Just
Plain Bad Business
Jan-Jun 2000
Archive
Jul-Dec
2000Archive
Oct-Dec 2000
Archive
2001-2002
Archive
Jan-Jun
2003 Archive
Jul-
Dec 2003 Archive
Jan-Jun
2004 Archive
Jul-Dec
2004 Archive
Not sure if you’re still accepting stories or not, but I had
to tell you about our latest pizza-getting episode. My husband and I love
a particular style of pizza from a well known company. This style is
frequently advertised as being one of their most popular. There are a few
locations in town, only one being close enough to deliver to us. We called
the closer location only to be told that they did not have any more of this type
crust. (This has happened at least four times, and we call early in the
evening, not minutes before closing or anything. The last time, the person
on the phone told us that the manager was cheap and never wanted to pre-order
too many of any of the crusts, so they were always running short.)
No biggie, we decided to go to another location that
couldn’t deliver, but wasn’t a far drive. I listen to my husband on
the phone ask how much for a large pepperoni with extra cheese. Then,
satisfied with the price, he orders (and repeats the words) large pepperoni with
extra cheese. After he gets off the phone, he comments on the guy’s
thick accent. (This will be important later.) I drive to the shop
and for some reason, think to look inside the box before I leave. (This is
at one of those places where they generally show it to you when they bring it
out.) It’s a sausage pizza. I am not an angry customer, and,
apologizing, point out to the man that he gave us the wrong pizza. He
disagrees. “No, I remember talking to you,” he says. “You
ordered sausage.” It’s the heavily-accented guy that my husband told
me about, so I explain to him that he can’t remember talking to me because my
husband ordered and I heard the order. Furthermore, I explain, hoping to
help my case, my husband hates sausage and would never order it. He agrees
to make us another one but says, “You should tell your husband that pepperoni
and sausage are pretty much the same thing.” And then, “Your husband will
probably be mad at you because he’s very hungry and it will take ten minutes
before the new one is ready.”
The last straw comes when he, in full voice, yells to the
pizza cook to ask him if he wants the now unwanted sausage pizza to take home to
his kids. The guy declines. Then accent-guy turns to me and says,
“You may as well take this one home too. We aren’t allowed to take
pizzas home.” Classy. We now drive all the way across
town to the only location that has both the pizza we want and some semblance of
acceptable customer service.
BadBusiness0526-05
During my "apprenticeship" into the professional
world as a temp, there was this one incident I will never forget. I had an
interesting set of interviews with three different supervisors, one after the
other, all on the same afternoon at the same company. Each one lasted
fifteen minutes, maybe a half hour. An uncommon procedure, but not unheard
of when you might be serving under more than one manager.
The first two interviewers were polite and professional. The
first manager even offered to get me a soda and said it would be fine to have it
throughout the rest of the interviews. The second manager was drinking one
himself and, as insinuated, didn't bat an eye at my having one. It was a
West Coast, casual company. Food and drink was at many desks. As an
interviewee, I was even a bit more dressed-up and business-like than most of the
regulars. Everything seemed to be going great.
Then came the third guy.
The first words out of his mouth were "You know, we
haven't found someone worthwhile from (your temp company) yet." His
tone of voice was one of thin toleration instead of professional warmth, as if I
was wasting his valuable time. He sat behind his desk and gave me the
stony stare when I answered his questions. Believe it or not, this was
better than when he spoke, as during those times he didn't bother to look me in
the eye. He had obviously made up his mind that I wasn't going to work out
before I walked in the door, and I began to wonder how many temps had been
intimidated in this manner.
The one little thing that just sort of said it all? When
I politely (almost meekly) asked if there was someplace I could put my (now
empty) soda can, he held open the door, said "There's a trash can on your
way out", then shut the door on me so fast I almost got smacked on the bun.
The secretary outside watched, sympathetically sighed, and shook her head.
I don't know whether he disagreed with the company's casual policies, his wife
had left him, he was having power squabbles with the other managers, or what,
but apparently I *wasn't* the only one he treated this way.
