I am working at a bar/restaurant in a touristy part of Italy. A group of tourists is behaving obnoxiously, but they’re spending a lot of money, so our management is being lenient with them.

Customer: “Is your house cabernet any good?”

Me: “Well, it’s the house cabernet, ma’am. We wouldn’t put our name on it if it wasn’t any good.”

Customer: “Hmm, we’ll see. I’ll take a glass.”

I bring the bottle over to pour into her glass. When she sees it comes from a screw-top bottle, she scrunches up her face in disgust. She still tries a sip but immediately exclaims:

Customer: “That tastes horrible! I should have known; all screw-top wines are horrible!”

She sends the glass back and orders a higher-end cabernet (with a cork) instead. I pour the glass, but in some confusion, my manager mistakes the old glass for the new one and brings it out to her instead. This time, she exclaims:

Customer: “Oh, yes, this is much better.”

I told my manager, and we both shared a nice glass of expensive aerated cabernet after our shifts! Part of me thinks he knew what he was doing, but he’d never tell!

We have a customer who always orders cakes from us for special occasions. She’s not exactly unfriendly, but she has a habit of leaving her dog outside while she orders or comes in for pick-up, and the dog always “does its business” right outside our front door.

On its own, that’s not an issue — my dog also has his favorite spots — but this woman never, ever picks up after the dog, leaving one of us with the unpleasant job of cleaning up the steaming pile before another customer steps in it and drags it inside.

The customer comes in today.

Customer: “I’d like to order your chocolate cake for my birthday! It’s going to be a big celebration, so it needs to be extra special!”

As I am taking down the order details, I notice her dog is outside doing its thing again.

Me: “Ma’am, just so you know, your dog has a habit of fouling the street right at our entrance when you come in. He does that every time you’re here. We’d appreciate it if you could pick it up when you leave.”

Customer: *Looking at me blankly* “If it lands on your doorstep, then it’s your job to clean it up, not mine. I’ll be in on Monday to pick up the cake.”

She trots out, leaving me shocked at the entitlement. I tell my manager what happened, and he gets a devilish grin on his face that means he is thinking up a way to deal with this situation the way only a manager and owner of a small independent business can.

On Sunday night, just before we close up, I hear him call the customer from his back office, and he gets me to listen in. He puts the call on speaker.

Manager: “Hello, [Customer]?”

Customer: “Speaking.”

Manager: “This is [Bakery]. I am calling to let you know that, unfortunately, we will be unable to provide you with a cake for tomorrow. You will, of course, be refunded.”

Customer: “What?! No! The party is tomorrow! I need that cake!”

Manager: “I’m sorry, but we won’t be open tomorrow, so we can’t sell any cakes.”

Customer: “Why not?!”

Manager: “Well, y’see, a city health inspector came by, saw that we had dog excrement outside our front door, and marked it as a health hazard. We have to legally close until we can pass another inspection.”

Customer: *Silent*

Manager: “I hope you understand.”

Customer: *Silent*

Manager: “I’m sure you’ll be able to find a nice tray cake from [Chain Store] tomorrow morning.”

Customer: *Silent*

Manager: “Okay, well, take care, then.” *Click*

Me: “That was amazing!”

Manager: “She earned that.”

Me: “But what happens if she comes in tomorrow and sees that we’re open?”

Manager: “That’s the other thing I wanted to tell you. I think we’ve earned a paid day off tomorrow. Go have a nice day, and I’ll see you Tuesday.”

Best boss ever!

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Back in college, I rented a house with a couple of people. The landlord knew we were all twenty to twenty-two years old and mentioned that she always prefers to rent to college kids to give them a “real-life” experience.

Well, after the first six months of living there, we got a notice to evict for repeated late rent. I was the “head of house” on the lease, so I called [Landlord] from my cell phone and sat with all of my roommates. 

Landlord: “Hello?”

Me: “Hi, [Landlord], this is [My Name] at [address]. I’d like to discuss this letter I got today.”

Landlord: *Angrily* “Yes! I expect you to be out in ten days.”

Me: “I don’t understand why, though. I always deliver the check the Monday before the beginning of the next month. We have never been late paying you.”

Landlord: “That doesn’t matter! I go to the bank on Fridays to deposit everything. Several times I’ve had to make extra trips for you.”

Me: “I don’t understand. Do you want the check exactly on the first of the month?”

Landlord: “I always rent to college kids so they have an understanding of how bills work. I don’t know why you’re so difficult.”

Me: “I… don’t know, either. I’m very confused. But if you’re willing to end the lease in ten days on [date], I guess that’s it. We’ll go.”

Landlord: “The only other option is for you to pay the rest of the lease in full by the end of the ten days.”

Me: *Laughing* “No, we won’t be doing that. But I will be talking to my friend’s dad to see what we can do about this.”

Landlord: “Who the f*** cares about your friend’s dad?”

Me: “He’s a lawyer. I’m pretty sure you’re just being a f****** b****, and he’s going to tell me if I’m right.”

The landlord hung up and didn’t answer when I called back.

Two days later, there was a letter on our door saying the previous eviction notice was void and we could stay for the rest of our lease. I changed my payment pattern to reflect her Friday visits to the bank and we never had another issue.

I’m still stunned that she was trying to evict us because she hadn’t cashed our rent check by the first of the month. We told all of our friends and fellow majors that they should not rent from her. 

Oh, and I don’t have any friends with lawyer fathers!

This happened back in the early 1990s when our office still had only a rudimentary LAN and the ‘386 was the best available computer (intel chip launched in 1985). Instead of network printers we still had individual printers cabled directly to a user’s desktop computer (and only users who constantly needed a computer had a printer – mostly secretaries). I’m not knocking secretaries – just using the titles of the people involved.

Our offices were laid out with a number of small shared offices, fronted by a large open area where the secretary desks were located. Due to furniture layout, a lot of people liked to take a shortcut through one secretary’s space – but they had to shimmy between her printer (on a stand) and the wall. Doing so would often knock that cable off the printer, and it was also leaving a scuff mark on the wall.

The secretary was very good at her job and respected, but she had no aptitude for computer hardware. She would call us that her printer wasn’t working, and we’d find that the cable was off. We showed her how to plug it back in, and she was fine with doing that.

What she didn’t understand was why she had to resend her print jobs after reconnecting the cable. She was used to mainframe computer systems with print queues – but her computer was standalone, so the system was not smart enough to realize that a print job had failed (and to automatically resend it). We tried to explain all of that, and just get her to resend her print jobs, but she was still puzzled. Where did those print jobs go?

Then one of our techs told her, while pointing to the scuff marks on the wall:

Tech Coworker: “Electricity flowed in that cable. The print job electricity comes out of the end of the cable and keeps hitting the wall causing the burn marks.”

She bought that explanation!

Secretary: “Is it dangerous?”

Tech Coworker: “It probably is since it’s burning the paint on the wall.”

After that, she was good about checking her printer cable and reconnecting it if it was loose.

Even better, she stopped allowing people to shimmy through that opening “to keep them from getting hurt”, which meant the cable stayed on and we didn’t have to keep coming back to reconnect it.

My manager has an interesting method for dealing with customers who are still in the store at closing.

Manager: *To the customer* “If we don’t close our registers and set the security system after a certain time, the security company will call the police to come investigate what’s going on.”

She only did this a few times, but each time, it was hilarious watching them zoom to the checkout!