We often hear stories of customers being rude to employees and that makes us forget that the entitlement can go both ways. It could be a result of something that happened with another employee or customer or they could just be having a bad day but regardless, employees can be rude too.
Let's take a look at some frustrating interactions that customers have had with entitled employees.
All posts have been edited for clarity.
Kids Meals
“My mom and I usually ordered kids meals from a Chinese place in the mall because a regular size was too much food and we didn’t want to carry leftovers. The price didn’t seem like a loss as it was a tiny clamshell container with mostly noodles, a little bit of meat for six dollars, and included a fountain drink but we tipped anyway. This particular incident was quite a few years ago.
We ate at the same place until another restaurant gave us a sample and we decided to give it a try, despite it being more expensive. My mom and I ordered kids meals and my sister, the youngest, got a regular meal. There was no posted age limit on the meals and no employee said adults couldn’t get them. We got to the cashier and told her our drink orders.
The cashier said, ‘Your kids meals get no drinks. Only hers,’ and pointed to my sister.
My mom responded, ‘She didn’t even order a kids meal and the sign says kids meals come with drinks.’
The cashier retorted, ‘You guys are adults and she’s a kid, so she gets a drink.’
I was actually twelve at the time.
My mom responded, ‘If I’m paying over seven dollars for a kids meal I’m getting drinks. We’ll just leave the food then.’
The cashier said, ‘Okay, you can get drinks, but order an adult meal next time.’
My mom was going to leave a tip to make up for any losses they took on kids meals but didn’t after that. We kept eating at our usual place from then on and the other place closed down a couple of years ago. Our usual place has since expanded to other malls in the area.”
Eat-Deal
“So a few years ago, my ex-parents-in-law gifted my ex-husband a restaurant visit, bought like a gift card and redeemed towards the bill at the restaurant. It was called an Eat-Deal.
We chose a restaurant from the list, made reservations and confirmed, that yes, they did Eat-Deals. We arrived at the restaurant that was half full at peak dinner time and were seated three meters from the bathrooms.
I asked the waiter to place us elsewhere and with an eye roll, it became possible.
We were seated at a far better table and the menus were slammed on the table by the rude waiter. We each decided our orders and waited for the waiter to return. Ten minutes later and several raised index fingers, nothing. This was a pretty good restaurant, I counted nine waiters servicing the guests and five others just standing idle by the kitchen.
Finally, the waiter decided to take our orders and promptly asked, ‘Which bottle do you want?’
We explained that we do not drink and the waiter let out a sigh. We ordered a coke and sparkling water, which the waiter ‘accidentally’ sploshed a bit on the table.
My ex-husband’s appetizer arrived, but mine was apparently not done yet. Fifteen minutes passed and I waved the waiter over. I informed him that we were out of pea soup.
He turned around and walked away.
The entrees arrived. My ex-husband’s order was right, but mine came without hollandaise sauce and I asked the waiter for some.
He responded, ‘No more hollandaise,’ and walked off.
Our desserts arrived forty-five minutes after we finished our entrees. I ordered caramel ice cream and got vanilla.
I promptly asked, ‘Is there no more caramel?’
The waiter turned around and walked off.
When it was time to pay, I whipped out the Eat-Deal and my card.
The waiter left with the Eat-Deal and returned thirty minutes later to claim it was invalid.
I logged into the website and showed him that it had been activated and spent at the restaurant fifteen minutes ago.
He huffed loudly and walked off again. Ten minutes later and he returned with the remainder of the bill.
I paid the rest with my card and asked to speak with a manager and got the owner. I showed him the pictures of the food and told him about the waiter.
The prick responded, ‘Then perhaps don’t bring an Eat-Deal.’
We never went back and my department at work planned to eat there, but I told them about the experience and got to personally make the call to cancel the booking for eighty people.”
Tattoo Artist
“I had a job where it was a pain to get time off, so I booked a tattoo with a guy months in advance. The guy’s studio was a six-hour drive away, and he asked for a three hundred dollar deposit on top of his rate of four hundred dollars an hour for the work. That was fair enough for tattooing, but still, a pretty price for what I was getting.
I emailed him two weeks prior to the date to confirm. No response for seven days. I emailed him again and basically said that if I didn’t hear anything ahead of time I would be canceling.
He responded and said that he didn’t check his email often and to text him instead. He didn’t answer any of the questions I had from the original email so I had to copy and paste the entire email into a giant text message for the guy to communicate with me.