They hadn't "found someone worthwhile" to staff this
position yet? Gee, I wonder why that could be, what with this bitter,
controlling, petty little manager sabotaging everything....
At least there wasn't any worrying whether I'd get the job or
not. I never bothered to call back with my temp agency on this one.
BadBusiness0527-05
My husband and I recently moved into a new apartment complex.
As we were looking into different places, I called the place we currently live
to schedule an appointment to look around. A woman named Kim answered the
phone, and she set me up for an appointment that afternoon. I came to the
complex without my husband, since he was still at work, then if I liked it,
he could come back at another time. Kim showed me around the building,
showed me all the amenities, and a sample apartment of each floor plan they
offered. I really liked the look of the place, so my husband came back
with me that evening.
By the time we were finished with the tour, we talked for a
minute, and we decided to set up a lease. Kim took us back to the leasing
office and set up the necessary paperwork. There were lots of papers to
sign, faxes to be sent, forms printed, etc, so it took a while, probably about
half an hour. As we were signing and filling in information, Kim is
telling us different stories about herself and her family. (You know how
some people you barely know tell you their entire life story?) So we gave
her back all the papers, and she said "Let me check these out, just a
minute." So we sit, waiting patiently, for her to check them.
She kept us sitting there for another 20 minutes, telling us a story about
people we'd never met!!!
Finally, we get ready to leave, and I make an appointment with
her to pick up my key the following Friday. Our old apartment lease was
ending, and we needed to move quickly. I watched her write my name down,
and I told her I could be there at quarter after 5. I saw her write down
"5:25" (as in a quarter is twenty-five cents), but at that point I
wanted to leave so badly I figured I would just let it go. Not the
brightest crayon in the box.
So the following Friday I go to pick up the key. Two
women are in the office; neither is Kim. They are both helping other
people, so I wait patiently. One of the women asks if she can help me, so
I tell her I have an appointment with Kim at quarter after five. She gives
me kind of a funny look, and glances at the other woman, who shakes her head.
The first woman asks me to wait in the lobby until they finish up. No
problem. I'm sitting there in the lobby for about 15 minutes or so.
So I wait until the second woman, who is the building manager (we'll call
her Connie) comes out of the office. She sits down next to me with a
little form and says, "What kind of an apartment are you interested
in?" I stared at her blankly for a minute and said, "What?
No, I'm moving in today!" She kind of looked blankly back at me
for a minute, and then we went into the office together. It turns
out that Kim had never told Connie that we were moving in, never turned in our
papers, never got our keys, nothing!!! Apparently, Kim wanted to leave
early, and when asked if she had any appointments that evening, said no.
Connie finds our lease agreement shoved/buried in Kim’s files, pulls it out
and looks it over.
By this time my husband had arrived from work, thinking that I
would already have the key, we could start moving smaller items, etc.
Connie asks me to look over the typed form that Kim drew up for us, to check for
any mistakes, before signing (something Kim never asked us to do). Turns
out that she had my husband’s name spelled wrong and my social security number
wrong! So Connie has to re-do our ENTIRE lease agreement with spelling
changes, faxing, more form filling…by this time it’s about 7pm, way past the
time I thought I’d get to eat.
Then I mention to Connie something about our cat, and she
says, “Cat? What cat?” We were allowed to have cats in the
complex, but had to pay security fee. In all the confusion of re-doing the
lease, I forgot that I had filled out another paper with the pet fee on it.
If I hadn’t mentioned anything and the landlord needed to get in our apartment
one day and saw our cat, we could have been evicted! Plus, when someone
moves in or out, they’re given the use of the freight elevator to move the
furniture, but there’s a schedule. Of course Kim had forgotten to put us
down on that, and of course someone was already scheduled
to use it that day. (Luckily, they were very nice and understanding, and
were moving the same floor as us, which made it easier.)
Finally, by 7:30, more than 2 HOURS after I had come in, and 1
hour after Connie should have been able to go home, we are done! Connie
apologized profusely, with promises that she would deal with Kim when she came
in on Monday. I found out recently that she has been fired—yay!!!
