Here’s a thought for you ass-clown, next time you’re stuck wondering why you have to deal with shit like this consider that your vocational life choice revolves around you wearing a name badge.
Seriously we’ve heard it before. You’re an adult working in the fast food industry at the customer level. It’s par for the course. Deal with it.
Written like someone who has never worked retail before.
Someone needs to do a little more lurking and reading before making stupid comments.
Well, it wasn’t 15 minutes later, but I think we just found the VERY angry woman…
Ah yes. People who don’t understand their own bank’s policies. My personal favorite.
I used to work overnight at a hotel just off Interstate 95, near Savannah, Georgia. A fair percentage of our guests were travelers, often headed to Florida to do Fun Things. By the time they had rolled into my parking lot, many had left home in, say, West Virginia at O’Stupid-Thirty in the morning, fueled up in Virginia, had lunch in North Carolina, and ate dinner and bought fuel again in South Carolina. Inevitably, the hotel payment would be the trigger for their bank to decide “possible fraudulent use - don’t authorize card.” I would try to explain to folks: Please call the toll-free number on the back of your card, answer the security questions, and reassure the nice folks at your bank that it’s really you using your own card while traveling. It’s nothing personal, just an automatic fraud alert because your card has been used in multiple states in short order. Just call the number. Please. I can try to run it again, but that won’t help. You can go to any of the other local hotels, and the card will still be declined. You can yell at me as though I’ve accused you of being poor, and it won’t change this scenario. Yes, you can also try to use the ATM down the street. You’ll be declined until you call your bank.
If I had a dollar for every one of those people who finally had to call the 800 number after being declined by my system, and the hotel across the street, and then the gas station next door (because the tourist got mad at all of us stupid hicks who couldn’t operate our card systems and decided to get some coffee and gas and keep driving… always. I know, because I talked to all of the other night auditors and clerks on third shift, 'cause there’s not a whole lot else to do at 2 in the morning.) Anyway, if I had that dollar per idiot, I’d be a debt-free woman right now. (Or I’d have drunk better booze during my stint there.)
One guy almost restored my faith in humanity: My system declined him (for the reason described above. I think he had traveled from Maryland that day.) He tried to check in at the La Quinta, and then the Quality Inn, and the Ramada. He then tried to buy some coffee and gas across the street. He drove on down to the bank ATM. And finally, he called the 800 number. He came back to the property where I worked, apologized for not listening in the first place, and asked politely whether I’d consider renting him a room despite his previous poor manners.
But that was just the one guy. Most of 'em were just idiots, and I hope several ran out of gas on I95 and had to call their banks before the tow truck driver would hook 'em up.
I didn’t know about that policy when I was travelling from Florida to Georgia. My card got declined, and instead of arguing I pulled out another card. If I’d had only one card, I would have called the 800 number. I’m not sure where anyone expects to get by arguing with employees of gas stations or hotel desks or trying the card again and again in other places.
Not sure where the OP lives but where I’m from, for $20 that pie better be topped with marijuana.
Okay, I’ll give you that one, on principle- with a “however”
The way our computers and card scanners work, it will actually come back as “bad card swipe”, not “declined” when that happens.
So, in my particular situation, it will never come back as not declined after coming back as declined.
That being said, a customer has zero way of knowing that because they don’t work at where I specifically work- so I will concede the point. Thanks for enlightening me actually, I appreciate the outsider perspective.
People are REALLY insistent that I should know why their card is declined.
The machine doesn’t tell me why. In fact, here’s an update to this story:
The reason why their card was declined, in this case?
Because they changed their order, to a lesser amount, which meant (our computers automatically do this) the card was voided.
But, that void DOES NOT PROCESS for a few business days. Until then, your money is in Limbo.
Seriously, limbo.
The money is absolutely not in our possession, it’s marked down as an irreversible cancellation on our part.
The bank has already marked that money down as being possibly spent, it cannot be re-spent.
And it will take the bank until tomorrow or the next day, or the next day, or up until a whopping five fucking business days to undo that void.
