It is a relic of the Communist era; the intent is to maximise the number of employees. Efficiency takes a back seat to providing as many jobs as possible.
That’s weird. Our local Sonic as the car stalls, a conventional drive-thru, and a walk-up window at the covered seating area (this might be because it’s across from a high school). In the car stalls there’s a intercom that you use to place your order.
Back to the OP, I’ve seen people, usually but not always older, get utterly bewildered ordering at Sheetz. They have multiple touchscreen terminals to place your order at (they used to have terminals outside at the gas pumps to), it prints a slip that you take to the cashier to pay, then you pick up your food.
I still get annoyed when I see the Sabarro people tricking people into spending more on their food. When ordering slices they have gotten into the habit of asking customers “What side do you want with that?” as if it comes as part of the deal. It doesn’t. They charge you the price of the side for it. Somewhere along the line management must have figured they can sell more asking “What side do you want?” rather than “Do you want a side with that?”
They also have decided that the default beverage size is extra large. Unless you specify small or medium you’re getting the extra large. And they’re going to charge extra for it too.
Also in the camp of never having run into a Starbucks that had any issue with me ordering coffee in non-Starbucks term (I hate coffee but am in there on occasion to get something for my wife).
Also don’t know why the Panda Express employee would be confused by an order of just kung pao. That may not be what you wanted but it is a regular order there, I never get the plates with rice/noodles, just a la carte items. I say “I’d like a honey walnut shrimp and pepper chicken.” They say “what size” and I tell them. End of interaction.
There’s a family diner here in San Leandro, California that I’ve been to for dinner a half dozen times. The menu clearly states that dinners come with x sides, one of y drinks, and one of z deserts. I’ve ordered and received just the entree, none of the combination stuff. I’ve ordered so that I received the entree, the sides, and the drink. But I’ve never successfully ordered so that I also get the desert. I don’t usually actually want the dessert so have never made a fuss but am curious if I’m missing some magic incantation or they just suck.
When McDonald’s ended their “Any size coffee for a buck” promotion, I went to get breakfast and asked for a Number One with whatever the standard size coffee was it came with. On the board pops up something like “Upcharge Medium Coffee +30¢”. I said, no, just whatever size the meal comes with, they said it is that. This went on about two more round before the person taking the order gave some huffy “Ok, fine whatever!” and I got my order with the appropriate small coffee for the listed meal price. Apparently asking for the meal as listed on the menu means paying an extra 30¢ for coffee?
I didn’t even care about the 30¢, I was just annoyed that they were so blatantly trying to upcharge me based on my supposed ignorance.
A lot of hot dog stands around my hometown have very confusing ordering systems that border on chaos. It’s assembly like-like, and you frequently have to repeat parts of your order as you pass through. “What would you like to drink?” Three steps later - “What did you order to drink?”
In the 1970s, one stand had a system where you ordered hot dogs from one (outdoor) window, and waited for the food there. You then moved on to a french fry/onion ring window, if you wanted any. Again, wait, get food. From there, you move on to a drink window. After that, you waited in line and paid; the cost based on what was on your plate. It was like something of an outdoor cafeteria; I don’t know how they would have prevented people running off with their food before paying.
A lot of hot dog stands around my hometown have very confusing ordering systems that border on chaos. It’s assembly like-like, and you frequently have to repeat parts of your order as you pass through. You make your entire order with one person, who records it. As you pass through an assembly line, you repeat your hot dog order to the person making dogs. Same thing with fries/rings. Same thing with drinks. At the end, you recite your order to the cashier, who matches it with the order recorded by the first order taker person.
In the 1970s, one stand had a system where you ordered hot dogs from one (outdoor) window, and waited for the food there. You then moved on to a french fry/onion ring window, if you wanted any. Again, wait, get food. From there, you move on to a drink window. After that, you waited in line and paid; the cost based on what was on your plate. It was like something of an outdoor cafeteria; I don’t know how they would have prevented people running off with their food before paying.
Or you can just get whatever food the waiter wants to give you.
At a local Chinese sit-down restaurant, our waiter Ken was getting extremely irritated with some of the indecision happening in our party and just blurted out, “You come here all time you dont know what you want?? Just get Sweet&Sour chicken, you like that. We go clockwise.”
We were all like WTF??? and the ditherers continued to dither.
I’ve been to festivals where you have to buy food tickets, so that I guess the vendors can hand in the tickets at the end and the festival people can give them cash minus their percentage. However the same festival has non food vendors and they all take real money. I guess they pay a flat fee for their booth space. I’m not sure why there are two different systems.
The ordering system at Cheesecake Factory isn’t confusing per se, but their menu is like twenty five pages. The first time I went there I had to whip out my notepad to remember which things I might want to order.
Since I’m not a major coffee drinker (I prefer tea), I didn’t initially realize that those size designations were specifically a Starbucks thing; I though they were generic espresso lingo. Starbucks was the first place I ever had an espresso, though. So one day, while wandering on foot as a tourist in Seattle, near Pike Place Market, I felt like a cup of coffee (yeah, I prefer tea, but I’m not drinking tea from a paper cup) and went into a Seattle’s Best Coffee shop. I ordered a “tall” something or other, which resulted in the barista listing their cup sizes in ounces because “we don’t call it that here.”
10 bucks says it was a warm day and the barista was so used to making iced drinks they didn’t think to ask. I’d hop on over to my local starbucks and run a test but since it’s -10F here, they’ll probably just make me a hot tea. But be kind to the baristas. They’re only people and I can guarantee you that whatever obvious thing you think they should or shouldn’t do, they’ve been snapped at by someone for doing or not doing before.
I’ve also never experienced snootiness about lingo from starbucks baristas or from non-starbucks baristas. The only time I’ve ever had issues was when I ordered a dirty chai at a 'Bou and the barista didn’t know what dirty meant.