Every other time I have had a question or concern about the complex, Connie has
been more than happy to answer it for me, with no delay.
BadBusiness0602-05
Even though this story has a happy ending, it still bothers me
after six years. It was January and I was scheduled to
graduate in May. I had been looking for a job and had an interview with
"Inconsiderate Company". The position was what I'd been looking
for, and the salary was good; it was also near my family. The interview
went well, and a week or so later I was offered a position and signed a letter
of intent.
Finding a job really took a lot of pressure off of me.
I'd gotten along well with the rep in Personnel, and we would email jokes back
and forth, that sort of thing. Well, as April rolled around I emailed her
asking for some Realtors in the area so I could start trying to find a home.
I finally got a reply a week later stating that they didn't feel they needed me
after all, but thanks anyway.
I was graduating in 6 weeks and I didn't have a job! I
hadn't been looking for one because I thought I had one. After scrambling
around for a couple of weeks a friend steered me to the company I work for now.
I'm happy here and I feel very lucky I didn't end up at Inconsiderate Company.
Now I know a letter of intent isn't a contract, but they could
have had the common courtesy to tell me I wasn't needed. If I hadn't asked
about realtors they never would have said a thing to me. BTW, after
I called my email "buddy" asking why they hadn't notified me
about this before she offered to set me up with an interview with one of
Inconsiderate Company's branch offices. She still doesn't understand why I
turned her down!_
BadBusiness0617-05
Our office has about 80 employees and there is never an email
or notice or any mention about “contributing” to gifts. Once word gets
out about good news like a wedding or baby most everyone will just generously
contribute. About 2 years ago, one of the top managers “Tom”
announced his engagement to “Sue”. The office was extremely excited
for him, as he is one of the favorite manager, a little bit older (about 42),
and this was his first marriage. Contribution for a gift came fast
and furious. Since I collect the money, I was just overwhelmed by
everyone’s generosity. I collected $2300!
I found out that Tom and Sue were registered at a very
exclusive high end store. So the following weekend I went with my sister
to this store because neither one of us would miss an opportunity to look at all
of the beautiful things at this place. I think we spent a little over 2
hours there and we became familiar with the store’s fine china associate
“Elaine”. I was able to purchase 5 full place settings in their china
pattern with the money that I had. Yes, it cost $420 for one 5 piece place
setting! So with tax it left me with a little over $100 so I placed that
remainder in the store’s gift card. The store offered to ship the gift
to the Bride and Groom’s home. I could even send a personal card with
it. So in the next couple of days I had everyone sign the card and I went
back to the store to send it with the gift.
I received confirmation that the gift, gift card, and personal
card was sent and received (they have the most excellent service at that store)
but no one heard anything from Tom or Sue. I shrugged it off as perhaps it
was just an oversight on their part. Maybe they were overwhelmed with the
wedding, as it was going to be about 350 guest list and perhaps they would get
to thanking everyone after the wedding. No one from the office was invited
to the wedding but that wasn’t a big deal.
So the wedding date comes and goes and there is no mentioned
or thank you for our gifts and about 6 months have gone by with no word.
As an additional coincidence, I had another bride who registered at this same
high end store. Again, I made the trip with my sister and we ran into the
same associate Elaine. She recognized us right away and began to tell us
this horrific story about Sue. A few days after the wedding date, Sue came
into the store with everything everyone purchased for her on her registry at
this store. She actually had to park by the “red curb” outside the
store just to unload her SUV. Her total came to almost $12,000. A
lot of people bought her gift cards too. Elaine wasn’t the clerk to help
her with the return (because the manager had to be called in for this) but she
overheard Sue tell her companion that it was a good thing she registered at this
store because of their easy return policy and that she will be getting a lot of
cash! The manager tried to give Sue a little bit of a bad time by telling
her if she had “doubles” that this would be a little
bit easier but returning her whole registry was a bit too much. Since she
had the “gift receipts” they could give her store credit. This was
unacceptable to Sue. She ranted, raged and caused a screaming huge scene.