Your money is actually out-of-play until they do that. I literally cannot do anything about that.
So, the dumbassery here went super-saiyan this time.
Making more sense.
In our case, the computer doesn’t even ask whether it’s debit or credit, or ask us to put in what type of card it is, like mastercard or visa or whatever.
Alls I do is swipe the card or type it in if the magnetic strip no worky.
Thanks guys, I appreciate the feedback. There’s stuff I don’t know because I’m aware of how our system works, but not aware how others’ systems work. So it gets frustrating when I repeat an action I know is doomed to fail, with absolute certainty… but it’s not so certain from the customers’ point of view.
I’ve always been patient about that kind of thing, but I was unloading during my rant, so I felt the need to vent about that then and there, rather than at my actual customers.
I appreciate your feedback as well. You’re a fucking dumbass who doesn’t comprehend that those pizzas do not belong to me, they are property of the corporation I work for, whose policy is not to give away food to people who can’t pay, or to terminate employees who do.
But I appreciate you telling me how to do my job. Get bent, wino.
A) That’s not even a nitpick, that’s a **solid-ass point. Kudos.
**
B) I do not understand how the world works too, sometimes.
C) In this case, it’s actually the merchant, not the bank, that is requesting the extra money hold. Sometimes it is the other way around. I only am aware of this problem in that I had to do some googling about it because it affects me at work, it’s not actually something we need to know, because it’s not within our control and not always within our power to explain why cards decline- that’s firmly the bank’s responsibility.
D) And, in this specific specific case, we found out later why their funds were unavailable this time. I was led to a certain conclusion due to the customer’s own statements- 99 times out of 100, someone mentions their account balance, and the card doesn’t run, it’s because of what I said. This one time, surprise surprise, it’s because the customer had their card voided once before I even got involved, and no one, from the customer to the employee who saw that happen, mentioned it to me.
That being said
E) I *never *know why someone’s card is declined, nor is it my job, and I’m not saying that as a dodge; I am not the bank and I have to rely on the imperfect information I’m given, which is that the card is declined, it doesn’t state why, and then I have to rely on the testimony of the witnesses present, so to speak. That’s literally all I get to work with. If they can’t tell me what happened or refuse to, I can’t possibly know why it was declined.
Yeah, things may have changed.
For one thing, all calls are recorded, so people cannot do that over the phone anymore.
Secondly, all orders need a ticket, or the inventory count will be low, and that’s my ass.
Thirdly, all ticketed orders need an explanation for why they aren’t paid, or that’s my ass.
Fourth, there’s two different cameras staring directly at me. I start giving away pizzas with no ticket, I get precisely one strike before I’m fired.
Finally, declined payments are a specific never, ever, ever, ever give away food for that reason. Again, one time and I’m done.
They have done a very good job at cracking down on employees doing precisely what you’re describing because most of us are sympathetic human beings and rationalize that we’re not harming the corporation “that much” and help the one guy in front of us.
Until that happens three or four times a day, and several employees are doing it, leading to a loss of hundreds of dollars per week in food cost. Someone got wise and decided let’s make sure it’s not even an option.
So I don’t get the option to decide who to be magnanimous toward, unless I have a reason, and I’m not inclined to lie and risk my job for a person being shitty toward me from the start of the call.
So that’s why I didn’t appreciate being called a shitty human being for something that isn’t within my zone of control, Wino. You take that crap up with the corporation, I just work there. I have all the power in the world to re-run someone’s card or take an alternate form of payment, that’s what I’m bringing to the table. All other options are cut off from me unless I like being homeless and unemployed.
Ah, your solution is to find a job that doesn’t involve working for, around, or serving, dumbasses.
Such a job does not exist.
Actually, I can handle it, better than most people. That’s why I have the position.
I deal with ten thousand shitty customers with serene grace, until That One Customer, and then I rant about it anonymously on the internets, and I’m All Better.
99 percent of other people will tell that customer to kiss their black ass on the blackest part of the brown eye, and get fired. That’s why I have the job, because I have not done that yet.
