m4ge:
i walk into starbucks and order a pumpkin spice latte with 13 shots of espresso. i tell the barista that i intend to transcend humanity and become a god. i ask for no whip cream
you say this jokingly but i had a customer actually order a pumpkin spice latte with 9 shots of espresso (also no whip) and when i asked her to verify that she did indeed want 9 shots of espresso she looked me dead in the eyes and said “i have 5 kids”
I once had a woman come in and ordered an Americano with 19 shots of espresso. The drink took ages. It held up the line. I asked her why, and she shrugged and said “I just don’t care”. We still talk about that woman. We never saw her again.
new cryptid: exhausted woman at starbucks
Actual conversation I had at register:
“Hi, welcome to [Starbucks]! What can I get you, today?”
“How much is it to fill a Venti with Espresso?”
“I- I’m sorry?”
“A venti cup. How much to fill it with Espresso?”
“Oh. uh. Well, it’d be I suppose… I only have a button for a Quad. I don’t have special pricing for twenty ounces of espresso in a single… drink.”
“Price is the furthest thing from my mind right now. How many ‘add shots’ is that?”
*deep breath of fear* “It’d be a quad with,” *clears throat* “uh, sixteen additional shots of espresso. But, ma’am, I should tell you that the shots will start to get really bitter if they have to sit and wait for us to pull twenty of them-”
“Taste means nothing to me.”
At this point I am truly fearing for my very existence in the presence of what must clearly be an eldritch being.
“Oh. Well, okay.” I put on my absolute best customer service smile to hide my terror and accept that I must face this dragon, fae, or demon with dignity. “We can certainly get that for you! The price will be _____.”
She begins to pay, I shit thee not, with golden dollar coins. We are a block from Wall Street, and this eldritch demi-being is paying for an unholy elixer with golden coins. My life will end soon, I am sure of it.
“Do you still have the ‘Add Energy’ packets?”
My heart began to race at this request. “Yes ma’am.”
“How many can I add?”
Futile though it is, at least I know the rote response to this. “For health reasons, we won’t add more than one per drink and we cannot sell the packets individually.”
“One then.”
I alter the order and tell her the new price. She pays, dumps the change and five golden dollars into the tip box. I write the order on the venti cup and pass it silently to the girl working the hot beverage station. Normally we called and pass, but this was … not something to be spoken aloud.
My fellow takes the cup, not thinking anything of the minor break with protocol, until she sees the order. She stares at me. “No.”
The woman, which I call her for no other greater insight into her terrifying being is within my grasp, simply stands on the other side and says, calmly but with a commanding tone I expect of Admirals in bad movies, “Yes.”
My fellow barista pales before her task. But we are dutiful, we are true to our task, great though it may be. She sets about clearing the two brand new Matrena’s of all distraction, and sets two tall cups in the ready position. The energy packet is emptied into the venti cup, and the shots begin pouring.
The barista was damn near shaking. This woman’s gaze felt like the fires of the sun. Finally, the shots are pulled, the cup is filled, and the hand off takes place.
Our visiting Incomprehensible takes it to our milk bar and adds a dollop of cream. Satisfied, she proceeds to down what must have been half the damn cup.
Then she smiled at us, like a benediction and I was honestly filled with joy. And horror. She left, and we knew nothing more of her after that.
When I talk with other former employees, we quickly begin talking about “The Company” as if we’d never l, perhaps knowing that part of our soul still powers that awesome and terrible corporate machine. And when I share this stroy, other Baristas at first act shocked but quickly settle and comes the chorus,
“Yeah, I had one like that.”
Okay, Starbucks lore is my new favorite genre of literature. Please collect all these and more into a book.
…I thought Venti Espresso Cryptid was a fever dream my manager had. Good lord.
Tag: customer service
friendly retail reminders
or not so friendly since some of y’all don’t know how to fucking act.
•when a retail worker greets you and asks you for help, you can politely decline. there’s no need for the nasty attitude, that’s literally their job.
•check your coupon dates and what they can be used for. your cashier isn’t responsible if your coupon expired or if you chose not to read what it’s actually going to cover.
•speaking of fucking coupons, yes you have to actually show the cashier your coupon.
•don’t haggle. it’s not a yard sale.
•something discontinued or out of stock? has nothing to do with the people that work there. don’t yell at them.
•if you’re looking for a particular item, take a picture of it or write it down. getting frustrated with an employee because you walked in looking for something but gave the most vague details is unfair. companies repackage things constantly and come out with hundreds of products each year.
•yes retail workers do get paid to pick up after a store. but should you leave your coffee cups and gum wrappers around? no, who fucking raised you?
•please watch your children. it’s your job to watch your child, not a retail worker’s.