They finally gave in and gave her the money. When the manager was
verifying the amounts on the gift cards, the two women would scoff at the
amounts. The whole store was relieved when the two women left and they
placed a noticed that she could not register for anything else there (Yes, they
are that exclusive and frankly I don’t blame them!) I never told anyone
at the office what I knew.
Two years pass by and Tom one day mentions that he is
expecting a baby! The response for contribution this time was slim.
I was curious if something had happened. I asked a friend of mine
“Joe” who also worked directly for him what was going on. He told me
that when Tom’s group came over to his house that following year for his
annual Christmas party, they were in for a surprise. A small group of
employees asked Sue if they could see the place setting that was purchased for
them and they were taken back for a rude awakening. Sue tells the group
which also included an executive that she returned it to the store. They
were all floored. She was asked if she didn’t like it or if there was a
problem with it and she casually says “I only registered at that store so that
I could get the money.” She continued to tell them that she picked out
the most expensive things to register for just for the money and then laughed.
They were so stunned by her comments that they literally stood there in a group
for a few minutes more and just didn’t say anything. When they did speak, they
agreed that she could have just lied and said that she had them locked up
somewhere and didn’t want to get them out. Later on, they all mentioned
that they never even heard of any “thank you” for the gift. Word got
out into the office about Sue’s behavior and I suppose everyone was just a
little tainted.
So now it comes time for a baby gift and as I mentioned before
the contribution is small. So I dipped into our office fund (I can do
this) and placed some more money into a “gift basket”. I chose not go
off of her registry and just purchase this gift basket from a very nice baby
store. When the baby was born, I sent flowers to the hospital and the gift
basket to the house. Tom came back about three days later boasting with
pictures. When we looked at the pictures, I noticed that Sue was
surrounded by white roses. Literally more than 6 dozen roses surrounded
her. I commented on how beautiful they were and Tom tells us that his wife
doesn’t accept anything less than white roses. Carnations and star
gazers are just too common for her (a little bit of an insensitive comment since
we sent a blue arrangement which included carnations). Tom showed more pictures
which had different relatives and people in the room holding the new baby.
In a few pictures, I noticed a table in the far back of the room in a very
dark place that had several arrangements on it including the one I sent from the
office. It was a little peculiar looking as it was not arranged but kind
of stuffed into the corner. Again, no one ever received a thank you for
this.
Before the end of the day, I got a call from the store I
purchased the gift basket from asking if I would like to come in and get a
refund. I was confused. Apparently, Sue was in the store trying to
return this $265.00 basket only THREE DAYS AFTER THE BABY WAS BORN!! The
clerk told me that since the transaction was new and not complete (I think she
said it took 5 business days to go through) that if Sue couldn’t return this
not even for a gift card until the transaction was completed. Sue had
given the clerk my phone number so that she can ask for me to come to the store
with the company credit card. She wanted me to refund the card and perhaps I
would give her the cash. Sue gets on the phone and in this very sappy sweet tone
tells me this too. (I have never spoken to Sue before and I don’t know
how to answer people when I’m in shock). So the only thing that came out
of my mouth was that I wouldn’t do it. She got irate with me where she
was trying to belittle me. I didn’t want to take it. So I
interrupted her and told her I was not going listen to her tone and abuse and
requested that she not call me again! Luckily, I never did. Additionally,
I called the store back 2 days later to see if Sue was successful in returning
it and they told me that they didn’t and wouldn’t! They requested Sue
not to come back into the store as her belligerent behavior was more than
harassing it was threatening. A police officer was near by and they
requested for Sue to be escorted from the store. She went kicking and
screaming and didn’t calm down until the officer threatened to call Child
Services to take the baby while they throw her in jail!
A year later, Tom announced his second baby. I wasn’t
shocked that no one contributed, as Tom and Sue were becoming quite the topic of
conversation because of her bad behavior and inappropriate outbursts while she
visited the office or at company functions. When I didn’t send flowers
to the hospital, Tom came to me a few days later and asked if we still do that.
