The Story of the Iced Coffee Lady

If you've ever worked in a fast food restaurant, in retail, or really any service job, you KNOW there's always one customer that will ruin your day. Often times, you know it right away when you look at them. The frown, the same "I need to speak to a manager" look in their eyes, and their more than disappointed tone of voice. Well, on this particular day, I had met the ULTIMATE worst customer.

I was fairly new to the job at this point, I'd only been there a few months and I really hadn't had to deal with any horrible customers yet. I was still in the stage where if there was a problem, one of my coworkers would bail me out and save the day. This particular day, however, I wasn't so lucky.

I was working on fries, cleaning out the fryer, and generally just cleaning my station. I was minding my own business. All of a sudden, my coworker, who had been there a LOT longer than me, walks over to me and says, "You need to deal with this customer."

Me? Why me? I'd never dealt with this situation before, why couldn't she do her job and handle it? Or if it was that bad (trust me, I came to learn it was) why didn't she get a manager? To this day, I don't know. I have a feeling this girl had it out for me, but she also sucked at her job.

So I walk over to the window, a position I wasn't all that good at to begin with, I open the window half an inch, and I hear it. The bloodcurdling scream of the customer parked outside, just a mere two feet from where I was standing.

"Your coworker closed the window and has been ignoring me. My iced coffee was made wrong, I refuse to leave until it is made right. MAKE ME AN ICED COFFEE NOW!"

That last sentence still rings in my head to this day, and this incident happened at least two years ago.

So, being the "customer obsessed" person I was, I asked her what was wrong with the iced coffee. She proceeded to hand it forcefully to me, and told me that it wasn't sweet enough. Seems like a pretty easy solution, I have NO idea why my coworker couldn't walk over to the pump, add a pump or two of sugar, and hand it back. As I proceeded to do this, I handed the coffee back to this customer. She tried it, and shook her head.

"How hard is it to do your job?!"

Well then, ma'am. At this point, a girl in the seat next to her who I assumed to be her daughter, buried her head in her hands and said "Mom, she didn't do anything to you, she's trying to fix it." While I appreciated this girl defending my honor, the rage inside her mother did not burn out.

So I take the coffee back, and remake it again. This time, when I handed it back, she drank it, shook her head, and drove away. No "thank you" (not that I REALLY expected one at this point), nothing at all.

Thanks to this lady, my coworker had to deal with a line of angry cars who wanted their food and had been waiting for much longer than they should have, upon returning to her position.

Here's the moral of the story: customers, please be nice to your service workers. We will do what you ask of us, as long as you're polite. Service workers, if a customer is causing THAT much of an issue for you, remember this cautionary tale, and always grab a manager. And as for my former coworker, customer service is not your forte, sweetie.