To think food service employees shouldn't mess with peoples orders?

[LucyLeblanc]

Saw a Tiktok earlier of a barista claiming she "messes" with the orders of "rude" customers. And there were thousands of comments in agreement with her and saying they also do similar 😧

The examples she gave were: Putting full fat milk in the customers coffee, rather than semi-skimmed. Giving them regular coffee rather than decaf, and vice versa. Serving them carrot cake rather than the chocolate cake they ordered. Etc...

I know she's not necessarily contaminating the food as such, but I think petty acts like this are totally unprofessional.

I understand some customers can be rude, I've worked in retail, but I just got on with it, I didn't feel the need to mess with anyones food for 'revenge'.

AIBU to think this is petty behaviour and food service employees should maintain some professionalism?

It is usually a case that they serve us coffee and the sandwiches follow. We were eating our sandwiches and the coffee had not arrived - I think they had forgotten - no big deal. My point was that my friend didnt want to say anything just in case any of the things people are talking about on here happened, even though they know us as regulars and chat to us regularly.

Never underestimate how rude people can be to people who are serving them. Every time there are threads on here from people who work in the service industry you get story after story of customers shouting and unleashing torrents of verbal abuse for things that are completely outside of the staff member’s control or for not indulging the customer’s mad requests.

😂

I worked at Costa for a few years as a teenager and I actually dealt with many many nice customer but also some OUTRAGEOUSLY rude ones.

I would never do this however; I especially would never ever give somebody caffeinated if they had ordered decaf.

I may have on extremely busy days given the odd skinny customer full fat but that was definitely not malicious

You must not have worked in hospitality before. People can be unimaginable dicks to service staff.

I’ve worked at McDs and people can be horrifically rude when having their order taken. They order a burger and get aggressive when you ask if it’s part of a meal or not, or get angry and rude if you say ‘sorry I didn’t get that last thing could you say it again?’ That sort of thing

But nope I would never have tampered with orders

Customer service is so much easier when the 'customers' are on the other side of a phone line. Would never go back willingly to face to face customer service.

Came on to say just this. DS is 13 and type 1- it worries me that someone will give him full fat coke instead of diet because they think he’s “faddy” or something. However, he tells me he can spot full sugar v diet on first sip. We have only ever sent something back once!

I agree.

We all have off-days, so 'punishing' someone for a perceived slight is just not on. If you're that sensitive, you're in the wrong job.

Pretty much the only time in my life I have been so threatened and denigrated (in a non sexual harassment context) was by a middle aged woman ordering coffee in the store I worked at. I wasn't even the one serving her, I had just given my other colleague a look of concern due to the way this woman was ripping into him. I was shift supervisor so it was my job to oversee this but I was very young myself, 18 or so.

Still think about it semi regularly because of how I would have thrown her out of my bloody store at the time now I have 10 more years of work experience under my belt, I think about how I just froze and I regularly wonder if she remembers doing that to me and regrets it.

I really think this is true, bugger conscription to the army lets make it conscription to a public facing role either in hospitality, catering or traffic management.
I've worked as a waitress, bar staff and shop when I was at school/uni.
Now in my job I sometimes have to help direct traffic for road works, the abuse people scream at you is unbelievable, on one memorable occasion someone threw a used nappy at us!

God that's horrible - i'm not a rude customer but the thought of someone giving me caffeine when I have a heart problem & absolutely have to avoid it is terrifying

While I absolutely agree about not giving wrong items on purpose as it is dangerous...

You don't have to be sensitive to not be ok after being called cunt and threatened with physical violence. Or calleed stupid because the custome was not right...

Maybe we should stop excusing twats with "just an off day"

I knew someone who pissed in a chip fryer

That sounds far more dangerous for the pisser than for the unfortunate customers.

People order decaf for a reason, like heart condition and pregnancy and she’s fucking risking lives.

My DD worked at McD as a teenager and was told things like, 'move your fat fucking arse and get me a burger now' (when there was a bit of a queue in the evening). She was only 16 ffs, having to deal with drunk men.

She wouldn't have messed with food though because the manager and supervisors were fearsome apparently. (And very unsupportive.) She lasted about 5 months.

Virtually impossible these days since you order from a board rather than a person.

Indeed. I'd expect specks of scalded penis as a result of that little escapade. Possibly an instant circumcision if the angle was careless.

To my knowledge (although I have no idea if I've been interpreted as rude!) I've only been rude once and that was fairly recently when dropping my car off at Audi for a fault that they were supposed to have rectified on any of the previous 8 occasions it had been there. I was SO frustrated that yet again they had promised me a loan car and had no record of it when I dropped my car off - to my everlasting shame I let the poor person booking my car in bear the brunt of my frustration. When I collected the car later in the day I was dealing with the CS manager and asked him to pass on my sincere apologies to the young man (who was dealing with another customer at the time so I couldn't speak to him directly although I wouldn't have blamed him if he had run away) that I had taken my frustration out on him as I knew it wasn't his fault. I'm still cringing at my behaviour - it was so totally unlike me.

Shame their fearsomeness wasn't directed at the right people.

I got treated rudely by staff the other day I honestly didn't deserve it their syrup had run out in the sprite I simply went and told them asking for a new one and I stood there and stood there waiting while my food got colder and everyone in the kitchen stood there chatting away (McDonald's so I can clearly see them) eventually they decided I had been punished enough took the syrup from the cupboard under where they had been chatting changed it and bought over my drink sometimes there is just no fucking need for the attitude I get other customers had been pissed off at them (they gave someones order to the wrong customer and took forever to replace it) but doing that served zero purpose just wasted time when the kitchen was behind anyway

I feel like there is a lot of victim shaming on this thread. Of course it's possible to be rude to someone in any interaction, the service industry is notorious for employees having to put with awful customers.

You're not "in the wrong job" if it upsets you that people treat you like you deserve to be treated like shit, and that they deserve to be the ones to treat you that way.

Jesus wept.

A friend was rude at a cafe and they gave her regular instead of decaf coffee which caused a seizure. She clearly told them "You need to be sure it's decaf or it'll make me ill" which they shouldn't have ignored just because she was rude.

Rude or not, they shouldn't get revenge like that.

I wouldn’t believe anything you see on SM these days as most of the videos are completely staged.

They shouldn't, but she was a dick for being rude nonetheless. Why was it necessary?