He proceeded to tell me that his wife was hurt that we didn’t send anything to
her. I actually didn’t reply to him. I just smiled and went back
to work.
BadBusiness0311-05
My father died almost two years ago, in 2003, barely a week
before his birthday. This hit my mom especially hard; though he wasn't the best
of fathers (or husbands), she still loved him dearly. A bit of background on my
dad: Since we found the internet several years ago, he'd been signing up for
several free-stuff sites and mailing lists, so we would catch an insane amount
of telemarketer calls.
So, it wasn't much of a surprise when, a few months after his
passing, my mom gets a call asking for my father. Here's the gist of what was
said (I wasn't there, but my brother told me about it):
Caller: Hello, may I speak to Mr. G? Mom: I'm sorry, but he
passed away recently. Caller: Well, may I speak to his replacement then? Mom:
*stunned silence, cold voice* He does not have a replacement. Caller: Oh. Well,
Mrs. G - it is Mrs. G, right? Mom: Yes. Caller: (cheery happy telemarketer
voice) My name is A with Such-and-Such magazine, I'd like to speak with you
about a subscription--- Mom: *more stunned silence* F*** you. *click*
I almost wish she had him there in person. Some people can be
so tactless!
BadBusiness0512-05
I had just returned home from working in a resort town for the
summer, trying to earn/save money for my university tuition in fall. Knowing I
had a huge bill coming up, I was living on the EXTREME cheap and basically let
my closest girl friends know it, so there would be no awkward moments with them,
if they wanted to invite me out for lunch or they wanted me to attend some event
I couldn't possibly afford. I am also NOT on for charities or letting people
pick up the tab, so our events would have to include a rented movie and some
chips... nothing extravagant. One of my friends, we'll call her Deb, invited me
to a "Party Lite" candle party at her apartment (please let this me
known that Party Lite is a combination of pyramid scheme and a rip off where you
pay $20 for a pack of crappy scented candles.) I informed Deb that I do not like
candles, and I rarely if ever burn then, and that I did not have the money to
purchase anything, so I would not be going. Deb BEGGED me to come, saying that I
would not have to buy anything, that I was under no obligation, and so forth...
they just needed another person there because there was not a lot of people
coming. After about an hour of unrelentless harassment, I agreed. I showed up 10
minutes early, with chip dip, some fruit and pop in tow, because I feel terrible
she's having to throw one of these god awful parties. When I arrive, I am
informed that there is only Deb, the "Party Lite" consultant, and the
consultants roommate there. Therefore, I am the ONLY PAYING CUSTOMER!
As the night progresses, I'm pressured into buying $60 worth
of crappy candles (gifts I suppose), the consultant spends most of the evening
on the phone and doesn't even DO her presentation, the three of them are totally
rude and talk about the most VULGAR... "sexual situations" (I'm not
claiming to be innocent, but I have limits ESPECIALLY about what I want to hear
from other people that I don't even KNOW), then they start giving me the gears
to host MY OWN party.
At this point, I'm pissed off for having to part with my money
and listen to these girls, so I say "You know what? I don't even like
buying this crap, I'm not going to hold a party where I try and pressure my
other friends into spending their money on this garbage, so I don't see that
happening. Ever." Although I know that was incredibly rude, I think after
being treated so poorly be Deb and the consultant not even doing her job
properly... needless to say, regardless of begging, I will never, EVER go to
another one of those parties again. (Deb has coerced another friend of ours to
throw one next week. You'd better believe that is not going to happen!)
BadBusiness0630-05
Went with my family to a fast-growing in popularity flame
grilled chicken eatery in Brisbane and were enjoying our scrumptious, spicy hot
chicken when my wife noticed a bug in her burger. We checked as you are
wont to do, and sure enough, unanimously decided it was a bug and worthy of
complaint. Called over the waitress who was in a hurry and came to address us
after the second beckoning. She looked at the food and said she would take it in
to show the manager. I could see directly inside the kitchen and saw her speak
with the manager and show him the offending plate of food and bug. We waited and
waited until we could wait no more and called her over and asked her what the
manager said. She said she would get him immediately. Eventually the manager
wandered over. He said, no the waitress had not shown her the item in question.
