Being the manager isn't always easy, especially when problematic customers come in and cause trouble. Sometimes, the only thing that can brighten them up after a particularly rough day is telling an especially uppity customer when they ask for a manager, "Oh, I AM the manager!"
Knowing The Owner Is Not Always A Good Thing
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“My brother was a bartender at a sports bar and some underage kid was trying to get served. My brother wouldn’t serve him and was told, ‘My dad knows the owner, if you don’t serve me I’ll get you fired!”
My brother’s response was to turn to the owner, who was sitting there having a drink, and asked, ‘Do you know this piece of crap’s dad?’
Owner: ‘Who is your dad?’
Piece Of Crap: ‘Kevin BlahBlahBlah.’
Owner: ‘Yeah, I know him, he’s a real piece of work – get the eff out off my bar.'”
She Thought Going To The Other Location Would Solve Her Problem
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“I work at a deli franchise with another location in town. We had this insane and rude old woman screaming and ranting because she couldn’t use a coupon for something the coupon was not even for. We stood there arguing a good five minutes holding the line up. Her grown granddaughters were with her, trying to call her down and clearly embarrassed. Usually, I would have just given in and let her use the dang thing, but she was being so rude I was not about to help her.
She asked to speak to my manager and I said I was the manager. She didn’t like that at all and said, ‘Well, I’ll just go to the other location, they will take my coupon!’ She left.
A few minutes later, we ran out of a product we needed, so I called the other location to check if they had some we could borrow. They did, so I headed over to get it.
I walked in the store and who do I see about to get in line for some food? The old coupon lady.
So I washed my hands, put some gloves on, and jumped on the food line.
The lady walked up to the counter and I smiled huge and said, ‘Hello! How can I help you?’
Her granddaughters both gasped and went, ‘Oh no, here we go,’ and the look on the grandma’s face was priceless; she did not try the coupon again.”
Everywhere That Lady Turned, There Was The Manager Shooting Her Down
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“I ran an ice cream shop. I must have had to say, ‘Actually, I am the manager,’ at least once a week.
My favorite was this woman I eventually banned from the shop. She would come in with her husband and bratty kids. Then she would try to order a large (three scoops) and ask me to put it in three single scoop cups, but only charge for the large.
I said no. You either order three single scoops or you order a large. The difference in cost is quite a bit, but it’s fairly standard for companies to do it this way. I wasn’t having it. She got all mad that I wouldn’t do it. First she said, ‘Well, the manager let me do it last week.’
‘No, I didn’t,’ I told her flatly.
‘Well then, whoever was working let me do it and they said they were the manager.’
‘No they didn’t, I believe my workers over you.’
‘Well, I want to talk to the manager.’
‘I am the manager, you are talking to me, I said no.’
‘Fine!’ And she and her little family stormed out without any ice cream. No skin off my back. She was rude to me and my workers, I wasn’t going to let her treat us that way.
Then she proceeds to call the shop the next day when I was working again. She said, ‘Hello, I need to speak to the manager.’
‘Speaking, how can I help you?’
‘I was in there yesterday and some little hussy lied and said she was the manager, but she wouldn’t let me get what I wanted.’
‘That hussy was me. You’re banned from our location, don’t come back.’
She tried to call corporate to report me. Corporate outsources complaints to the manager with the highest rating in the area, which was me. So when she called corporate to complain about me, she also got me. I wrote up the details of the conversation and forwarded all of her messages to the district manager, and he agreed with my decision and allowed me to send her an email officially banning her from the store.”
If They Had Actually Served Him, They Could Have Lost Their License
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“I owned a pub some years back.
One weekday night, I was off and chilling in my flat which was above the premises when I got a buzz to come down to the bar.
I came down to see my barmaid in the corner with a group of about 6-7 people of various adult ages and one obviously underage lad. My barmaid had refused to serve him, so they had bought one, assuring her it was not for him, then they just gave it to him anyway right in front of her. She rightly had gone over and taken it back, and was getting a lot of foul mouthed abuse from one particular odious little sucker who was actually calling her a ‘fat witch’ as I approached.