Wise sage, you’re out of your element. You might mean well, but you are talking out of your butt. Mine may hurt, but if I wasn’t there, people would not get their food in the first place, because no one else is willing to do my job. That’s the only reason I’m even doing it, there was a vacancy and I wanted the cash. And in spite of a hundred customers over the years trying to get my job taken from me, it has not happened, because I’m doing it correctly.
Why all the hate over ranting about a shitty customer? If I dealt with customers all day, I’m sure I’d have some shitty ones, and I’m sure I might like to rant on the internet for giggles. As a reader, I giggled. I don’t get the hate.
1/10, derivative, uninspired, humorless.
Hey, low-wage worker! Get a fantastic wonder-job and never ever complain once in your life! How our society works is that everyone can be a millionaire, no one actually has to make the pizzas or scrub the floors or wash the dishes, and it is within everyone’s power to be a self-made success overnight! Call me now, ask me how!
Eat shit and die.
Meh, for all my shots right back in their direction, I really don’t care. It’s the Pit, recreational turn-it-back-on-the-OP is valid.
They just need to bring a better game than that.
Wow, times sure have changed since I was in the biz. We routinely had pizzas we couldn’t sell because they were made wrong, customer wasn’t home, or whatever. Pizza isn’t “retail” in the sense that you can put it back on the shelf and sell it the next day, so we had three options: eat them, throw them in the trash, or give them away. Sometimes we’d do the latter. The manager certainly was never in fear of losing job over it, so I guess they bestow a lot less authority to store managers nowadays. It must suck to be a glorified drone under constant surveillance, with no latitude to think and act for yourself.
Which is not to say that this dickhead deserved a free pizza. It’s just kind of sad that you don’t even have the option.
There’s also several cameras on the inside. Employees cannot leave the store with pizzas in their hand, unless it’s on camera, and they can’t eat pizzas inside the store without being on camera.
They became very serious business on the food waste, and they *really *want their tax write-off for donating the food to an established food bank which serves the homeless and underprivileged (So, while charitable, it’s not 100 percent out of the goodness of their heart, get me?)
It’s a pain in the ass, particularly when the employees work a 12 hour shift and they are entitled to 20 percent off the menu price, so I bust my ass all day, and I get to pay 9 bucks for a large pizza, after taxes.
So there’s layers and layers of “things have changed since I was in the biz”. Things have changed quite a bit since I started in the biz, including the bit about the driver’s wages being slashed which I talked about elsewhere. Then they got crazy with the security measures. You’re always on camera.
Good news is, customers can’t get away with shitting on me over the phone, because all I have to do is not provoke or respond, and I’m in the clear. You don’t get anything for shitting on the employees and threatening their job to get free stuff. That’s the one thing I’m very happy about.
Yea, they’re just whores. You can fuck them, fuck them in the ass, hit them, pee on them. They have to take it and act like they like you, or you can make one phone call and get them fired. It’s their fault for partying in high school.
Wow, that’s impressive.
Usually when a customer is upset, they pick a path and stick with it:
Path A) You, low-wage worker, are a dumbass and I am going to shit on you until you kowtow to my desires. Even if I’m wrong, and even if I know I’m wrong. I cannot back down, it’s fight or flight motherfucka.
Path B) Here’s what happened. Can you please help me?
Folks who choose Path A almost never relent and go back down path B.
The folks that swallow their pride and do? I have great respect. It’s one thing to have nice manners in the first place, but I’ve been a customer myself, we’ve all blown our stack at someone sometime for doing something egregiously dumb. But to be corrected and admit when you’re wrong is a rare sight indeed.
People seem to think it makes them vulnerable to admit wrongness.
One thing you’ll notice about me is if I am wrong and you point it out to me, politely or impolitely, I’m going to process that in my brain and if it comes back that I was the one wrong, I’ll admit that.
Whether or not I’ll be nice about it depends on the person telling me I screwed up- if they were informative and not a total unrepentant dick, they’re going to get a “my bad” from me. If they were a total dick, I’ll admit to being wrong, and point out they were so much of a dick that it’s now irrelevant.