When they do their job well, servers can make a diner's night. When they DON'T do their job so well, let's just say the experience sours a bit. These diners had the misfortune of being served by these unprofessional, rude, and downright outrageous servers. The night may have been ruined, but at least it makes for a good story!
It’s Totally Sick To Brag About Something Like That
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“I was at a local place where one (female) server was bald, it looked like she either shaved a lot or was going through chemo. I felt sorry for her until I overheard her gloating about a $20 tip someone had left because they ‘thought I had cancer.’ The way she acted it seemed like she was actually doing it on purpose for tips.”
“He Had To Be Restrained By The Manager”
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“I had a waiter spill $100 worth of drink (first and last time in my life I ever paid that much for a beverage) all over my dinner. He refused to replace it either. After I didn’t tip him, he literally chased me out of the restaurant and physically threatened me for his tip. He had to be restrained by the manager.”
“I Have Never Been More Upset With A Server In My Life”
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“I was at a relatively nice Italian restaurant and ordered a dish without bacon in it because I don’t eat meat. The dish came out, everything seemed fine, but when I tasted it, I was sure that it had bacon in it. No problem, mistake happens all the time. I politely informed the waiter when he returned to check in. He looked at the plate, took out a fork, tasted it, and then has the audacity to say, ‘Nope, there is definitely no bacon in there.’
I have never been more upset with a server in my life. Don’t know what happened to him, but that meal was free in the end.”
“Everything Was Going Nicely Until The Waitress Commented On My Mom’s Order”
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“I was out to dinner with my family. We sit down, order our drinks, and so far everything is going nicely. The waitress comes, and we order. When it gets to my mom, she orders what she wants, and the waitress responds with, ‘If you’re on a diet, you don’t want that.’ My mom had said nothing whatsoever about being on a diet. She is slightly overweight, and I mean very slightly. She is self-conscious and it’s difficult to even get her to come out to eat with us.
My mom simply said, ‘I’m not on a diet,’ with a cold stare. The waitress turned red in the face and walked off to place our orders.”
“Over The Course Of Dinner, I Started Feeling Really, Really Sick”
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“I went out to dinner a few months back with some friends at a pretty typical chain restaurant.
Me: ‘I’ll have a Diet Coke, please.’
Waitress: ‘Oh, we only have Pepsi, is that ok?’
Me: ‘Sure. A Diet Pepsi would be fine.’
I have my soda and a few refills over the course of dinner and start feeling really, really sick.
Right about here is where I should mention that I’m a type 1 diabetic and, since I usually drink Diet Coke, I don’t know the difference in taste between diet and regular Pepsi.
I checked my blood sugar, which had been perfectly on target before the meal, and my meter just read HIGH, meaning that the value was so high that the meter actually couldn’t process it. What I had eaten for dinner couldn’t possibly have put me there (and I’d dosed with an appropriate amount of insulin to cover for it) so we flagged down the waitress and I asked, ‘This isn’t Diet Pepsi, is it?’ She responded by telling me that it wasn’t, that the Diet Pepsi fountain was out of syrup and she didn’t think I’d mind, and besides, I’m plenty skinny and don’t need to drink the diet stuff.
I started cursing, pulled out my insulin syringes to dose for the four full-sugar sodas that I drank, and told her exactly what I was doing. I then told the manager what had happened, and that I wasn’t planning on paying for the meal but would instead put the money toward the ER bill that I was about to incur. Went to the hospital where the lab determined that my blood sugar was still in the 700s even after I dosed, and I ended up staying overnight because my glucose level stubbornly refused to come back into range.”
When In New York, You Just Have To Deal With Undercooked Burgers
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“I was at a cafe in NYC a couple years ago with a couple other people. One of the people I was with got a cheeseburger, and it came back undercooked. When this was pointed out to the waiter, rather than take it back and bring out a new one, he started arguing with her. It was a pretty long argument too, where he told her she can’t expect ‘well-done’ to mean the same thing in every restaurant. He also informed her that she’s in New York, and to just deal with it.”
