Pitting myself for being a bad, bad customer...

The BBQ Pit
1

Although, it wasn’t intentional.

mr. avabeth and I went to an afternoon matinee of Harry Potter - which was a surprisingly well-behaved theater for the amount of children involved (my favorite sight of the afternoon was a mother with her temper-tantrum-throwing three year old outside of the bathrooms who, in response to the child yelling, said “Those people in there PAID for their movie and you are not going to ruin it! We’ll stay out here until you can behave!” - I wanted to give her a big hug and ask her to teach other mothers as a community service). We enjoyed the movie, but of course, we were hungry afterwards.

So, we headed to Bennigan’s (“Oh, boy, Bennigan’s!”). As we went in, we were sat fairly quickly. The restaurant was nearly empty, especially for a Sunday, but it’s in a strange location, so that may have accounted for it. The hostess gives us our menus, tells us that our server’s name is Jenn, and leaves.

We pore over the menus, deciding what we want to eat. So we choose our dinners and wait.

And wait.

And wait.

No Jenn. We’re beginning to wonder if Jenn is a figment of the restaurant’s imagination. We didn’t have anything pressing to get to, so we were patient. Probably ten to fifteen minutes had passed when finally, a server named Bridget stopped by.

“Have you been helped?” She asked cheerfully.

We both shake our head, and I pipe up “The hostess told us our server’s name was Jenn, but we’re starting to wonder if she really exists.” I had a smile on my face the entire time, but…umm…oops.

Next thing I know, all hell breaks loose. (Well, that might be exaggerating a bit…).
But she apologizes profusely to us, and I try to assure her that I was just kidding. It doesn’t work. She apologizes again, takes our drink orders, and disappears.

Then Jenn appears. Apologizing profusely. Telling us how sorry she is. Again, I try to tell her I was just being a smartass, and we really weren’t upset. She continues to apologize. Between Bridget and Jenn, I think I heard the words “I’m sorry” 25 times.

So Jenn takes our order and leaves the table. The next thing we know, the MANAGER shows up to apologize to us. He puts a complimentary basket of chips and salsa on the table, tells us he had cut some people and they didn’t know there was a table out there, and that’s it’s his fault. AGAIN, I try to tell them I was kidding. He apologizes. Again.

The rest of the meal was fairly uneventful. The food was good, Jenn was very attentive, and the manager came by to check on us.

But I still feel awful. They thanked us for being nice about the misunderstanding, and again, we assured her that we were kidding. We did leave her a nice tip, but I still feel terrible about it. Heck, it got us good service, but that’s not the way I want to get good service.

I’m never joking with a server again.

Ava

2

I wouldn’t worry about it - you said you weren’t mean and were only joking.
I talk like that to people all the time - nearly all of the time the humour will take the sting out of a criticism.

3

Ava, you didn’t do anything wrong and you have no reason to feel terrible. It doesn’t sound like Jenn is going to get beaten up for this; she wasn’t told she had a table. Somebody did screw up and it’s perfectly appropriate for them to be told about it. Granted, they went a little overboard on the apologies, but they screwed up.

4

You know, I’m half torn over laughing hysterically over it and being really embarrassed - I just don’t like being fussed over like that, you know? I have to admit, it’s funny looking back on it, but we really didn’t ask for free stuff (they also discounted our bill 10%).

Ava

5

I’d like to mandate a once-only “I’m sorry” rule for neglect or other bad service from any waitress or other customer service person. It seems like its either one or one thousand, and either you’re pissed or embarassed.

The other day I ordered a Martini at Applebees. It came in a shotglass on the rocks. I told the waitress, “I want a proper Martini,” and handed it back to her. She said “I’m sorry” once and only once, got me the real thing (in a conical glass, no ice) and never mentioned it again. I could have hugged her. She just did what I asked and didn’t make a big deal about it, but she didn’t get grumpy either.

6

Egads. I mean to say, “it seems like it’s either None or a a thousand.”