After talking about the piece, I booked a hotel in the town six hours away.
The appointment was scheduled for nine o’clock in the morning so I decided to drive there the day before, stay at the hotel overnight, get my tattoo done, and drive home that same evening.
At eight o’clock the night before the appointment, he texted me and said the scheduling software had mistakenly let me book a nine o’clock in the morning slot. He informed me that he didn’t do tattoos before two o’clock in the afternoon and that he was changing the appointment time to two o’clock.
I told him that didn’t work with my plans and asked if it were at all possible to keep the nine o’clock time.
He basically said that no, he can’t do a tattoo that early because he isn’t a morning person and that I should reschedule to a time when he wouldn’t have to feel rushed.
I never said he had to be done by a certain time, just that I preferred if we started earlier so I had more daylight to drive home in.
So, tired after driving and fed up, I just said I would reschedule. I later canceled and said it was because of my work schedule, which was true, but also because I didn’t want the guy working on me anymore.
Of course, the guy’s self-owned business ‘can’t do refunds.'”
“Unable to Process” Part 1
“After working all day then helping some family members move furniture, we decided to eat out instead of cooking.
After the meal, the check came, I went to pay and my husband went to the car. I swiped my card and immediately got an error that said, ‘Unable to Process.’
I’m a shift manager so I recognized the error. That error meant their system timed out or was down.
The cashier didn’t realize that because she said, ‘There seems to be an issue with your card, swipe it again.’
I tried a second time and got the same error.
The cashier said, ‘Your card isn’t working.’
Now again, I knew from experience if I got that error, it meant our system was down, not a problem on the customer side. But, just in case, I pulled up my app because I just got paid and had only spent ten dollars. The paycheck was still there.
She asked me to swipe again.
I got the same error for the third time.
She told me there was an issue with my card again.
Humoring her, I responded, ‘Okay, let me try another card.’
I tried my emergency-only card, linked to my grandma’s account. There was more money in that account than I would make in ten years. I knew if that one didn’t work, it was most definitely their system. I got the same error.
I got a snarky, ‘That one doesn’t work either,’ from the cashier.
I didn’t go full-on Karen, but I said, ‘Get your manager, please.’
The manager came over and the cashier told her what was going on and how it kept giving me the ‘Unable to Process,’ error.
She sighed and said, ‘Again? Let me try my code.’
She turned to me and said, ‘I’m so sorry. This has been happening all day.’
I looked the cashier straight in the eye and asked, ‘Oh, so it isn’t my card? You’re having system issues?’
The manager looked up at me, looked at the cashier, who looked like an animal caught in the headlights, and jerked her head as if to say, ‘Get lost. We will talk later.’
She signed in and the same thing happened. She swiped my card three times and got the same error message.
By that time, I had spent at least twenty minutes trying to pay. I was tired and ready to be home. The manager then asked me if I had another form of payment.”
Continued Below.
“Unable to Process” Part 2
“I responded, ‘I have my two debit cards and apps to send money from my phone. I don’t carry cash.’
She then asked me if I could wait another fifteen minutes to try again.
I asked if she was serious because I had already spent longer trying to pay than it took us to eat.
Her response was to ask me if I could possibly go to an ATM and informed me there was a bank ATM across the street, one in the gas station down the road, or a big-box superstore down the road.
I asked, ‘Are you serious? Because you have been having issues and not informing customers that your system is not working correctly, you expect me to go to an ATM, pay their fee, plus my bank charges a fee for using an out-of-network ATM, and my gas, to go get cash? Had we known I couldn’t use my card, we would have just gone somewhere else? Now, if you’re going to take the seven-dollar ATM fees and three dollars in gas, I might consider it. I didn’t come in here without money to try to scam you out of a free meal. You should have a sign or have servers inform people you can’t accept cards at this time.’
By that time, my husband had come back inside because it had been almost forty minutes of me trying to pay and now there were a couple of other families behind me waiting to pay. I quickly gave him the run down and double-checked if he has any cash. Nope, maybe five dollars, but no more than that.
The manager asked me to try my card again.
At that point, I said ‘No, I have tried it six times and I’m not trusting that your system won’t reboot and charge all of those to my card. Then it will take me up to ten business days to get a refund of my money.’
She then asked me if I was going to the ATM.
I countered again with removing at least ten dollars off the bill to cover my gas and fees.
She finally said she was just going to have to comp my bill.