•not all stock rooms are full of products. most of the time everything is out on the floor.
•don’t hit on retail workers you fucking creep. especially when you know they can’t voice their discomfort. they don’t want you. them being pleasant is part of their job description
a lot of these are common sense and just behaving like a kind and considerate human being. don’t be a dick
Because it has come to my attention that apparently a lot of people weren’t taught proper tipping etiquette so here’s what I was taught.
- Always tip at least 20%.
- If you got something in a special or had a coupon, you tip on the price you would have payed, not the price you did pay.
- At breakfast always tip 25%. Breakfast is never as expensive as dinner and your waitress shouldn’t be shortchanged because you got $5 eggs instead of a $10 sandwich.
- If you keep a table for longer than an hour, add 10% for every hour you keep the table. It’s great that you’re catching up with a friend you haven’t seen in ten years, but you’re fucking over the waitress by staying for four hours. Every hour you’re there you’re costing her money. Make it worth her time.
We all know to tip 20%, but as someone who works as a cook and often talks to the waiters, no one seems to know about the rest. This is what my dad taught me and this is what I’ll teach my children. Be respectful to your waiters. Don’t undertip. They need to eat too.
Rules to live by until we get this crap fixed and start paying a living wage.
Also for your delivery driver they should be getting a 20% tip too! Some drivers don’t get paid for the time they do deliveries or are waged really low just like waiters are!
Also if the weather is bad outside and you MUST order delivery you need to tip at least 25% if not more. These people are out hear braving extreme cold and heat, snow, rain, and wind to get you your food and sometimes at risk to themselves to get you some pizza. Show them some love please!
- Hotel workers have a 40% higher injury rate than other service workers.
- Women are 1.5 times more likely to be injured than men, because nearly every hotel housekeeper is a woman, and housekeepers have a 50% higher injury rate than all hotel workers.
- Hispanic housekeepers are two-thirds more likely to be injured than white housekeepers.
- 91 percent of hotel housekeepers have suffered work-related pain.
- 66 percent take pain medication just to get through their daily work.
Here’s how you can make housekeepers’ jobs a little less shitty.
- Reduce bending situations. For instance, hotels often tell you to toss towels on the floor that you want replaced. Try setting the towels on the closed toilet instead.
- Gather all the trash cans into one.
- Leave a note saying not to change the towels every day.
- Make your own beds.
- Write a note with a tip thanking the housekeeper for not making the beds.
- You can strip the beds by taking off all the sheets (including the ones holding the duvet, if that’s the system the hotel uses) and pillowcases, putting them in a pile, and then piling or loosely folding the blankets and duvet and putting them in a separate pile with the pillows on the stripped bed.
- Tip daily. The same housekeepers aren’t always there every day.
- $2-5 per person, per day is the expected gratuity if you’re a courteous guest.
- Remember to mark it clearly for them so they know it’s for them to take (as opposed to leaving bills just sitting out willy-nilly).
- Do Not Disturb: If you put up a Do Not Disturb sign, the housekeeper is usually just given another room to clean. In a lot of cases, that new room will be outside their normal section, one of the leftover rooms in another part of the hotel. This means they’ll have to push their heavy cart a little farther, spend time waiting for an elevator, and then have to clean a little faster to get it done. That other room might also be a normal, fine room, or it might be a disaster zone, where someone gutted a fish in the tub or spilled Pepsi on the bed. And if there isn’t an extra room to be given to a housekeeper when they have a DND, they’ll probably just be sent home early (especially if it’s a non-union hotel), so they lose some of that day’s pay.
- For all these reasons, try not to use the DND sign. Just tidy up your room as much as possible, follow the steps above, and leave a tip. Your room will just count as an easy clean, and maybe the housekeeper can take a couple minutes to sit in the armchair and rest instead of rushing to the next room.
THANK YOU FOR THIS.
Never remake your bed on the last day. Leave it in a nice ball on the bed for housekeeping to scoop up 👍🏼
my dad always taught me to make my bed in hotels and clean up to make it easier for hotel workers. they’re there to do general cleaning, like vacuuming and cleaning the bathroom for the next guest, they shouldn’t be expected to pick up your trash and other sorts of mess you’ve left behind.