Seeing me, this jerk turned around and said, ‘Who are you, her effing bodyguard?’
‘No, I am the landlord and owner, and I came over here intending to hear you out and sort this out amicably, but now I think I am just going to ban you all from this pub permanently. Get out. You can all thank this little idiot here.’
I also reported them to Pubwatch, which meant they got temporary bans from all other pubs in town as well. They tried to get back in mine a while later, but I ejected them immediately and informed them if they tried again, I would not hesitate to have them arrested for trespassing.”
She Had No Idea Who She Was Speaking To So Rudely
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“A couple years ago, I had been given a great opportunity to open a new restaurant. I was in my mid 20’s and this was the first chance I had been given to completely run the show. It was our opening weekend, so I called up one of my old managers, who’s also a good friend, and asked if he would come help me for the first week, which he happily agreed to.
So it’s Saturday night, every table is filled and the wait is over an hour, things were going better than I expected, although I honestly wasn’t sure what to expect.
Myself and my friend, who’s about twice my age, were just walking the dining room, spending the majority of our evenings clearing plates and talking with customers. Everyone was cheerful and many commented on how happy they were to have a new restaurant in the area. Then came the first problem customer in our young history. When I cleared her plate and asked how everything was, she snapped about how they had been waiting five whole minutes for the server to pick up their credit card. I told her I could help her with that and reached for the card she put on the table. A look of complete disgust came over her face and she snatched the card back and put it in her purse. Ok? Cool?
A couple minutes later, a waitress asked me if I picked up the card. I told them no, she put it in her purse and that she was ready to give it to her. That’s when it went off the rails. This woman insisted that I had taken her card, and was demanding I return it. I came back over and told her I watched her put it back in her purse, which she vehemently denied and started to be unreasonably loud. She began demanding I find her card now, or she was calling the police, and actually stood up and began stomping her foot like a child. This threw me off, and I started to wonder if, in the chaos of the night, I actually did take her card. So I looked everywhere, no card. I went back and asked her again to please look in her purse, but she refused. My friend saw this happening and came over to try and assist. It was at that point that she stood up, looked him straight in the eyes and said, ‘Your filthy bus boy lost my credit card and you better find it, now!’ Now it started to make sense. She was looking down on me, and that’s why she didn’t want me to touch her card because she assumed I was some sort of low life. He explained to her that I was actually the manager, her behavior was appalling and asked her to look in her purse for the card. What a surprise, there it was! She put her head down, paid, and left without saying a word.”
Be Careful Who You’re Rude To At The Bar, That Might Be Your Potential Employer
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“I was bartending one night when these two girls come in, treated me like garbage, ran me ragged, and didn’t tip. Afterward, they came up to me, each with resumes in tow, and asked for the manager on duty.
I had the biggest and brightest smile when I told them it was me and held my hand out for the resumes. They paled and went downstairs (lounge upstairs, dining room downstairs) and I figured they would leave. Then I got paged to the front hostess stand, by the hostess, and there were the girls. They thought that I was lying to them!
It was beautiful.”
She Played Along With The Lady’s Lies, But That Didn’t Mean She’d Give In To Her Demands
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“I worked at one of those mall-pretzel stores back in high school. It wasn’t a busy mall, so there would be days where I’d open and close and be the only person there. This was one of those days. The woman walked up, ordered multiple orders of pretzel nuggets, three large smoothies, and a pizza pretzel.
‘That’ll be x$.’
‘Oh, nuh-uh, I was here earlier and you all were outta the smoothie mix. I done paid and talked to the manager, he left a note in the drawer.’
Oh, really now?
I opened the drawer and grabbed a random piece of paper. ‘OH! Yep, here it is. He even said he accidentally overcharged you and to refund you back some cash.’
The woman snapped her fingers in front of my face, ‘YEP! That’s what happened, I done forgot about that.’
‘Well, it’s going to take me a bit to get everything together as I’m the only person here, so would you want to browse around and come back in about 15 minutes or so?’