The guy behind me spoke up and said, ‘I’m going to tell you right now, I don’t have cash and I’m not going to the ATM either, so you’re going to have to comp our bill too.’
The lady behind him said, ‘I do have cash but if they don’t have to pay, I’m not paying and being penalized for having cash.’
I asked my husband for his five dollars because I had to give the server something, but the lady with cash said she would pay all of our tips because it wasn’t the server’s fault her manager wasn’t being proactive and letting people know.
I gave the server the five dollars anyway and the lady two people behind me pulled out her wallet to give her more.
While she was doing so, she very loudly told the server that no one was blaming her, but management should have had her inform people that they can’t take cards before they ordered and ate instead of waiting until it was time to pay.
It was the manager’s own fault if she had to comp all the food by not letting people know they couldn’t pay with a card. Lucky for her, there were only three other families and a couple still in the restaurant. They heard it all and were heading up to pay by the time we exited.
Based on what our check came to, she probably had to comp around four hundred dollars in their last hour of business.
I think I would rather have lost those sales to another restaurant instead of having to explain to my superiors why I had to comp that much.”
Bad Waiter
“It takes a lot for me not to tip at a restaurant. As someone who had worked in the food service game for eight years, I am incredibly sympathetic towards the ups and downs of the restaurant.
I went to this Chinese restaurant with a friend of mine. It was relatively small and I had gone there before. It wasn’t busy and their food was always good.
It started with the usual sit down but we didn’t get menus, I tried to wave them over but was ignored.
I thought maybe the waiter was busy.
We waited about ten minutes and the waiter walked by and asked, ‘What do you want?’
I responded, ‘I don’t know. I never got a menu.’
He gave us one menu then stood there and waited for us to order.
We rushed to order just to get him to leave.
There were maybe three or four full tables but it took almost an hour to get our food. My friend and I had ordered two items to share.
Our waiter never came back after we ordered.
Finally, someone else brought out our food. It was good but not worth everything that happened prior. We were both annoyed, so I paid but crossed out the line for the tip.
We left the restaurant and not even halfway down the street I felt a tug on my arm.
It was the manager who said there was something wrong with the check.
I examined it, nothing seemed out of order, and the card went through.
He pointed to the tip section.
I just looked at him and said, ‘No, that is correct.'”
Rude Waitress Part 1
“I underwent upper jaw surgery. It was an unpleasant recovery, to say the least, and I was unable to eat properly for months afterward due to the pain and nausea. I also had elastic bands on my braces keeping my teeth together to aid alignment during healing.
Around eight weeks after surgery, I had another round of routine x-rays to check for any movement, with the hospital being a decent drive away. My mother did a wonderful job caring for me and drove me to the appointment. When we went into the city we went to lunch as well, my treat. That time, we decided to get lunch at a French-style café.
The place was quite posh, with the waiters and waitresses in smart white and black uniforms and a large selection of cakes along with cakes displayed that you could order for special occasions in the storefront. It was safe to say that my heavily bruised cheeks and neck with a little blood sneaking out of my nose and mouth shocked the waitress when she greeted us.
The café was nearly empty, and once seated, we ordered because we knew exactly what we wanted. My mother ordered her usual salad and I ordered a ham and cheese omelette. I could speak reasonably well, but pointed to the menu as well as speaking. Our waitress came back with our drinks straight away, but then there was an influx of customers, and it seemed as if only one waitress aside from ours was working.
We ended up waiting forty minutes before our food came, and I wasn’t sure if my nausea was due to hunger or the usual upset I had been feeling. My mother went to the counter at one point to try and buy a packet of biscuits, but the waitresses paid her no mind, even walking past her.
I told her to just bring them to the table and we could add them to the bill, but she felt that would be rude.
So finally our food reached us, and the waitress apologizes for the wait, placed our plates down, and turned heel.
I had been given a toasted cheese and ham panini but I managed to catch her attention.”
Continued Below
Rude Waitress Part 2
I said, ‘Excuse me, I actually ordered a ham and cheese omelette.’
The waitress responded, ‘You ordered the panini.’
I said, ‘I actually said omelette. It’s fine, mistakes happen, but I do need an omelette instead.’
She retorted, ‘No, you ordered the ham and cheese panini. It says so on your order receipt, if you want me to get it and show you?’
At that point, my face was throbbing due to speaking, and I was feeling exhausted and hungry.
I asked, ‘Please can I just have a ham and cheese omelette? I can’t eat this panini.’