We suggested he go and have a look at it and see if there was anything he could
do about it. He came back and said the waitress had thrown it out and there was
not much else he could do about it. I had actually seen him go into the kitchen
and take a look at the plate with the food on it and discussed something again
with the waitress. Up till this time, I had no intention of taking the matter
any further, as I expected a sincere apology and as we had all eaten our fill
anyway, any offer of a replacement something to make up for the inconvenience
suffered would be refused by us and we would go our merry way. Now, I was upset
and suggested there was gross mishandling of this complaint, as I was genuinely
aggrieved. He threw a perfunctory 'couldn't be helped' my way and left.
I wrote the head office a very terse letter outlining the
spoilt evening. I received a reply very promptly. In fact I received a call from
the Sydney Headquarters and was promised a voucher, in fact I was assured
it was in the post. Unfortunately it did not arrive, but at least I was placated
somewhat.
BadBusiness0119-05
Having worked off and on as a server to support myself while
attending college, I’d like to think that I am extremely understanding when it
comes to being a patron at a restaurant. After all, I know what it is like
to have upwards of five tables full of people who all think that they are your
only customers. I am happy to say that, until the incident which I will
describe, I had not had any dining experiences that warranted complaint.
A male friend and I had decided to have dinner at a casual
restaurant that I absolutely love. I had been there several times before
and the food and service were wonderful. We had arrived before the dinner
rush so things weren’t very busy and we were seated in the section of
“Jan”. Perhaps it is insignificant, but the first thing that I noticed
was that Jan was somewhat older than most of the wait staff (this was a college
town and the entire wait staff appeared to be around 15-20 years younger than
her). She seemed friendly and confident, however, and my friend and I
ordered soft drinks and appetizers. I also ordered an alcoholic drink from
the bar. She asked for my ID, which was appropriate as I was only 23 at
the time, and after determining that I was of legal age she commented to my
friend that he had better “take care of” me as I was a little girl and that
was a stout drink. I was slightly offended that such a personal remark had
been made but I chalked it up as a misguided attempt to be friendly and
overlooked it. A few minutes later my bar drink arrived, and around 20
minutes later the appetizers were brought to us. We still had not received
our soft drinks, however, and asked the man who brought out our food to inform
our server of that fact. A little later another group was set in Jan’s
section. A few minutes later she appeared from the back of the restaurant
for the first time since taking our order. We got
her attention and informed her that we were almost finished with our appetizers
and still had not received as much as a glass of water. She actually waved
us off with a nod and proceeded to her new table to take their drink orders.
By now I was beginning to get angry, but I decided that she
would probably bring out all of the drinks together to save time and as long as
I did get something to drink everything would be fine. After another wait
she brought out our food…but STILL no drinks. When we brought this to
her attention again, she mumbled something about how so and so was supposed to
bring them for her. (Which is a pet peeve of mine…I think it is very
unprofessional to blame a co-worker in front of customers,
whether they are really to blame or not.)
Finally, after we had sat with our food for a couple more
minutes, the delayed soft drinks arrived, brought by another server. I
assumed that the worst was over and settled down to my meal. My friend had
ordered a hamburger, which he proceeded to cut in half. To our
horror, it revealed a large green chunk of what appeared to be mold in the
center of the meat. Needless to say, we had both lost our appetite by this
point and, after waiting a couple of minutes for our waitress to return, then
being unable to flag her down when she did pass by; my friend arose and tracked
down a manager. My friend calmly explained the entire situation to the
manager (I regret to say that I was incapable of speaking calmly
at this point, so I decided to say nothing at all). He was very
understanding and sympathetic, apologized for our trouble and told us not to
worry about paying for what we had ordered as he would take care of it. He
even brought a carry out container for my meal, which was untouched. As we
were leaving, Jan hurried (for the first time all evening) to our table to look
for a tip and, as my friend observed, seemed very put out to find nothing,
staring very pointedly after us. I suppose I made my own breach of
etiquette in not leaving a tip, and I did feel somewhat guilty as I have always
believed that even mediocre service deserves at least a 15% gratuity, but after
reminding myself that Jan had only been to our table twice throughout the
evening (not counting the time she waved us off) I believe that
receiving no tip was more than she deserved. I must add that I have since
returned to the restaurant several times and have never had another problem
(though I do check any meat I order carefully) and have not had the
displeasure of seeing Jan there again.