Wow I wish I knew all of this before I was 21. Like I never thought to tip the cleaning staff and now I feel horrible for never doing it
Important for everyone who stays in hotels, for whatever reason.
i was thinking about the weirdest phone calls i got when i still worked at the public library and i remembered this one phone call. it was probably less than 20 seconds long, but it still makes me laugh.
anyways, this woman called and without even saying hello after i said the usual “public library, how can i help you?” spiel, she said, “i have a very important question: when you shelve books, do you push them all to the front of the shelf or all the way back?”
it took me a second to process the question and then i answered that, at the library, we always shelve them so that they are even with the front edge so they’re easier to grab and see. she was obviously delighted by this answer and then, as if an afterthought, she asked, “okay, what about you? what do you do at home with your books?” i said i did the same thing. she hummed in obvious agreement and then just like that she said “thank you!” and hung up.
i never heard from her again. i hope she won whatever argument she was having.
for about a year, i worked at a call center for sprint. i have a similar kind of story.
a woman called, and said she had a question about the call history on her bill. “sure, let me just pull up your account-” and she cut me off going, “no, no, it’s not anything specific, it’s just. so, if you change the time on your phone, does that change the time on the bill?”
“uh… no? the time on the phone doesn’t matter, the call history is recorded by the towers.”
“ohhhh” she said in the saltiest voice i have ever heard “so even if you changed the timezone it wouldn’t change the time on the bill? to, say, the middle of the night?”
i stg yall i looked into the camera like i was on the office. “um… no? it would still be the local time of the tower. is there anything else i can help you with?”
to me, overly chipper: “nope! thank you! have a great day!” turning on someone as she hung up: “she says yoU’RE A LYING SACK OF-”
i still mean-snicker every time i think about it.
You gotta give it up to that guy for a balls all in impressive lie though
Me: *shows basic human decency to cashier
Cashier: ??!?! Thank you! You’re the nicest person ever!
Me: are you ok
Reblog if politeness to retail and service workers is important to you.
As a former cashier, can confirm all cashiers are not okay, please be nice.
Seriously okay, be polite and good to cashiers ❤
it costs so little to treat people like people
I worked with toddlers and pre schoolers for three years. Sometimes I accidentally slip and tell a friend to say bye to an inanimate object (“say bye bus!”) & occasionally they unthinkingly just do it.
I’m glad there’s a teacher version of “accidentally called teacher ‘mom’”
when I worked at Medieval Times occasionally I would slip in real life and call people “my lord”
One time during family prayer, dad began: “our father who art in heaven, American Airlines, how can I help you?”
One time my dad went to the White Castle drive-thru and the lady (who was supposed to say ‘Welcome to White Castle, what’s your crave?’) asked, “Welcome to White Castle, what’s your problem?”
She apologized profusely while my dad proceeded to lose his shit laughing.
Yesterday I went to Wendy’s and the girl said “Welcome to McDonalds” and then just sighed
Somebody in the elevator asked me what floor I lived on, and I answered “please open your books to page eight”, and we just kind of stared at each other, blinking.
i work retail full time and my script gets frequently messy – ill ask the same question twice, or say “$2.60 is your total” while handing back their change, or say “how are you doing today?” instead of “have a good day!” like name it ive bungled it
but anyway, this lady came thru my line buying a book and the review on the front said: “few books are well written, fewer still are important, and this book manages to be both”
as i handed her the bag i was trying to say “thanks, youre all set” and instead my brain mashed up the review and i said “thanks, youre important”
there was this short pause in which i tried to figure out what the fuck id just said. she blinked and then said “oh thank you! youre important too!”
the real kicker was one of my coworkers. when i was relating this story later his response was “at least you said something NICE. last week i accidentally combined ‘youre welcome’ and ‘no problem’ into ‘youre a problem’”
one time, since I used to work as a daycare teacher with preschoolers, i was on my college campus in my gym, and someone was running in the weight room and tripped over a machine and fell, and instead of offering to help, I just stared and said, “This is why we use our walking feet.”
we both sat there for a while until the guy nodded and said, “yeah, okay, i should’ve done that.”
I’ve spent a good chunk of time working in kitchens, so I still will reflexively say shit like “behind” and “coming around” as I maneuver through spaces and around people.
Which, actually, not such a bad thing; I’m a big guy and can come across as imposing pretty easily. The position calls can help defuse that, and also help avoid collisions.
Less good is the time my brain was half functional and I let slip a “coming with a knife” while grocery shopping. THAT took some explaining.
I work in an office and send tens of emails to customers every day. Once my mum asked me to send her a train ticket I had bought for her. I emailed her “Hello mum, as agreed, please find attached the ticked you requested. Thanks, Alex”
i worked as a camp counselor, and i would have the kids tap somewhere on my legs if they needed something because im a pretty tall dude. today asked my cat if he needed something.
I have woken up in a cold sweat saying “is that for here or to go?”
the first time i was tapped to say grace at thanksgiving i was probably in like, the fifth grade, and i said: “[blah blah blah]…..give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against. one nation, under god, indivisible, for liberty, and justice for all. amen.”
we all said amen and started eating and then about five minutes later, into the silence, my brother went, “…………wait.”
wupacing 