The waitress wrote on her notebook and snarkily said that it would be a long wait as it was busy. She left the panini on the table.
My mom had to dig into her salad as she needed to eat, and I sat there avoiding looking at the food. It had been twenty minutes since I asked for an omelette. Luckily for me, a manager came downstairs and made his rounds asking customers how their meals were. When he came to our table and noticed my mother finished and my food untouched, he asked if everything was alright with our meal.
I explained everything and mentioned that I could not eat anything hard, and even showed him my tiny spoon that I brought to fit between my elastic bands.
He was shocked, apologized, and went to the kitchen to check on my order. When he returned, he offered us free drinks while we waited.
So a few minutes later, our waitress walked to our table, I’m sure that she would be stomping were it not for the high heels, with a sour expression, and plonked my omelette down on the table.
So I finally ate and we asked for the bill. Of course, the panini was included along with our second drinks.
I mention that and she demanded that I pay because I ordered it and could not just change my mind.
I asked for the manager, and she refused. Again, luckily for me, he passed by and I called him over. I showed him the bill, reiterated what the waitress had just said, and he asked the waitress to follow him.
He came back, apologized, and said that our meal was on the house. I offered to pay for the salad and omelette, but he refused.
We did go back to that location for lunch again, and that waitress avoided us, which suited me just fine.”
Karen Cashier
“At the grocery store checkout, the older cashier with a Karen haircut glared at me and demanded to see my ID.
She said ‘I’m going to need to see your ID,’ and hadn’t even glanced at the belt, which just had a few food essentials, nothing that needed an ID.
I was taken off guard, not simply because she had no reason to ask for my ID, but mostly because of the way she demanded it so aggressively. I politely let her know I didn’t have it. Unless I need it, I often leave the house without my purse. I was at the store with my boyfriend, who paid for the groceries, and we weren’t getting anything questionable, so I didn’t need it. I was simply there to keep him company. The point is, it didn’t matter if I had my ID or not, as she did not need to see it, but mostly, her attitude toward me was seriously uncalled for.
With more of an attitude, she asked, ‘Well then, what will you do when you get pulled over by the cops?’
I told her that I don’t drive without my ID.
Again, I was there with my boyfriend, he was the one who drove and paid.
She scoffed, as she started to ring up our items, and said, ‘Must be a cushy life.’
I stood there confused and wondered what the heck was wrong with the woman. Her whole attitude towards me was actually a bit unsettling. Her whole interrogation was solely focused on me, she said nothing to my boyfriend.
We came up with a theory that maybe she thought I was someone she didn’t like, for whatever reason, but couldn’t be sure. So that was why she demanded my ID. Other than that, I have no idea.
I remained pleasant with her, and kept my patience, even though it seemed she was trying to push at me. She hadn’t treated the man in front of me like that, or my boyfriend, just me. It was so weird and off-putting. I made sure to avoid her in the future.”
Restaurant Card Games
“My husband and I decided to go out for drinks and wings on a Saturday evening.
We chose to go to a well-known sports-themed restaurant, that was known for having a circular room with screens showing all manner of games. It had a good reputation and I had been there before, the service and food were pretty good.
It was a busy night but they still had a few tables available, so the hostess led us to a table near the server’s station, kind of out of the way, near the back of the restaurant, gave us menus, and said a server would come by soon.
At the time we were really into playing Scopa and Brisk, Italian card games, and kept a deck on us to play when we were bored. Well, we were sitting there for about fifteen minutes and no one had come to our table or introduced themselves as our server, and we got kinda annoyed but gave them the benefit of the doubt because they were busy. So we took out the cards to pass the time.
It took about thirty seconds before someone came to our table to tell us to stop playing cards, and when we asked why, they said it could be gambling and the restaurant could get in trouble. So we were kinda annoyed at that too and told them we had been waiting a long time for a server to come by. They promised they would send someone over.
Well, twenty more minutes went by, and literally, no one came to our table. We were just watching the servers come to the station, grab extra plates and napkins and things, pointedly not make eye contact with us, and rush off.
We finally flagged someone down and told them we had been waiting for more than a half-hour for someone to come take out order. He said he wasn’t our server but he would take our drink order and send someone to take the food order. Fine, whatever, so we ordered drinks.
Another ten minutes went by, and we didn’t have our drinks nor have we seen that server again. We said forget it and left. Worst service I’ve ever had.”