(I am an off-duty police officer, treating a friend to lunch at a place owned by a famous local chef with amazing reviews that has the best burgers I’ve had in a long time. It isn’t busy so we have our waitress’s full attention. She is talkative, she makes jokes, she’s quick with our drinks and taking our order, and she brings our order as soon as it is sent out; all around she’s the PERFECT waitress. She comes around a few times to check on us, but then she just stops coming by our section after a group of young college guys walks in. I don’t know if she knows them or what but she never leaves their side, laughing and carrying on with them. After waiting fifteen minutes for her to bring our bill, we ask another server:)

Other Server: “As I am not your waitress I can’t, but I’ll tell your waitress.”

(Another ten minutes pass by and still no waitress; it is now getting close to 2:30 pm and I need to be home by three to greet my daughters after they get off the school bus.)

Me: “Let’s just leave the money on the table.”

(We look up the menu online and total up our order, including drinks, taxes, and even a tip, writing everything down on a piece of paper with a note explaining our situation. We even leave a little extra to cover anything we forgot, and my official LEO business card which says my police department, full name and badge number, phone number, and email. For some reason, and I’m glad he does, my friend decides to record a video; he turns the camera to the table taking a video of the note, our makeshift bill, and the full money amount. We walk out the door towards our vehicle with him still recording. As we are walking out the door, the waitress and the owner/chef come running out the door screaming.)

Waitress: “STOP! WE’VE CALLED THE POLICE ON YOU! STAY HERE UNTIL THEY GET HERE! NOBODY DINES AND DASHES ON MY WATCH! IT COMES OUT OF MY PAY!”

Me: “But we have paid.”

Owner: “With who?”

Me: “We left payment on the table.”

(We all walk back inside to the still-cluttered table to show him the $60 cash with the note showing our $42 tally and then what we left.)

Owner: “Why didn’t you wait for your waitress to bring you an official bill?”

(Before I can say anything, my friend, who doesn’t like confrontation but has had enough with being made to wait, speaks up.)

Friend: “We waited for over twenty minutes for her to bring our bill. We even told another waitress—” *points towards the waitress cleaning a nearby table* “—that we wanted our bill.”

(The other server confirms this and says she told our waitress we were waiting for it and that our waitress said she’d take it over in a minute.)

Friend: “But instead of bringing us our bill your waitress decided she would continue to flirt with that group—” *points to group of six guys at a table nearby* “—and refill their drinks twice. As soon as they walked in, she completely ignored us, never offered to refill our drinks, asked if were done to clear the table, or gave us our bill, so we took it upon ourselves to look up your menu online and tally our total and just leave it on the table with the handwritten bill with an $18 tip. He even left his LEO card with his information! I don’t know about those guys, but he needs to get home to his daughters and I need to pick up my wife, so we don’t have all day to just sit around waiting for her to decide which guy she wanted to sleep with.”

(The owner’s mouth is open, slowly gulping like a fish, and turns to look towards the waitress, who looks like she wants to be anywhere else but there at that very moment.)

Owner: “This is the third time you’ve been accused of ignoring customers to hang out with guys from your school, and then you took it a step further and accused them of stealing without even checking the table first!” *turns back to us* “Gentlemen, I am sorry for any inconvenience my former server has caused you. I promise you that this will never ever happen again as she will no longer be working here. Please accept my most sincere apology and accept a $20 gift card for each of you for a future visit and take your money back as the meal is on the house.”

Me: “Thank you, but that is not necessary. The burgers and fries were amazing and we ate them, so we want to pay.”

(I don’t fault the restaurant, just the waitress! We will still go back!)

(While managers usually schedule our breaks, there’s some flexibility. My coworker comes on the radio to ask about it.)

Coworker: “Hey, [Manager], when’s my break?”

Manager: “It’s at [time].”

Coworker: “Can I take it earlier?”

Manager: “Uh, I guess so. What’s up?”

Coworker: “There’s an event going on in Pokémon Go…”

Manager: *sighs* “All right, go take your break…”

Related:
Here We Pokémon Go Again, Part 41
Here We Pokémon Go Again, Part 40
Here We Pokémon Go Again, Part 39
Here We Pokémon Go Again, Part 38

This story is part of our Pokémon roundup!

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(I am taking drive-thru orders. A customer pulls up and places her order for chicken nuggets. I ask if she wants fries with that; instead, she asks for a whole potato. At first I think she is joking because I’ve had similar orders followed by “just kidding.” But after I ask if I heard her right and she confirms that I did, I explain that we don’t have whole potatoes, but that she can order fries, instead. She immediately pulls around without another word into the speaker. I wait for about five seconds for her to come around, thinking, “Surely she’s not ignorant enough to think that we actually sell whole potatoes.” When she pulls around she makes sure to correct this thought of mine.)

