I used to work at a TGIFridays back in the long ago, and we used to get our fair share of people looking for something free (large franchise restaurants appear to attract that type of clientele). One night while I was working the bar, a woman in the dining room started yelling about how she was choking (even though it’s not possible to talk if you are actually choking). We were in the middle of our dinner rush, and the whole place went quiet as servers are scrambling to figure out how to help this woman.
The server who was waiting on them attempted to give her the Heimlich (which the woman had asked for herself) while she was sitting in her chair. My guy was the shift leader that night, and he rushed over to the table to assess the situation. As he got tableside, another server (who had some military training) grabbed the woman by her head and shoved his fingers down her throat. When asked immediately after by the SL why he did that, he snapped into military mode and responded with ”Drill Sergeant always says, if someone is choking, you stick your fingers down their throat to dislodge the object!” To which the SL replied, ”Did your drill sergeant also tell you to assess the situation first, because if she’s talking, that means she’s able to breathe.”
The SL began to ask the woman if she had any allergies that could be causing her throat to swell up. She jumped up from the table and started yelling to the restaurant that she needed the Heimlich (the whole time this was going on, her dinner companion was calmly sitting there, like he’d seen it all before). She ran over to me (I had left the bar to see what all was going on), grabbed my hands and put them around her waist. I told her I was not going to give her the Heimlich if she wasn’t actually choking, because you can do more damage than anything else at that point. She began to try to thrust my hands into her ribs, and I tried to wrestle my hands away from her.
Just then, the cops showed up, and one of them came running in, shoved me aside, and lifted the woman up off of the floor with her Heimlich before we could let them know about her ”situation”. The woman began coughing and wheezing, probably due to the ribs that had just broken. The cops checked her out to make sure she was ok, and we then told the cops about how she had been talking and screaming the whole time. They had a little bit longer of a chat with her after that, and told us she seemed stable (they were talking mentally), but to keep an eye on her.
Since she felt slighted that we weren’t helping her in her moment of need, she demanded that her meal be comped. She and her dinner companion proceeded to spend the next 2 1/2 hours hanging out and relaxing. As the night went on and cuts were made, the couple was still sitting at their table when it was down to just my guy and I. They flagged him down (they hadn’t ordered anything in 2 hours) and asked for a dessert. He obliged, brought them their sweets, and dropped the check off while clearing the empty plate. The woman expressed disbelief to him that she was getting a check for the dessert, ”I thought that the bill was on the house tonight for all that I went through!”. To which he responded, ”Your bill with your other server was taken care of, but she has been gone for over an hour now, so you began new with me. Sorry.” The bill was paid (with no tip, of course), and we never saw them again.
Submitted by: M
I work at a Peruvian/ Brazillian restaurant in the Seattle area. About a week ago a man came in as I was standing at the bar waiting for my bartender to give a couple of Caipirinhas and a Pisco Sour for one of my tables. Our host sat him at one of my bartenders floor tables, when my bartender looked at me and said ” I’ll give you an extra shift drink if you take that guy for me.”
I dont generally drink but I figured its always good to have an owed favor from your bartender so I said sure. I should have known that that was a bad sign but I didn’t; boy did I learn My lesson.
The man seemed nice enough as he ordered a glass of red wine and the rodizio ( side note: At the restaurant where I work we Tipout 10% of our total rodizio orders to our Gauchos. at forty dollars a head, that’s four dollars of tip I have to give to my gaucho per person who orders rodizio).
I get him the wine, and engage him in some light conversation while my gaucho makes his way to the table, the first cut arrives and this seemingly nice hispanic man turns into The Biggest Jackass I have ever seen. He starts bitching about the cut saying that its too fatty and to get my gaucho over to his table with another cut, I let my gaucho know.
