When I was in my teens, I used to spend the summer working at my uncle’s pub, partly to help him out, but mostly because it had been my dream to run my own restaurant since I was five. I loved working there because my uncle would show me how to do almost every job in the pub. I worked as a waiter and in the kitchen, and he showed me how to order and take stock, prepare menus, and so on. Best of all, he paid me, so it was a great way to earn money and learn “the biz”.

I’d been working there since I was fourteen, and my uncle taught me a great many things over the years, but one thing he was quite adamant about was how he dealt with customers. He would always tell me it wasn’t worth trying to please customers who had no interest in being pleased.

As with any establishment, we had our fair share of problem customers, and my uncle had zero tolerance for them. If you had a genuine complaint or issue, he bent over backward to make things right. If you were looking to score free stuff or were just complaining for the sake of it, you got asked to leave.

I was sixteen. One swelteringly hot day, a bedraggled-looking family trudged to the bar and asked if they could have some tap water. They looked like they had crossed the Sahara to get here or something.

I gave them each a glass of tap water and they guzzled it down.

Mother: “What is the cheapest food item on your menu?”

I pointed to the snack section on our menu. Because the family looked fit to drop, I found them a seat outside in the shade. When I took their order, the kids kept begging for more than the basket of chips the mother was ordering, telling her how hungry they were, but the mother ordered the chips and nothing else.

I rushed back in to get her order to the kitchen. They were falling a little behind, so I quickly helped out before heading back to my post. On my way back, I saw the mother come out of the ladies’ room. It was obvious she had been crying. I realised it was none of my business, but this woman looked so unhappy, so I stopped to talk to her.

Me: “Are you okay?”

The mother burst into tears, so I took her to a quiet corner. It was hard to understand some of it through her tears, and she was cagey or vague about some details, but from what I gathered, they were having money issues because her husband was getting royally screwed by his employers. They were fighting it, but in the meantime, they were strapped for cash.

The kids still needed to be entertained over the summer holidays, so they decided to have a cheap day out and go on a nature walk along the river. They had a picnic by the river and generally had a great day, but when they tried to walk home, they got lost. This is a rural area with a lot of walks and trails, some of them marked, some of them not.

Mother: “We tried to follow the river to get home, but we’ve been walking all day and still haven’t gotten anywhere familiar.”

This was in the days before mobile phones were commonplace, let alone smartphones.

Me: “Where did you come from?”

Mother: “We live in [Village].”

That village was over ten miles away! My guess is that they followed the river the wrong way — easily done.

Mother: “My kids are exhausted and hungry, but we only have enough for the chips we ordered. We have no money for a taxi, and there’s no one we can call to come and pick us up. My kids are starving and tired and I have no idea how we’re going to get home! Do you have a map so we can figure out our way back?”

Me: “Just leave it with me.”

I immediately went to my uncle, explained the situation, and asked if there was anything we could do. Surely, we could get them more than a basket of chips. They had three children, all under ten, with the youngest being a toddler.

Uncle: “It’s too hot for a family to go without a good meal and a cold drink. Give them whatever they want.”

The mother was hesitant, clearly embarrassed about receiving charity, but eventually, the family ordered a meal each. My uncle made sure to give them extra-large portions. Every bite was eaten.

Once they’d finished, my uncle had a chat with the parents about how they would get home, and after much back and forth, he offered to give them a lift. 

When my uncle came back, he told me:

Uncle: “This is why we don’t try to please people who can’t be pleased. Because if we spent all our time and money trying to appease them, we wouldn’t be able to help customers like that.”

I didn’t see the family again for the rest of the summer, but I hoped they were okay.

A few weeks later, we received a cheque from the family to pay for the meal we had given them, and they attached a thank-you note. My uncle tore up the cheque and wrote back to explain that he wouldn’t cash it. He told them to keep the money and get the kids ice cream, instead.

The following summer, I went to work for my uncle as usual and was delighted to see the family come back. I was relieved to know they were okay.

Mother: “We’ve wanted to come back for a long time, but we haven’t had the money until now.”

They ended up becoming regulars.

As I said, I have so many stories from those summers helping my uncle — some good, some bad, and some just plain funny — but this story and what my uncle told me really struck a chord. I see so many stories on this site where businesses and managers give in to problem customers, so I wanted to share this story.

Over twenty-five years later, my uncle and his pub are still going strong. There have been rough patches here and there like the recession and the current major health crisis, but the pub has pulled through. My uncle even helped me set up my own restaurant, where I take his motto of customer care to heart.

This story is part of our end-of-year Feel Good roundup for 2022!

Read the next Feel Good 2022 story!

Read the Feel Good 2022 roundup!

I work in a deli. When you buy fried chicken by the piece, it costs a lot more than if you buy the full eight-piece.

Customer: “I’ll take four fried breasts.”

Breasts are $2.29 a piece, so it comes out to over nine bucks plus tax.