Customer: “What do you mean, you don’t sell potatoes? How the h*** do you sell french fries and not have whole potatoes?”

Me: “I’m sorry, ma’am, but we have our fries pre-sliced, packaged, and sent directly to our distributors, and then to our restaurant. Since nothing else we have is pure potato, we have no whole potatoes that we keep around at the store. Would you like me to get you a different side with your nuggets, like a side salad?”

Customer: “Listen, dumba**, I know you may not understand basic things and that’s why you’re working at a fast food place, but I need you to go to the back, get me a potato, and bring it back to me free of charge since you’ve ruined my visit. Have one of your managers hold your hand for you if you can’t figure it out.”

Me: *my patience tested* “Ma’am, would you like to speak to one of my managers? I believe they could help you better.”

Customer: “Never mind. I’ll just go get one from [Competitor] across the street.” *drives off*

(I told my manager on shift what had happened, and she nearly pissed herself. I’ve had a lot of strange requests, but the one that stuck out to me was this situation, mostly because I was called so many names in such little time for such a dumb reason. I just hope that the other place got her potato for her.)

(The store I work register in regularly puts out ads for our sales, so customers know when something has a pricing deal. We also have digital coupons for people who use our couponing app. On rare occasions, the physical ads will advertise a deal for if you have a digital coupon. This is one of those occasions. A customer comes up with five packages of [Laundry Detergent].)

Customer: “You take digital coupons?”

Me: “Yes, ma’am, we do. Just put your phone number into the card reader when the option comes up and it’ll find any coupons clipped to your account.”

(I ring up everything and make sure she can enter the digital coupons account number before getting her total.)

Me: “All righty, your total is [total].”

Customer: “Wait, that’s not right. Those [Laundry Detergent]s should be two dollars each!”

(I look back through the transaction on my end. The only digital coupon that applied for the transaction worked, but only on one of her items.)

Me: “My apologies, ma’am, but it looks like the coupon went through correctly.”

Customer: “No! See, look at the ad!”

(She then grabs one of the copies of our current ads we keep near the register and turns it so it’s facing me. Sure enough, it’s right on the front page, and says that the [Laundry Detergent] is two dollars with a digital coupon. It does not explicitly state that the coupon only applies to only one package of it, but it does not apply to multiple packages of it.)

Me: “I see what happened here. Unfortunately, the coupon only applies to one item at a time.”

Customer: “But it said that they were two dollars with a digital coupon!”

(I recognize her tone as the “I’m right and I’ll start a fight about it if you say otherwise!” tone and notice the line building, so I decide to take a different approach.)

Me: “Well, ma’am, let me see what my manager wants to do about this.”

(I excuse myself and apologize to the people in line for the wait before I run off and find my manager, who does not suffer fools gladly. When I find him, I explain to him what she wanted.)

Manager: “Just tell her coupons only apply once.”

Me: “Already did. She sounds like she’s going to keep at it and make a fight out of it, though.”

(Once we get back up there I apologize to the now angry line for the delay before standing near enough to the register to finish the transaction once my manager and the customer are done.)

Manager: “So, what’s the issue here?”

Customer: “I’ve got a digital coupon for this and it didn’t apply to them!

Manager: “Well, the coupon only applies to one product at a time.”

Customer: “The ad doesn’t say that! It should apply to them all!”

Manager: “Our digital coupons only apply once per transaction.”

Customer: “Oh… so, if I split this into five different purchases, it would work?”

Manager: *clearly losing his patience* “No, they’re like normal coupons. If you use one, it gets taken and can’t be used again.”

Customer: “So, I can’t buy all of these with the coupon?”

Manager: “Not unless you have multiple accounts and multiple coupons.”

Customer: *clearly angry now* “Fine! Take all but one of them off.”

(My manager gladly does this and goes to his register to help thin down the line. She pays her total and takes her stuff with her while muttering about the ad under her breath. My next customer comes up with a full cart.)

Me: “My apologies for the wait.”

Customer #2: *laughing* “It’s fine! It’s not your fault she didn’t understand how coupons work!”

(We’re in the waiting room during our adult son’s brain surgery. A family sits near us and I hear:)

Family: “He’s in Jesus’s hands now.”

(I lean over to my son’s girlfriend and say:)

Me: “They sent a carpenter in to do a surgeon’s job.”