We serve 17 different cuts of meat on the rodizio including but not limited to: Wild Boar, Buffalo, Filet Mignon, Lamb, etc, etc, and he found something wrong with ALL of them. Somewhere in the middle of this clusterfuck of psuedo-preadolescent whining he orders a coke, which being a good server, I deliver quickly. He then says that the coke is flat and to get him another, I go and refill from the same fountain where I got the first and tell him that I changed the co2 ( which i didnt; because really, c’mon, you’d lie too) . he tastes it and says ” yeah much better”.
He finally gets full and tells me to bring him the check. I print out his bill, and drop it at his table. He slides in his credit card and hands it to me. after running his card I drop it at the table and he says ” You’ve been a great waiter, Drew. I’ll make sure you’re taken care of.”
I leave the table and breathe a sigh of relief thinking that at least I would be compensated for an HOUR AND A HALF of this douches bullshit. He leaves and I go over to grab the check as my busboy clears the table. I look inside at the credit card receipt, the bill was 67.36 ( Rodizio , two glasses of the Townshend T3,and the Coke) the tip line read, 3.00.
I was and still am LIVID. As I went in the back and used every curse word I knew, and a couple I didnt, My bartender comes to me and says ” He did that to me a week ago.”
note: He came back in last night, and was sat in my section. I gave him to the new girl. She got Four dollars.
Submitted by: Drew
So I work at an Italian restaurant that is generally considered to be a family restaurant. It’s a great job and I love the people I work with but the customers can sometimes make work a little difficult. One specific night was when a woman came in with her family and was seated in my section on a Saturday night right in the middle of the rush. As soon as I took their drink orders I could tell they were going to be difficult, each of them ordering varying amounts of ice, lemons, and combinations of drinks.
So I bring those all out and begin to take their order. The mother orders a small, thin crust pizza with light sauce, pepperoni and black olives. I tell her that by getting thin crust and light sauce the pizza will be dryer and there is a chance there can be some bubbles in the crust because of it, she orders it anyways saying that it never happens.
After this she started to complain about multiple things including the temperature, (which even if we did change the thermostat there is no way she would feel a difference by the time she was finished eating) what came on their salads, (which are listed on the menu and I also asked to make sure that’s what they wanted, which she said yes) along with the noise level and the wait time on their meal, which on a busy Saturday night at a family restaurant what do you expect?
So I bring out all of the food and of course, there’s a bubble on the pizza. It was a bite-sized bubble that I figured since she had ordered this pizza and I had warned her, she would be OK with it. WRONG! She refuses to eat it and demands to have another made (which I would have offered if she had given me even a second to respond).
So i have the cooks remake it, have the manager go out and talk to her, give her a discount on the pizza and $5 off her next visit and we box the pizza up to give to her when she leaves.
The remake comes out 7 minutes later and there’s still a small bubble. At this point I’m freaking out. My manager says to have it made again but to take this one out and let her know but ask if this one is alright. She gets furious so I have my manager take it off of the bill completely and then discount the rest of the meal.
The 3rd pizza comes out with no bubbles so I bring that out in a box along with the other 2 pizzas and their check. At this point their table has been pre-bussed aside from 2 cups so I let her know that I’m just going to drop these off in the kitchen and I’ll be right back to grab the check.
15 seconds later the whole family is up at the front counter paying the bill which went from being upwards of $50, down to about $30 because of all of the discounts. She ends up leaving me a $2 tip and left all 3 of the pizzas on the table just to show us that even though they were free and only 1 bite on 2 of the pizzas had a bubble, she would not eat them.
Submitted by: Jacob
I work at a coffee shop inside a grocery store we’re not all that busy late in the afternoon on most nights. So in that case we don’t make many tips to split between two of us. We had one customer who seemed very nice and ordered a coffee that was just say $3.12 and she took three dollar bills out of her wallet and then continued to sift thru her wallet for 12 cents. and then glances over to our tip bucket and looks up at me and says, ”may i take 12 cents out of here?”
I thought she just had no money left so of course i said, no problem. and as i handed her the receipt she opened another section of her wallet with twenties and five dollar bills. Continued to the other side and got her coffee, riped the straw wrapper off and threw it on the counter.
