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?

The message here is very clear, if you want decent service, be a decent person.

Problem is, you can easily get poor service even though you’re being perfectly polite. Complaining about that poor service is then no doubt going to get you labelled as deserving of having your food spat in….

Some area amazing at their jobs-they take no crap,boot them out and ban them

some are fucking useless-the 3rd time I was assaulted,the manger tried to call me a liar

i pointed out that it was on camera-she refused to save the footage,so I rang the police myself

she then went mental as I’d used my own phone to do so (we’re not allowed to use phones on shift which I’ve always respected and until then,I never had)

she simpered all over the two cops that showed up-it was sickening how she spoke/draped herself over them,the man was arrested and nothing else happened apart from he got a bollocking

she then was all over the WhatsApp group they have-calling me a liar again!

i got wind of this,to which I put in a complaint-so they tried to give ME a warning for ‘rocking the boat’

I had to get the Union involved in the end-I’ve not heard another thing about it

still rankles tho-all I did was change a bin liner-I didn’t ask for him to come up behind me,shove his disgusting hard on into my backside and try to shove his hand down my pants

all my fault-thankfully,the other managers (mainly male) stood up for me and have been really protective over me but they can’t be standing next to me all shift which is fair enough but any hint of trouble and they are there like shit off a stick

Aren't we taught to always be nice because we don't know what's going on with people? Dementia friends encourage everyone to be nice, patient and understanding.

Whether you've just been told the worst news in the world or the best you should always aim to be polite. But sometimes people aren't.

Very dangerous to swap carrot cake about as they have nuts in... I'd be very angry if that happened to me...!!!

Never watch the moving “Waiting” with a v young Ryan Reynolds then 😂😂

I didn't say it was classed as a professional job. I'm aware it's not.

But I think anyone who is in charge of serving someones food should have some professionalism, no? Especially when it comes to allergies, etc.

Totally agree. Customers should absolutely think about the day the staff had and be nice, patient and understanding.

Just don't act like a dick and they won't be tempted to?

This reminds my - many years ago as a student I had a holiday job working as a waitress in French speaking Switzerland. A group of Americans came in, were really loud and obnoxious and rude so I pretended I didn’t speak a word of English! It was great fun watching them struggle. My boss was highly amused/

You have restored my faith in human nature !

Problem is, you can easily get poor service even though you’re being perfectly polite. Complaining about that poor service is then no doubt going to get you labelled as deserving of having your food spat in….

There is some truth in that, of course. But I think most really poor service occurs when staff are demoralized, which often relates to rude customers and poor management. The worst managers take the side of the dick customers and pander to their unreasonable complaints. Oddly enough, I live in a country where staff are not expected to do more than serve you. There’s no pressure on them to be particularly nice or to smile or pretend they’re having a good day if they aren’t. They all get paid adequately however, and it’s a long time since I’ve had properly awful service, as happened more often in the UK. Presumably it relates to people (whether bosses or customers) thinking they’re somehow better than those working on the lowest rung.

I worked at Mcds for a while. I was grabbed at, propositioned, called stupid because only stupid people work at McDonald’s…once, when taking an order out to a parked up drive through, they grabbed me and tried pulling me into the car. Apparently I was hot, and because I worked in mcds that made me ‘up for it’. My shift manager was always on stand by to kick people out if they got abusive. He was fab. He called the police on the grabber.

The worst I ever did was add a little extra ice to the drinks so they wouldn’t get as much pop. Wouldn’t have dared do anything else.

So, what recourse does a customer have? I wasn't nasty or in a bad mood. I requested sugar free latte and received a sugared latte that caused my blood sugar to suddenly soar, then drop. Sending me into a hypoglycemic episode. When the paramedics arrived, my sugar was below 50, I appeared intoxicated. I was able to tell paramedics I was diabetic. A few Glucose tabs and a bit of IV fluids brought me back up w/o the emergency room. It may be funny to some, but that little cow cost me dearly.

I just wonder when this all changed. In my teens and early 20s, I worked in retail 30/35 years ago. I worked my way up to a pretty nice shop but first did my stint in a variety of shops including at the tills in a large supermarket. Pretty much everyone was really nice. A customer in their 30/40/50s would be 60-90 now… so that would be a bigger proportion of people of my generation and younger, who acts like this then?

What about a customer sendingva dish back because it's cold, or they left out the mushrooms? That's not rude but apparently some restaurant staff think that gives them the right to tamper with food.

Being rude is wrong.

But I am surprised that so many people think that justifies putting peoples lives at risk.

Being rude doesn't deserve a death sentence.

I worked in catering in the early eighties,in a large hotel, there were many many arseholes, and unfortunately they got what was coming.
😂 Most of the the stuff posted here is very tame compared to what the coked up angry hard school Scottish chefs did to their food. However the vilest stuff was reserved for the management who spectacularly stupidly ate in the restaurant

Don’t upset hotel staff. But if you do, make sure you take your toothbrush out of the bathroom. You would never know 😱

But I think anyone who is in charge of serving someones food should have some professionalism, no? Especially when it comes to allergies, etc.

Its not professionals serving you so you're not going to get professionalism.

Most in the industry will have been trained if your lucky, some will be keen and eager to please - but that is very different from professional service of an accountant, teacher or barrister.

many food places don't even now have the allergy folders readily available, staff may or may not have done training and yes its incredibly dangerous.

Waiting staff is not looked upon as a carer in UK and is a job at the low end of the market, there are thousands of vacancies with the sector that just are not being filled and onto of that its poorly paid. Attracting people that you want to show professionalism when a customer is abusive or rude - its not going to be common. At least they will walk away and ignore you at worst they may as explained be tampering with your food (they will also pay the consequences if something happens)

I requested sugar free latte and received a sugared latte that caused my blood sugar to suddenly soar, then drop. Sending me into a hypoglycemic episode.

This is not how diabetes works, but nice try.

Anyway, if you weren’t rude, presumably it was a mistake, and that can happen to anybody.

All you unprofessional s, need some manners and better corporate training. Yes I've seen one too many YouTube videos of customers going ott and holy smokes etc, but still, that does not make it right for any employee to be rude, and unprofessional too, as I've also seen that happen at times, and in some cases that just escalates the situations.

This will probably sound bizarre but here’s an example of working in a supermarket cafe.

A man cut across an very elderly woman in the queue. I asked him to go back behind her. He threw his metal basket at my head suddenly in response. Security came off and he swore at me, tried to punch them and they ended up getting back up to remove him from the store. He attempted to use a shelf bracket at one point to lash out with. He’d looked, until he threw the basket, neatly dressed and normal, so I had just presumed he hadn’t noticed the woman somehow - I wasn’t rude. Just said something like ‘excuse me sir, this lady is next. Could you step back please?’.

Even that wasn’t the end of it. He made an official police complaint later, which I was called about, alleging a different event completely. Very unsettling at age 19 to have.

To think food service customers shouldn't be rude arseholes?

A customer tried to head butt ds2 when he said they’d run out of the drink he wanted. Thank god for security.

Thank goodness for the cameras in most fast food joints now