Good Thing They Caught Everything On CCTV
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“I was at a Mexican food restaurant with a girl I’m getting to know. It wasn’t a date, really, it was just like hanging out and getting to know each other and we decided to go grab a quick bite. Anyways, I’ve kind of gotten into this horrible habit of only paying with my debit card and never having cash on me. As you probably know, a lot of times when you pay using debit/credit over a certain amount (I believe it’s 5 or 10 dollars) places have you sign a receipt that they keep. The receipt the guy at this place handed me had a place to leave a tip.
Since I’ve been to this place a couple of times before, I know how the service works here: you order at the register, go and sit down, they call your number, and then you go up and receive your food. So I didn’t leave a tip. I’ll tip at this place/places like this if I order something specially made or something with extra toppings on it and they don’t charge me but, other than that, I really do not see the need to tip. They aren’t bringing your food to you, they aren’t doing anything out of their way, they aren’t bussing tables, there’s simply no need to tip.
Anyways, I don’t leave a tip and the guy just said, ‘Wow, big spender here.’
I looked up at him and was like, ‘What?’ At this point, I honestly have no idea what he’s talking about. It didn’t even register in my mind that he could possibly be upset that I didn’t tip because he’s done nothing to warrant a tip. The guy ignored me and said to the girl I’m with, ‘Glad you’re dating such a big spender. He can’t even afford to tip. How do you think that’s going to go further down the line in your relationship?’
She’s just kind of baffled, I’m just kind of baffled, and at that point, I just decided it was best to ignore the dude and go sit down, so I shrugged it off with a, ‘Whatever.’
After a bit of an awkward sit, our food comes up, so I went up to get it and decided to just get it to go. We grabbed our drinks and our burritos and walked out of there while the guy gave me dirty looks and kept calling me ‘Big spender.’ We decided to sit down on a bench near the restaurant, only to find our orders are completely messed up and nothing near what we ordered at all, as well as our drinks only being filled halfway. I’m normally not that picky and would have just said forget it, eaten it, and wrote it off as more trouble than it was worth to fix the order, but I was here with a girl and didn’t want to look like a wimp.
We took our food to the restaurant, where I explained to the guy our issues, and he said, ‘Oh, complaining about your order and couldn’t even be bothered to tip? Now you’re putting me through all this trouble and can’t be bothered to tip,’ and just kept rambling on with crap like that while a line formed behind us. He finally went to fill up our drinks and when he came back, he said, ‘Whoops!’ before he pretended to trip and sent our drinks flying all over me and the girl I was with. I demanded to speak to his manager and he immediately stopped playing his little game, started saying crap like that he realizes he was being a jerk before, but that he really did trip and crap like that. Basically saying anything to beg us not to talk to his manager and even offered us our money back on the order, but I refused and kept demanding to talk to his manager until the cook in the back finally heard what’s going on and went to get him. The manager comes out, the girl I’m with and I both explained what happened, and the kid kept babbling that it was an accident. The manager took me and the girl in back to get us cleaned up and, after that’s done, invited us to watch the CCTV footage of what happened along with the kid who spilled crap all over us.
The kid clearly tripped on nothing and deliberately sent the drinks flying on us. The manager fired the kid on the spot, explained to us he had only hired him on for the summer since he was a long time friend’s son and that the kid had been acting like a total jerk the entire time he was employed, but the manager regrettably turned the other cheek since it was his friend’s son. The manager was a really nice guy and paid for our meal as well as gave us a card each that gave us 10 free meals at his restaurant. He even went in the kitchen and cooked our orders himself, gave us them in to-go bags, and paid for a cab (we had walked) to take us back to my place so we wouldn’t have to walk home in sticky clothes.”