The whole point is, it’s not a big deal to brake a five dollar bill when and order comes to $3.12. And to see that we don’t make a lot of money and then to take it for yourself. Yes, it was only 12 cents…but that’s still rude. and then to leave your mess on the counter. just because our job is to serve you coffee and to be polite..doesn’t mean we’re your mothers and we are there to pick after you messy uncaring people…and sadly that’s what we have to do. because no one seems to have any respect for anyone these days.
All i can ever think of when things happen like this is….How would they feel if i came into their work and made a mess? took there money? and was so completely rude because i had a horrible day even though you had nothing to do with it? You wouldn’t like it, no one likes it. And being in retail, working at a resturant, coffee or grocery store i give credit to the people that do it. cause it sucks and it takes a lot to deal with.
Submitted by: Steph
It all started on a beautiful Thursday night working on a deck. We were slammed being sat back to back all night. The rush finally ended and thought i could catch a breath at 9:30. Well i had about a minute to catch up before our late night rush came in. I had 3 two tops and a 5 top all in the matter of 15 mins.
My one 2 top that my co-worker kindly sat in my section came in waited 30 secs at the most to be welcomed at the door ( our hostess was sent home.) When she started screaming …. ”IS SOMEONE GOING TO HELP ME? Are you really just going to keep me standing here like this with my little daughter?! ”
At this point i knew it was going to bad news no matter where she was sat. She wanted to sit outside away from everyone! My co worker beth told her Derien (me) will be right with you. Her kind response was ”oh you’re not my server? good.” I automatically asked Beth ”is this lady a crack head? Is something wrong with her?” I shake it off and act like i would with all my customers bubbly and happy. Introduce my self and that whole deal. Oh and i forgot to mention it was 10 at night and brought her 4 year old ”diva” daughter as she said in for dinner and walked the whole way to the restaurant to feed her. I ask her what she wanted to drink and of course no surprise she got her self a LONG ISLAND ICE TEA her daughter a sprite. Ordered a kids fettucinni Alfredo and insisted on a salad with it. So she asked if it came with a kids meal, of course i said yes because i knew she was going to give me hell so i made her one for free so i could keep from her drama and the mother got fried poppers and for dinner baked shrimp Au gratin.
So i put in the poppers order and made the salad on the house for her ”Little Diva” and brought it out as soon as it was ready. I then went on to serve on the rest of my tables and give them great service. While i was running around and in the middle of taking one of my tables orders this lady yells ”EXCUSE ME?!!? Can i get a server? Do I EVEN HAVE A SERVER? CAN I GET SOME SERVICE?!?!?!” While this nice young gentleman is trying to order, i laughed apologized to him and said to the lady i will be right over. And finished they tables order.
I proceed to walk over to the lady’s table and said ”How can i help you?” and her response was ” UMM where is my food?! I dont understand what the problem is my food isnt here where is it?! Are you ever going to bring it out?! She proceeds to scream at me as i walk away ( with 3 other tables around her) so i decided to turn around i told her ” You know what you can leave and dont even worry about the bill ill buy it, but you are not staying here i will bring out your food in boxes and you need to go”
Walked inside screamed for a manager Beth walked up to her and talked to her told beth she did nothing wrong and she wanted to talk to the owner right away. Beth told her over and over that wont get you anywhere and she persisted to tell her to call the owner and that she couldn’t believe she wasnt going to fire me. Beth finally said ” LIsten lady you arent going to get anywhere with the owner if you want to talk to his daughter (which happened to be me derien the server and the boss’ daughter) then you may.” She Zipped right up. Until i was boxing her food and she was watching me in the kitchen and said ”MAKE SURE SHE DONT SPIT IN MY FOOD” which i would never do even to someone like her.
All in all what a great ending to a great night! I had to apologize to all of my tables even thought they didnt care and made jokes of it and were completely stunned.
I also put in on the house account and gave my self a tip for having to deal with the devil!
CHEERS to being a server! :]
Submitted by: Derien