To think this is rubbish customer service from this cafe

[MerryInthechelseahotel]

Dd 21 was coming home for the weekend from university and was a bit early for her train. She went into a chain cafe near the train station and bought a coffee and went to sit down on the chair.
Unknown to her there was a syringe and needle on the chair and the needle stabbed her leg.
She sent a text to me but when I didn't respond she text her friend who is a student doctor.
She took the syringe to two men serving drinks and told them what had happened.
They asked "are you ok?" And told her to leave the syringe with them in case someone comes back for it. That was it.

She left the cafe and phoned 111 as her friend had advised her and was advised to go to A&E and they took blood for comparison with bloods they will take from her in 6 months time and also started her on a Hepatitis B course of injections.

I suggested she write a complaint to the head office as the men who she talked to didn't know the seriousness of it, didn't take her name and address, hadn't checked the seat beforehand.
She wrote an email not blaming the men as such but saying what had happened and the reply she got was appalling.
They said the needle had a cap on it it didn't obviously otherwise she wouldn't have got jabbed. She has a photo of it too with their napkin underneath it.
They said they had checked the cctv and it had taken her 12 minutes from sitting down before going to the counter to report it (that's because she text to see what she should do)
They said the men said she had said she was fine but that's because she didn't feel unwell.
Would you feel angry if this happened to you or one of your children? What would you do or suggest for her to do?
Thing is she's not a confrontational type of person and if they had apologised she would have felt better but they didn't apologise at all.

Well I’d like to know where it was, would like to be warned. How do we know there isn’t regular incidents like this at that place as there are in some of the McDonald’s?

It’s a perfectly reasonable thing to tell the press or put on Facebook. The op’s Daughter got stabbed by a used needle which the proprietor took off her and then lied about!

Soubriquet I know! I guess I did post in AIBU

True. There’s rarely a unanimous thread when it makes sense

What do you want the staff to do

Errr pay attention to their cafe enough to make sure people don’t inject drugs in there? (Probably the toilets)

Like PP said, diabetics very unlikely to have left an uncapped needle around. Anyone who doesnt think there isn’t a massive problem with people injecting in toilets in public places is incredibly naive.

Well unless the needle belongs to one of the men behind the counter it's not really their fault it was there. Chairs are probably cleaned at the end of the day, unless utterly filthy, it's quite likely that whoever cleared the table had a quick look, missed the syringe and pushed the chair back under the table. After all OPs daughter sat there and didn't see it.
It's unfortunate but if I ask someone if they're ok after an incident and they say yes then I'm not going to force first aid on them either, they're trained in first aid, I don't recall needlestick being part of that. And they did the right thing taking the syringe from her, letting her go with it would have been irresponsible - how do they know she'll dispose of it responsibly?
The person who left it there is at fault, not the coffee shop workers and not OPs daughter, but they're unknown so everyone is now baying for the blood of the coffee shop workers? But can't say I'm surprised, it is MN after all.

AnotherOriginalUsername I've just asked by text if anyone discussed it with her and she said they only do that if they know the needle has been infected.

I’m not up for baying for blood, but I am up for cafe workers paying attention to people injecting drugs in their cafe.

That's a very poor response, a bit of sympathy wouldn't have gone amiss at the very least but they MUST have an accident/ incident book and so should have filled that it at the time. I wouldn't expect first aid from them but they could have made more of an effort with a young girl and as you say, they sound like they are trying to cover their arses now-I'd be tempted to name and shame on Facebook or if they are a chain take it to HO, its poor all round.

Was it Starbucks by any chance?

I know in America they changed the rules so that anybody could go in without purchasing anything.

Led to lists of needle stick injuries!

Not Starbucks.

They couldn't have filled in the accident/incident book as no one took any details from her.

No one has expected her to have had first aid

AnotherOriginalUsername I've just asked by text if anyone discussed it with her and she said they only do that if they know the needle has been infected

That makes no sense, they don't know that the needle isn't infected. I'd suggest she phones her GP and requests and urgent telephone consultation tomorrow, there's a 72 hour time limit in which PEP needs to be started to be effective.

Errr pay attention to their cafe enough to make sure people don’t inject drugs in there? (Probably the toilets)

Yes probably in the toilets, which belong to the station in most stations, not individual coffee shops. So no, it's not up to coffee shop workers to be policing the toilets and confronting drug users. And if it was done in the coffee shop area, drug users using in public are usually very discreet, short of one of them marching round constantly checking everyone's hands I can't see how they'd be expected to notice someone discreetly injecting under a table.
It's bad form from the company to have said the needle was capped when it wasn't and yes there's a point there for complaining, and it doesn't matter how long it took her to seek help, if she said she's fine and didn't feel unwell then there's little more they can do in that regard. And I quite often fill in accident reports for people who fall whilst drunk and you put a description of the person involved if you don't have name/address.

Errr pay attention to their cafe enough to make sure people don’t inject drugs in there? (Probably the toilets)

What do you suggest? Toilet chaperones maybe?

AnotherOriginalUsername It actually happened a couple of weeks ago but she wrote to them over a week ago and their response has just come back now.

Lbwestf123 I think they have sharp bins in some of the Starbucks now. Read it earlier but can’t find it again now!

The Wetherspoons incident link earlier in the thread is an example of what another company does with a similar incident.

Many years ago I got on a bus with my DC, (school pick up) , DD saw "A pen" in the wheelchair/buggy space.
It was a syringe (insulin by the looks of it)

I told the driver , he could not have shown less concern and just shrugged.
I took it to the local Pharmacy and asked to place it in the sharps bin (they did have one) , they eventually agreed (otherwise I'd have had to go to the nearest GP surgery)

Most worrying thing (apart from the blantant "Nowt to do with me" attitudes) was a toddler could have thought it was a pen too and picked it up while the parent was getting the pram sorted.

Exactly youwhat

For people asking it was a cafe very close to Manchester Piccadilly

OP can I ask...did the needle break the skin enough to cause bleeding?

If your DD has been to A&E they will have assessed her risk and the need for her to take PEP. As already said, there has never been a recorded case of HIV contracted from a discarded needle.

Also, testing for HIV can be done at 1 month where it is pretty conclusive, and definitely so at 3 months. Similarly for hepatitis check the window periods if you are concerned for peace of mind as your daughter does not need to wait 6 months.

Don’t see why druggies should have a place to shoot up especially in a cafe.

Sharps bins are obviously a good idea.

But if Starbucks make it there policy in the uk I certainly won’t be going!

@Lbwestf123 you do realise the sharp bins are there for people who require regular injections for medical purposes? Like diabetics. You wouldnt go to a Starbucks because they had a disposal facility for needles meaning they are catering to a wide customer base?

Thanks HIV yes it did break the skin and she was advised by 111 to wash the area. I will let her know she can go earlier to have a blood test.

@Pengaly

I have no idea where they are as I didn’t mention it.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.vox.com/platform/amp/the-goods/2019/1/14/18182540/starbucks-needle-disposal-sharps-boxes

No mention of diabetes in that article

But well done for virtue signalling for the diabetics. 🙄

But well done for virtue signalling for the diabetics

I was hardly "virtue signalling" was just giving an example as thats the only one i can 5hink of- sorry the mention of diabetes offended you i just highly doubt Starbucks' intention was to cater to street drug users...

I think most people with diabetes use insulin pens rather than old school syringes now, so unlikely to be that.

Yes, the staff could have been more helpful (more training needed?) but I wouldn't have expected them to spot the syringe necessarily.

I hope your DD is OK. This must be very frightening for her and it sounds like she dealt with it well.