The Service Was Only So-So To Begin With, Then The Waitress Took Things Too Far
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“This was back when I was in my third semester of college. Finals had just finished and I was in a strange funk from lack of sleep and not seeing friends for about two weeks straight. I was tired and nervous cause, you know, finals. Anyways, to relieve some stress, I decided to go out with friends and eat some hot wings. I gathered a few of my closest friends and we headed off to a certain owl-themed hot wing establishment.
We got our menus and started chatting, looking at the menu and just chilling. Then our waitress came over and did nothing. She smiled, kinda leaned in and rested her arms and just stared at us. We were thrown off and after a few moments, she finally asked us what we would like to drink.
When she came back with our drinks, she did the same thing, so we just started ordering because if she’s not gonna do her job, we might as well do it for her. We got our food (fried pickles and a ton of wings) and we thought things resumed to normal. NOPE. This is the WTF moment.
She came over halfway through the dinner and did her little routine. Smile, lean, stare. Then she looked me right in the eyes and ate one of the fried pickles. Looked over to my friend and ate another one. She then giggled and left a table full of mortified customers. We just stopped eating at that point, asked for the bill and left no tip.
While we’re trying to scramble away, I must have pocketed her pen when I signed the receipt. Some regular customer came outside and asked for her pen. We gave it back and he said something along the lines of, ‘Guess kids these days don’t know how to tip.’
I responded, ‘Not for terrible service, I don’t!’ I don’t expect much when going out, but I always tip a decent amount, even if service is slightly sub-par, because I know too many people who are servers and I know for a fact I could never deal with so much nonsense. But I expect to be engaged by the person serving me (not just staring at me) and I expect my server NOT TO EAT MY FREAKING FOOD WITH HANDS THAT HAVE BEEN GOD KNOWS WHERE.”
“She Didn’t Need It As Much As They Obviously Did”
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“I was a server and trainer for a chain restaurant. I trained this girl who was only hired for her looks. She was so dumb, it was sad. She never paid attention to her tables and was always at the bar talking to the bartender. One night, she had a table leave and she went to get her tip. Well, her tip was a handful of pennies with a note that said she was horrible. I will never forget seeing her take the pennies and run out after them. She threw the money at them and told them she didn’t need it as much as they obviously did. Fired right then, but I laughed so hard!”
Using The Baby Like That Was Low…
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“So me and some friends were at a Chinese Buffet and at the end of our meal, the waiter asked if we were ready to pay. He stood there while my friends filled out the receipt and then brought one of the waitresses over. The waitress had her baby with her. She then proceeded to say, ‘You’re going to leave a big tip, yes? A big big tip for the baby?’ Well, see, I was going to tip, but now I’m not. Some of my friends felt bad about not leaving anything so they left a dollar or so, but anybody who has the audacity to do that to me is getting the exact opposite. I can’t believe some people actually buy into that. They were nasty about it, too.”
The “Best Seat” In The House Doesn’t Come With Great Service
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“My girlfriend and I went to a restaurant one night and, since it was a Saturday night on the edge of downtown, it was pretty busy. We asked for a table for two and were seated after a short wait. They led us to a table that was next to the kitchen door and a busboy station, so dirty dishes were continually piled up behind me. This table was also situated behind a pillar, so we’re visually cut off from the rest of the restaurant. We ordered some drinks. 20 minutes go by. The waitress never came back.
The manager was walking by, asking other tables how they’re doing. We grabbed her attention and explained the missing drinks and MIA waitress. The manager asked for the waitress’ name. I replied that I didn’t know her name. I didn’t recall seeing a name tag. She said nothing, but gave me the one-eyebrow-raised-look-of-suspicion usually reserved for when little kids tell you lame fibs. She left to find our waitress and never returned.
We finally ordered from another passing waiter, as it’s late enough now. We’re hungry and we took our chances. Lo and behold, our food came, but still no drinks. While we’re eating, the original MIA waitress walked up, pointed to her name tag and said, ‘Beth. My name is Beth,’ and walked away. My lady and I exchanged puzzled glances and continued to eat.