Big difference, that letter “n”.

7

Hell, I’m just surprised you had servers and management who gave a crap about you sitting and waiting too long. You weren’t a bad customer, and you wouldn’t have been a bad customer if you had deliberately said that your waitron forgot about you.

The whole point of a restaurant is service, they provide a service that you need. Outside of deliberately providing bad service, forgetting about a customer is the worst thing you can do.

Stories like this are refreshing, because all too often, your server would shrug her shoulders and not care that you had been sitting ignored for 15 minutes.

8

I’m horrible about that. I always feel genuinely sorry - it’s usually something OBVIOUS that I should have done, and I was STUPID to have gotten it wrong - and I’m embarassed to have done it, so I end up apologizing like ten times.

9

From the service person’s side, may I please second that emotion? I can’t count the number of times when, after going through a huge routine with a customer over some minor thing they have up their ass, apologizing and fixing the problem, I’ve found myself at the point of saying something like “I’m at a loss as to what else I can do for you. I’ve apologized for the mistake, I’ve fixed it and taken steps to make sure it won’t happen again. What else would you like me to do? Tell me what you’d like me to do and if I can do it I will.”

10

It sounds like that priceless Monty Python sketch about the man in a restaurant asking the waiter to replace a slightly dirty fork. It builds up to the sacking of the entire washing-up staff, the attempted murder of the customers by the cook, and the suicide of the manager. The script only partially conveys the flavor of it!

11

Dang, Early Out, you beat me to it.

“No Mongo! Don’t kill the customers!”

12

If it makes you feel any worse…

The manager was lying, Jenn was being inattentive and trying to get a jump on her sidework because she was the next out and didn’t really care to keep an eye on her section but rather wanted to roll silverware in the back. Her name was brought up at the next shift lineup, and she was made a fool of.

Hey, that’s how the Bennigan’s I used to work for worked. :slight_smile:

13

Smacks a bit of a fawning Basil Fawlty to me, at the end there. :smiley:

Q

14

I sat in a restaurant with a friend for twenty-five minutes one time, waiting for a waitress to acknowledge our presence. Finally, we got disgusted and stood up to leave. As we hit the lobby, the hostess and the manager came rushing up to us.
“Finally,” thinks I, “maybe we’ll at least get an apology.”

Silly me. Instead, the manager grilled us about where did we think we were going and we’d better pay our bill immediately or else he was calling the police. Assholes.

15

Next time, bring Roman candles. That’ll get anyone’s attention.

16

Good thing he didn’t tell them about the dirty knife!

17

You handled it better than I did. I think I would have let them apologize as many times as they possibly could and I would have still been surly about it. I’ve been known to loudly exclaim, “well if we could get a waiter…” after about 10 minutes with no acknowledgement.

But I still would have tipped 20% so it all evens out.

18

And this goes double if the mistake you made was calling a person by the wrong gender.

Hey, it’s my fault I’ve got long hair and a cleanshaven chin, and people make that mistake all the time, calling me “ma’am” or saying, “How can I help you ladies?” or whatever, before taking a closer look. It really doesn’t faze me. So when you realize that I’m actually a “sir,” you don’t have to apologize at all. But I’ll understand and say, “no problem,” if you apologize once: I know you’re embarrassed by the mistake.

But why the hell do you harp on the issue? Why do you apologize repeatedly and explain to me exactly why you made the mistake, and then tell me about your nephew whose hair is also long and how people think he’s a girl too? LET IT DROP, YOU CRETIN!

Ahem. Maybe it does annoy me after all.

Daniel

19

You mean you’re a guy?

:smiley:

20

I don’t think you were a bad customer. I think you got really crap service (at first) and pointed it out to the first employee you saw (nicely, even!!)

You were a good customer. The staff were a bit absurd with the appologies (which would have made me uncomfortable) but you have nothing to feel bad about.

BTW - former server here - I used to pray for customers as nice as you. :slight_smile: