Why so miserable? (customer service)

[DeanoTheGame]

With customer service I have a few rules usually...

 

1) If i want your help I will ask... if I don't then quietly stand there and wait until I am ready! Don't come over all matey asking if you can help... no you can't! 

2) Be attentive, polite and courteous - get what I want, bring it to me relatively quickly and ask me once if everything is okay... If it's not, I will tell you! 

3) Don't over-do the friendliness... we are not friends and I am here for a reason... 

4) If I say I am not happy, do something about it. Give me a free (cheap) drink if its a problem with food at a restaurant. It's not a big thing but I will be more than happy with that, I don't want a refund just interest in my problem...

5) When I am done bring me the bill quickly... don't dither, have a chat with your mate at the till and forget the goddamn card machine! Nobody pays with cash anymore... just bring the machine so I can pay and leave! 

 

I don't think that is particularly unreasonable... 

 

Fucking barrel of laughs you.

[tiger_rick]

Fucking barrel of laughs you.

Ha, nice one.

 

I'm reasonable in restaurants, it depends on the place. You often find they've under-staffed. Poor bastards running around like blue-arsed flies. So I don't refuse to tip them if they're slow. As long as the food is good, I'll understand and if the experience is that bad, I'll send the company a snotty letter about how fucking tight they are!

 

Need to remember customers are cunts too. I took my girls to F&B's for breakfast last year so Mum could get some work done. There was a party of 18 truned up out of the blue for breakfast. The poor waiter was absolutely frazzled because they'd only staffed for a quite Tuesday morning (or whatever it was). Then the cunts asked him to split the bill 18 ways, but not equally, by what they'd all had, then they paid seperately including 11 who paid by card. I hope he gobbed in their coffees.

[Briefcase]

 

Fucking barrel of laughs you.

Ha, nice one.

 

I'm reasonable in restaurants, it depends on the place. You often find they've under-staffed. Poor bastards running around like blue-arsed flies. So I don't refuse to tip them if they're slow. As long as the food is good, I'll understand and if the experience is that bad, I'll send the company a snotty letter about how fucking tight they are!

 

Need to remember customers are cunts too. I took my girls to F&B's for breakfast last year so Mum could get some work done. There was a party of 18 truned up out of the blue for breakfast. The poor waiter was absolutely frazzled because they'd only staffed for a quite Tuesday morning (or whatever it was). Then the cunts asked him to split the bill 18 ways, but not equally, by what they'd all had, then they paid seperately including 11 who paid by card. I hope he gobbed in their coffees.

 

 

Bill Splitting is the worst. It's not difficult to get out a calculator and work out how much to pay or all put money in the middle of the table and split your change after. 

 

As I've said I once worked in this industry and things like this is what slows you down and take away that service with other guests. 

 

Adults who cannot split bills properly need to go back to school, I've had year 10's (group of like 20+) come in on a school treat thing and they all managed to put money in the middle of the table and then sort the change out amongst themselves after, if they can do it so should adults. 

[Scott Malbranque]

 

With customer service I have a few rules usually...

 

4) If I say I am not happy, do something about it. Give me a free (cheap) drink if its a problem with food at a restaurant. It's not a big thing but I will be more than happy with that, I don't want a refund just interest in my problem...

 

Genuinely would have piddled/spritzed in your free drink there, Algebra.

 

[Michael_3165]

Hey I am really polite and friendly to people but if I don't want to talk then just do the job lol

 

I am not one of those dickheads that complains and makes a scene. If you do the job i'll tip you. I'll be really polite even if I have to send food back and generally end up apologising for being a pain in the arse along with it. But I wouldn't SAY half that stuff because theres no need. 

[Chest Rockwell]

 

Bill Splitting is the worst. It's not difficult to get out a calculator and work out how much to pay or all put money in the middle of the table and split your change after.

 

As I've said I once worked in this industry and things like this is what slows you down and take away that service with other guests.

 

Adults who cannot split bills properly need to go back to school, I've had year 10's (group of like 20+) come in on a school treat thing and they all managed to put money in the middle of the table and then sort the change out amongst themselves after, if they can do it so should adults.

My maths is really shit. And as a customer I think that working the bill out is your job, not mine. Not in some stupid cunt scenario like Rick's but like, say, a 3 way equal split.

[King Coconut]

1. McDonalds and Subway are not restaurants. I don't care what they call themselves.

2. Bill splitting is the responsibility of the establishment. They know the prices, they have the calculators, they want the money. Stop your filthy whinging and split the fucking bill.

[shaneojack]

I've worked in retail the last 7 years and I've been told i'm one of the best customer service people a lot of people have ever had serve them, including more than one mystery shopper. I'm not just saying that to blow my own trumpet but instead because it means that I expect high levels of customer service in places because thats how I am with customers. If someone in a store is poor it really annoys me, i've always been told you have to leave your problems at the door when you're on a shift because you can't take it out on customers but at the same time 8 hours of fake smiles and politeness to customers who half the time are rude, ignorant or have a history of trying to rob from your store does drain you. 

