Our hotel rooms have electronic clocks that update automatically during Daylight Saving dates. A guest is rushing up to the checkout.
Guest: “We had to leave an hour ago, and your clocks bloody updated all by themselves! I thought I still had an hour! We were supposed to leave at 9:00 am!”
Me: “I’m sorry, ma’am. We thought the clocks updating automatically would be helpful, but I will leave a note with management that this should be advertised more clearly.”
Guest: “You’d better! It’s not helpful when you’re being too helpful!”
The guest dashed out the door. Also, it was 11:00 am, so she still would have been an hour late outside of Daylight Saving.
A client has asked for some modifications to some designs. We offer a set number of iterations to a design and then charge a billable fee after that. This client has asked for the first design change that needs to be charged.
Me: “That’s fine, I can get that done for you and I should have it back to you in about forty minutes.”
Client: “If it only takes you forty minutes why should we pay you?”
Me: “Because this counts as a billable piece of work and we charge by the hour.”
Client: “But it’s less than an hour.”
Me: “I was attempting to be efficient, but I can have it back to you in an hour if that makes you feel better.”
Client: “It… would.”
I finished the work, waited twenty extra minutes, and then emailed it to them. They paid for the “hour” of work happily.
When I first started to work the third shift, I was still going to church. At the time, I was working Saturday nights, which meant getting home on Sunday mornings. Obviously, I didn’t want to go to church (on the other side of town) after being on my feet for eight-plus hours. So, I requested to have Sundays off for church; I specifically asked for them to go to morning church services.
I got Sunday nights off, instead.
I texted the general manager who was in charge of schedules.
Me: “Why did you give me Sunday nights off when I requested the mornings off for church?”
General Manager: “It’ll be fine for you to go to church!”
Sadly, I didn’t press it, and I stopped going to church for another reason anyway.
It is 10:05 pm, and a customer notices me hanging around near them as they browse the aisles.
Customer: “What time do you close?”
Me: “We closed five minutes ago.”
Customer: “Oh, good.”
Me: “Good?”
Customer: “Yeah, that means I can shop without other customers getting in the way.”
They continued casually (and slowly) browsing.
It’s a Friday night during the full-house dinner rush. A table of six show up.
Customer: “We need a table for six, and we have a movie to make at [time].”
Me: “That’s in half an hour.”
Customer: “Yeah but the theater is just next door.”
They took fifteen minutes to order and then continued to get angry at me for the fact that I couldn’t “rush the cooks to go faster.”
I didn’t get a tip.