‘YEP! And can you throw in some extra dipping stuff for the inconvenience, ya’ll shouldn’t make paying customers wait like this.’
She waddled off to the cheap costume jewelry place across the way. I closed the register, took the key, put up my ‘Back in 20 Minutes’ sign and went out the back door for a smoke.
15 minutes later, one of the other mall employees came out to tell me about the woman screaming in front of the store.
As I walked down the corridor, I could hear the woman bellowing, ‘HELLOOOOO?! YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO HAVE MY FOOD! I’VE BEEN WAITING ALL DAY! HELLLLOOOO? PRETZEL GIRL!’
I came out of the back room, ‘Can I help you?’
‘I wanna talk to your manager! He TOLD me I could have free stuff and then you ran off without giving me anything. You is DONE, YOU IS FIRED.’
‘Listen lady, you’re a lying piece of trash. I’ve been here ALL day. I AM the manager as far as your concerned. And the ‘owner’ of this place wouldn’t let anyone get free stuff OR pre-pay. You want to come up here and waste my time, then I’m going to waste yours right back. If you don’t stop screaming at me, I’ll just have my friends in security remove you.”
20 minutes later, she was being led out by the ‘REAL’ police, and not just mall security.”
Her Face Was Literally Red From Screaming By The Time The Owner Got There
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“I was working as a hostess at a well-known pizza and pasta place. It was a Friday night and we were completely slammed. This woman ordered a decent size order over the phone and asked to have soup bowls of Bolognese sauce rather than the usual side cup it comes in. I wrote a note of it but just charged her for the side because we have no way to charge for a soup bowl of it. When she came in, I was taking an order over the phone, so the other hostess collected the order for her without realizing the sides were supposed to be soup bowls.
I got off the phone as she was checking her order and that’s when she started screaming at the other hostess about how her sauce was supposed to be in soup bowls. I chimed in that it was my mistake and quickly went to grab the soup bowls to hand to her.
Screaming the whole time, she went off on how our restaurant is crap, and every time she came in someone messed up her order, and she wanted to speak to the manager. We were slammed, so the general manager was working in the kitchen, and the other manager was behind the bar, so I went to the back office and grabbed the owner, apologizing profusely for bothering her because she didn’t usually deal with these things.
The owner came out and asked what the problem was, and this woman was red in the face from screaming. When she was finally able to get a word in, the owner said, ‘You have your soup bowls now, as well as two free sides of Bolognese. I don’t see how these hostesses could have handled this situation any better,’ and began explaining that she didn’t like that this woman was screaming at her workers, and holding up the line of people behind her.
The woman decided this wasn’t good enough and demanded to speak to the owner. The owner had a smirk cross her face and calmly replied, ‘I am the owner, now get the eff out of my restaurant.’
The woman left in a huff, babbling about how she was taking it to corporate, and everyone in line clapped. It was my favorite moment working there, hands down.”
This Is Why Drinking And Fast Food Should Never Mix
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“This guy wandered into the lobby of the fast food establishment I manage after we had locked the doors, but clearly one of our doors malfunctioned.
I politely told him that our lobby closed at 10 pm and that he was more than welcome to go through our drive-thru, which is 24 hours.
He started screaming at me, saying that he will have me fired, that he used to be a manager at so and so place, and that he will find me after work and mess me up. He asked for the manager on duty.
I smiled really big and said ‘Sir, I am the manager of this establishment and the manager on duty, you have two options. You either leave and don’t come back until you are sober, or you can leave in handcuffs, your choice.’
He left and I caught him hanging out by my car (though he didn’t know it was my car) at 2 am, so I called the police and they arrested him on the property as he slashed everyone’s tires.”
Her Childish Antics Only Got Her Kicked Out
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“I was the manager of a Tavern, a sort of pub/bistro combo. We had a big coffee machine but didn’t really promote coffee and the head office wasn’t overly concerned with it, so any issues with it took a while to get approval to fix.