 

The worst experience I had was when visiting a friend in Devon and we popped in the local Co-op where we saw a really great pizza offer, anyway we all line up with these pizzas and it turns out this offer either shouldn't have been displayed or had ended or something and the woman in charge was really going at this young shop girl blaming her and basically having a go at her on the shopfloor in front of customers. I bit my lip but then when I went up with my pizzas she said "if anyone else comes up with these i'm going to refuse to serve them, i'm fed up of this" in a snidey way because she just had to type something in her till or something to discount it. I waited till the transaction went through before giving her what for about being rude to her staff and to customers, she was gobsmacked and tried making out she wasn't talking to me badly but I wasn't having it. I felt that the young girl clearly couldn't say anything back to her boss so I did it for her and she gave me a smile as I left. 

[Briefcase]

 

Bill Splitting is the worst. It's not difficult to get out a calculator and work out how much to pay or all put money in the middle of the table and split your change after.

 

As I've said I once worked in this industry and things like this is what slows you down and take away that service with other guests.

 

Adults who cannot split bills properly need to go back to school, I've had year 10's (group of like 20+) come in on a school treat thing and they all managed to put money in the middle of the table and then sort the change out amongst themselves after, if they can do it so should adults.

My maths is really shit. And as a customer I think that working the bill out is your job, not mine. Not in some stupid cunt scenario like Rick's but like, say, a 3 way equal split.

 

 

Is it really difficult to use a calculator on your phone and add a drink, starter, main & dessert? 

 

People are quick to moan about a slow service but when people want a bill split three different ways thats what holds it up, most people will just say the amount they want to pay and done easy as that, bill splitting requires splitting each item on the till (via manager approval) then printing off three different bills and taking three different payments, next time someone receives a slow service remember that its probably people doing things like this that slow everyone else up.

 

Team Members don't have calculators (again a business problem) and shouldn't be using phones either, so just a pain in the arse really. 

[King Coconut]

Bollocks. I'm sitting on the shitter in germany typing this message on what is essentially a pocket pc and you are reading it instantly although you're probably many hundreds of miles away from me. If you can't split a bill without calling your manager or slowing down service of other guests, you're providing bad customer service.

[tiger_rick]

Splitting equally isn't an unreasonable request at all and the restaurant should be fine to help. If you want to split a bill depending on what you had then I think it's good etiquette to do it yourself. Basically because you're a group of tight-arsed bastards who need to find better friends!

[Chest Rockwell]

Or tell your server in advance so they can keep track if it's going to be a complex one.

 

I'm calling bullshit on needing three separate bills and manager approval to split a bill. I've literally never seen that. It's always three cards paying a share of the cost each.

[Sergio Mendacious]

I think the thing is... if I see someone smiling and saying/doing the right things I tend to (cynically) think that it's all just part of the corporate training. If they don't smile or are rude then I think they are dickheads... they can't win! 

 

That said I do have a belief that you have to get the right people for the job but most of these positions are non-skilled, low paid jobs so you get what you pay for. 

 

As a boss I tend to find the lower the educational attainment the less emotionally intelligent people tend to be, leading to them being less concerned about the 'experience' of the customer. That's a huge generalisation I know but part of it is down to wanting to have a career not just a job to pay the bills. The more invested you are in the job you are doing the better you are at doing it. 

 

With customer service I have a few rules usually...

 

1) If i want your help I will ask... if I don't then quietly stand there and wait until I am ready! Don't come over all matey asking if you can help... no you can't! 

2) Be attentive, polite and courteous - get what I want, bring it to me relatively quickly and ask me once if everything is okay... If it's not, I will tell you! 

3) Don't over-do the friendliness... we are not friends and I am here for a reason... 

4) If I say I am not happy, do something about it. Give me a free (cheap) drink if its a problem with food at a restaurant. It's not a big thing but I will be more than happy with that, I don't want a refund just interest in my problem...

5) When I am done bring me the bill quickly... don't dither, have a chat with your mate at the till and forget the goddamn card machine! Nobody pays with cash anymore... just bring the machine so I can pay and leave! 

6) I clap and smile when I see cool stuff.

 

I don't think that is particularly unreasonable... 

 

I bet this gets you a tonne of love from customer service people.

[Briefcase]

Or tell your server in advance so they can keep track if it's going to be a complex one.

 

I'm calling bullshit on needing three separate bills and manager approval to split a bill. I've literally never seen that. It's always three cards paying a share of the cost each.

 

Maybe what I've said has been lost in translation, but I mean for specific items, so if you said to me can you pay for garlic bread, pizza & a milkshake then splitting that is time consuming.

 

If the bill is £60 between three of you and you all ask to pay £20 each card or cash then that's fine. 

 

Its when people want one bill split into three so that there is now three bills on the table that it becomes a pain in the arse. Similar to what Tiger Rick said earlier.

 

Sorry if anything I said suggested otherwise. 

[Linus]

There's no way I'd expect the restaurant to split the bill. It's totally the customer's responsibility. Otherwise, sit on separate tables! Since I've been an adult, I don't think I've ever split a bill by item, though.