BadBusiness0307-05
My story concerns the rudeness of a conductor on our local
commuter rail. I take the commuter rail often with my two kids, since it is
easier than trying to find parking downtown in a major city. The incidents
occurred when my youngest was 7 months old and my oldest was 23 months.
The conductor, whose name really is Dick, has never been seen
to smile, say please, or any of those common niceties. But fine, some people are
like that. Where he crossed the line in my book was when I was trying to get on
the train one day. I had my youngest in a sling on my chest, and the older one
in a baby backpack/stroller. I was trying to carry said stroller up the stairs
in front of me, with my son in it. Naturally, this is all heavy and awkward. So
I politely asked Dick, who was at the top of the stairs, "Would you mind
giving me a hand with this?" Every other conductor on the line wouldn't
even need to be asked. His response was brusque: "Only if you take the kid
out!". Now, I'm still trying to figure out how that would have worked. I
struggled up on my own, while Dick sighed impatiently because I was holding up
the train. I resisted the urge to 'accidentally' drop my stroller on his foot.
Then a couple weeks later, I encountered him again. This time,
the older son walked onto the train while the baby rode in the backpack. I had
set the backpack on the seat to get the baby out, and had forgotten to put it
down on the floor. Normally I do this right away, and brush the seat off so that
future passengers do not get dust on their backsides. However, said baby was
howling for a bottle, so I had other things to think about. When conductor Dick
came along to take our tickets, he raised his voice, grabbed at my backpack and
said "This does NOT belong on the seat!" Had he asked me politely, I
would have moved it instantly with an apology. When you yell at me in front of
my kids, however, you do not get my best side. My response was and equally loud
"Excuse me? Do you really need to be so rude?" He snarled back about
how I was the one being rude. I shut my mouth, fed my howling baby, went home
and sent a nastygram to the head of the commuter rail customer service. I'm not
asking for Mary Poppins to take my tickets, but you could have a little common
courtesy, and a wee bit of understanding for one mom juggling two kids under 2.
BadBusiness0314-05
Here's a brief but very, very true story of the worst restaurant
service I have ever had:
A few years ago I was doing some environmental work with a
consultant in Battle Mountain, Nevada. After work, we decided to have dinner
together since neither of us cared to eat alone. There weren't a lot of places
to eat dinner in town, so we decided on what appeared to be the local favorite
based on the number of cars in the parking lot. I can't remember what I ordered
but my associate ordered a huge steak and baked potato. Shortly after our
dinners arrived, the waitress began taking orders form a table a few over from
ours. The customers were not English-speaking and were having a very difficult
time understanding the waitress's explanation of a "baked potato". The
waitress tried to explain, but got more and more frustrated because she couldn't
make them understand. Finally, she walked over to our table and asked my
associate "Is it OK if I show those people what your baked potato looks
like?" My associate said ok, thinking that she would carry the plate over
to the other customers and return it. Instead, she reached onto his plate and
picked up his potato WITH HER BARE HANDS, carried it over to the other table,
said "see, this is what a baked potato looks like", walked back over
to our table, and put I t back on my associate's plate. She then wiped her hand
on her apron and walked away like nothing happened. All my associate could say
was "did that just really happen?!" and all I could do was laugh.
BadBusiness0421-05
Page Last Updated May 18, 2007
|