Anyway, a lady ordered a coffee from me and I told her I would love to make her one but the machine was broken. She immediately got aggressive and demanded a coffee. I pointed to the big red ‘Out of Order’ sign and explained again. She went nuts, yelling and screaming, insulting me and demanding a coffee. When she finished, I told her again why I couldn’t get her coffee, but told her she was welcome to get a coffee from the cafe next door and come back and sit with her friends, they make better coffee anyway.
Again, she started yelling and stormed out. She got a coffee from McDonald’s and came back, doing the whole ‘Nya nya, I got a coffee,’ like a 3-year-old. Then she started on the personal insults.
I told her that’s great, fine, now go drink your coffee somewhere else, you are no longer welcome here.
‘You can’t do that! I want the manager!’
‘I can, and I am. Now leave, please.'”
It’s Customers Like This That Make “Service With A Smile” So Easy
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“I was pretty baby faced at the time and I wasn’t wearing my leadership fleece so I looked just like an average White Castle team member. This woman was being an absolute monster to my team (dumped her drink on the counter, yelled at cashier because he ‘took too long to count the change,’ etc.) Well, I handed her food to her and, without even opening the bag, she claimed it was too cold and demanded free food. Well, I told her that she didn’t even open the bag so there’s no way she would know if it was cold or not. She got mad and demanded to see the manager. I took two steps away pivoted around on my foot put my hand out to shake hers and said, ‘Hi, I’m the manager,’ with the biggest grin on my face. She left after that.”
Even After All These Years, This Story Still Makes Them Laugh
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“My parents owned a franchise deli some 12 years ago. My mom was there full time, making things run smoothly, and my dad would be there sometimes to help out when he wasn’t working his tech job. Well, this lady came in one time and ordered her food. When it arrived, she claimed that the kitchen made it incorrectly. My mom apologized for the inconvenience, comped her meal, and gave her a certificate for a free sandwich next time the lady came in. So the lady came in again, ordered her food, and again claimed it was made incorrectly. My mom again apologized and gave her another coupon for a free sandwich. This happened probably two more times. My dad had heard about it and was convinced they were just being scammed by this lady. Well, the next time the lady came in, my dad happened to be working the kitchen. Sandwich lady came through the drive-thru and ordered. My mom recognized her and, to make sure everything is perfect, my dad made her food himself and gave it to her. A couple minutes later, the lady called the store to say her food has been made wrong, again. My mom set the phone down and told my dad, ‘That lady is on the phone and says you made her food wrong again…’
My dad said, ‘You tell that awful woman I didn’t make her food wrong and that she is never welcome in this restaurant again!’
My mom picked up the phone and before she could say anything the lady cut her off, ‘I heard that! You tell that boy that he is fired!’
My mom responded with, ‘Ma’am, that ‘boy; is the owner of the restaurant.’ The lady hung up and never returned! My parents both have a long laugh about that whenever they are thinking of all the stupid crap that went on with that restaurant.”
She Clearly Thought She Was Too Good To Wait In Line Like Everyone Else
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“I worked at a restaurant where you filled in a ticket with all the ingredients you wanted on your pasta/pizza/salad. There were large boards above a counter explaining how to order correctly. Once customers filled out their ticket, they could bring it to the register. During a weekend lunch rush, with a line of at least 25 people, a woman came up to the counter and told our cashier what she wanted. When the cashier told her that she needed a ticket, she got annoyed about the ‘inconvenience,’ all while the line built up behind her. She demanded to be given a ticket and began filling it out right there.
Seeing this, I came up to the cashier and told him to start ringing up the people behind her while the lady took her sweet time making the important decision of which pasta sauce she wanted. She finally finished, paid, and sat with her gaggle of companions.
Later, she came up to me and told me that my choice to have the waiting customers pay before her was extremely rude. I responded by telling her that we try to make sure every customer gets speedy service and her holding up the line because she didn’t read our large signs was also rude to all of the other customers. She told me that she’d like to speak to the manager to complain about me. With a gleeful (and maybe slightly evil) grin, I replied, ‘You already did, I’m the manager.’ The look on her face when she realized she wasn’t going to get to whine and feel vindicated about my ‘mistreatment’ of her was lovely, and even though this was years ago, it still brings me joy.”