Me: “Well, sir, I’ll just go ahead and give you the four breasts, but I’ll add two legs and two wings to make it an eight-piece, which would be a lot cheaper at $6.99. You can save a few bucks and get more chicken!”

He then looks at me like I’m an idiot.

Customer: “I don’t want that much. F*** this. I’m going to [Fast Food Chicken Place].”

My kids are fortunate enough to have three living sets of great-grandparents. Each set does something to acknowledge their birthdays, be it a gift, some money, or a card. Considering that they all have several great-grandchildren in addition to grandchildren and children, I appreciate their taking the time to remember so many birthdays, and I always have my children send thank-you notes.

One year, my toddler got money from two of the pairs of great-grandparents for her second birthday. I gave her some crayons and paper. She scribbled drawings for them and I wrote at the bottom of each that we appreciated the fun cards (both had found cards with stickers, which also adorned the toddler scribbles) and the “piggy bank food.”

One pair of great-grandparents called to catch up after receiving their drawing in the mail, and they commented that they thought “piggy bank food” was a funny and cute way to refer to the cash.

The other pair of great-grandparents sent an email chastising me.

Great-Grandparents: “You should’ve let [Toddler] spend that money on something fun! A two-year-old won’t remember who gave them the money that’s being saved for a rainy day. It probably won’t even be spent before we pass away! You should let [Toddler] simply enjoy something fun and tell her it’s from us via the money we sent. We are deeply hurt that you’re not letting her spend it right away!”

I sent a reply email explaining.

Me: “I apologize. ‘Piggy bank food’ was only meant to be a funny euphemism. The next time we are out somewhere and [Toddler] wants a little treat, she will certainly be able to use her birthday money for it.”

That seemed to smooth things over, and the great-grandparents were satisfied. But really, all that fuss over a toddler’s thank-you note for two dollars in her birthday card!

I’m a web developer. For a while, I was working for a company. I had a good contract, decent payment, a fixed job location, and fixed working hours.

One of our clients made an agreement with my boss that one of his web developers would support them onsite. They were about 100 miles away from our office. I knew contract negotiations were coming up, so I volunteered in hopes of getting a pay raise.

This was a mistake.

I agreed to commute for a week, but it took four weeks. My job was to support their IT department in integrating the system into theirs, but I basically had to do everything for their underqualified developers.

Every week, I would think I was finished, and every Friday, I would be told by the client that I needed to come in the next week again. (This was technically illegal; employment law here states you need four days’ notice). Over that time, I racked up fifty hours of overtime, plus the added travel time.  

Eventually, I finished the job, and then contract negotiations arrived. I prepared a list of my qualifications.

Me: “I solely maintain and administrate this company’s project management software. I’ve trained several new employees. People like me, and I’ve volunteered around the office, increasing the overall employee satisfaction. Also, I took on an onerous and unpopular job helping an offsite client for a month, doing work that helped save our company’s reputation. I think all my extra work makes me an excellent candidate for a negotiable pay raise.”

Human Resources: “We’re really grateful for what you did for this company. I’m sorry, but because we’re reorganizing the whole company, we can’t be considerate of individuals for now.”

Me: “That ‘reorganization’ was scheduled to have ended three months ago. When do you expect to open negotiations again?”

Human Resources: “Not for another six months.”

Me: “This meeting was scheduled a month ago, and I was informed that it was a contract negotiation. Don’t all the things I do for this company count for something?”

Human Resources: “Well, nobody forced you to do that stuff.”

I quit immediately. Five other people left the same day.

The moral? Never do more than your contract requires you to do unless you negotiate a reward beforehand.

I’m in the office emptying the shredder into a garbage bag so the shredded paper can be taken to the pet shop — because who doesn’t love an excuse to help out the puppies, kitties, bunnies, birdies, and such? The general manager sees me.

General Manager: *Pondering out loud* “Should we charge them for the bag?”

Me: *Confused* “What? This is the shredded paper for [Coworker] to take to the pet shop.”

General Manager: “I know that. Should we charge them for the bag?”

Me: *Incredulous* “They won’t pay for a bag of shredded paper. They ask for donations. They just won’t take it.”

General Manager: “Not the paper. The bag. Do you know how much those cost each?”

Me: *Eyeroll* “Yeah, they’re something like thirty-eight cents each for the black bags. You know if we ask them to pay, they’ll laugh, right? Then it all just goes into the bin — bag and all.”

General Manager: “Hmm…” *Walks away*

This might even make a slight bit of sense if he’d spoken to housekeeping about reducing their rubbish bag use. But nope. We already emptied the three office bins into one bag to take out each day, so I thought zeroing in on the once-a-month shredded paper bag was just out there, even for him.

I know there are some real cheapskate business managers around, but this exchange is one I’ll remember for the rest of my life in the hopes of never, ever becoming this miserly.