Here's a shop that will make you cringe...

"Remember: if they’re in here racking up a dozen or more posts a day, and have a post count in the thousands, they are not out there really working."

I beg your pardon. I have thousands of posts, but they are spread over YEARS. I have shops today, and every day for the next two weeks. And I'll drive over 300 miles a day, on average, to complete them.

My time here is "down time" for me, when I decompress, sometimes vent, sometimes teach, and often learn.

smiling smiley

In other words, I work my you-know-what off.

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K. Here is what makes me cringe. My now-cuckoo voice. Eh! Tonight, it was so bad that it peeped, crackled, cackled, cut out, jumped half an octave, and otherwise sounded like an old-school radio that needed to go to the repair shop. A few times it sounded like a huffy old organ. The OP's experience still makes me wonder about the the location they visited from the perspective of how it was as a workplace. That is not cringe-worthy. That is just me, whose hackles rise about a foot every time I hear about a familiar sort of job/experience/have a red flag or deja vu moment and I know there might be a 'the rest of the story' that can be understood but not told. The part that can now be told is swapping places. If I were working that location and this OP came in for a shop, I might have scared the scrap out of them with my voice. That report would be accurate but it would not mean that I intentionally sneered, yelled, tried to embarrass them, or otherwise find a place for myself in the forum. Mind you, if the store had a policy of permitting customers to browse, I could have been praised for saying nothing and doing nothing.

Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished. - Lao-Tzu
Here's the thing though, customers in this pandemic have been nothing short of abusive. I am incredibly short staffed and a man was angry with his wait today. I apologize and bought him his appetizer I was like unfortunately we're very short staffed as the front of the house manager I was cooking in the kitchen, as you can see your server is in training. I'm so sorry that you waited a little longer tonight. And his response was, "see everyone's been short staff for months it's unfortunate you haven't been able to figure it out here."
I just lost all my summer staff and I've had four applicants in 30 days....
The problem is the customers were taught that they're always right. And that's just not the case. I can't even tell you how many times my staff members have cried in the past few months from how rude and insulting customers are. This is exactly why there's a staffing shortage. It is an abusive industry and the industry is generally very young and inexperienced. The things people say are so outrageous.
There is a major reckoning going on in the hospitality and restaurant industries. People are just tired of working their butts off and not making enough money to pay their rent and bills. Why put up with crappy customers when the check won't even pay the bills?
Don't get me wrong, the money my staff and I make is exceptional. I know servers and bartenders who were making up to $100K pre-pandemic. It's rough on the body, but the money is great. I'm in management and make roughly $75k. But the disrespect makes it not worth it. I used to love connecting with customers. The audacity used to be few and far between. Now it's just painful. But there is no lack of customers. Just lack of staff.
There's no excuse for customers to be rude when we all know that places are dealing with staffing shortages. I don't know what's happened in this country (although I suspect it, but that's not for here), but people feel so self-entitled and that they can be rude to people if they don't get what they want or need at the snap of a finger.

By the same token, there's no excuse for staff in any business to be rude to a customer who isn't being rude. We shouldn't take our frustrations out on good customers.

I learn something new every day, but not everyday!
I've learned to never trust spell-check or my phone's auto-fill feature.
On the rare occasion that I get service and attitude like the OP described, I know that it will take me a long time to write the report. I do not relish writing long reports when it is the result of the employee's rude service. My only satisfaction is that the employee will get the re-training and reprimand that she deserves, and that I will receive better service next visit at the store.
@Ideagirl wrote:

I'm going to do the return at another location.

How did you fare with the return?

I learn something new every day, but not everyday!
I've learned to never trust spell-check or my phone's auto-fill feature.
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