three significant mistakes already. He doubles two of the meats on my BMT –the Sub of the Day — and it is intentional; he has no idea how much meat is supposed to be on it. But there is no way I am going to tell him otherwise at this point.

He leaves my sandwich and [Employee #1] finishes it. She does an amazing job. [Employee #2] rings me up, all the time talking about how people were giving [Employee #1] a hard time — no one was — and how she just needed to do it at her pace and she’d get it done. I was more thinking that he needed the help, not her.

Then, I notice before I pay that he’s rung me up for the full price; as the Sub of the Day, my sandwich should be almost two dollars cheaper than that. I tell him that, and he’s like, “What’s the Sub of the Day?”

It’s 7:30 pm by this time; they close in less than two hours. You’d think he would know what it was by now. But, I finally get my extra-meat sandwich for the correct price and practically run out of the shop.

It took them thirty minutes for two people to make four sandwiches correctly, and the person on her first day completed more sandwiches and they were done correctly than the “experienced” guy who was supposed to train her.