When Beth brought us the check, I asked to see the manager. Beth asked, ‘Why? What are you going to say?’ I told her that I wanted to let the manager know that the service here was far below adequate. We were stuck in the corner and ignored. I reminded her about the drinks that never arrived and she just adopted the attitude of a snarky teenager, huffing and eye-rolling.
I said, ‘Get me the manager, NOW, please.’
‘All right…I’ll see if she’ll come over,’ promised Beth. After 15 minutes, the manager arrived. The FIRST thing out of her mouth: ‘Why don’t you like Beth?’ I snapped, but composed myself quickly. I explained that we were ignored for the past 90 minutes and this has nothing to do with liking or not liking anybody. Heck, we hardly even met Beth. I explained that I wasn’t trying to scam a meal. We ordered the food and ate the food, so I intended to pay, but I would not be returning and would tell others to steer clear of this place.
‘Ignored?’ cried the manager, incredulous. ‘This is the ‘date table. We find that young couples like to be off by themselves and not be bothered! Now, how about I give you a voucher for a free dessert next time you come in?’
‘Next time?’ I said. ‘You think there’s gonna be a next time?’
At this point, my wife, silent until now, said, ‘You could give us free dessert right now.’ The manager furrowed her brow and said, ‘Well, if I gave it to you now, then I KNOW you wouldn’t come back.’
I paid the bill, left the ol’ one-penny tip (you know…to make a STATEMENT) and visited the little boys’ room. On the way out of the restaurant, Beth brushed by us and mumbled, ‘Thanks for the tip, cheapskate.’ That place closed about six months later.”
“I Don’t Think It’s Safe To Give You A Knife”
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“Went to a steakhouse in San Francisco. Ordered steak. Got a butter knife. Called the waitress over and asked for a steak knife. She returned with a new butter knife, only with a wooden handle.
I said, ‘Sorry, what I’m looking for is a steak knife, something that cuts meat.’
She said, ‘That will cut meat!’
I ran the knife over my hand a few times while saying, ‘No, no, you don’t understand, I’m eating meat and this doesn’t cut meat.’
She said, ‘That’s a steak knife, though!’
I said, ‘I’m not sure what to tell you. I want a knife that can penetrate and slice meat.’
‘Are you threatening me?’ she asked. I had already handed her the ‘steak knife’ so I was just sitting there with my girlfriend, empty-handed.
I said, ‘What?’
She said, ‘Well, you’re very aggressive and asking me for a knife to stab and cut with!’
I gave her the wtf look. My girlfriend laughed.
I said, ‘Uh, no, you’re not a steak so you have nothing to worry about. Look, just give me what you have and I’ll deal with it.’
She said, ‘I don’t think it’s safe to give you a knife. I’m sorry,’ and walked off.”
“Well, Can’t You Just Eat This Instead?”
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“My wife and I and a couple of her brothers went out for coffee one evening. I had just gotten off work and hadn’t eaten, so I took a look at the menu and order beef frajolaki (seasoned steak with onions and tomatoes on a torpedo bun), and my wife ordered a turtle cheesecake with her coffee.
About 5-10 minutes after the waitress had taken our orders, another group of people sat down in the booth behind us. The same waitress came up, chatted with them and grabbed their orders.
After about 20 minutes, out comes the turtle cheesecake that my wife ordered. No, wait, it’s a cappuccino cheesecake. My wife called the waitress back and told her about it, and the waitress apologized and offered to bring her the proper one out, but my wife liked it well enough, so she said she’d just have the one that was brought to her.
Another 15-20 minutes go by, and I’m still waiting for my meal, getting a little pissed off by this point, when I spot the waitress coming our way, plates in hand. Wait, plates? I was the only one who ordered! She walks by us and to the booth behind us and distributes the food. Now I’m getting really ticked. I hear the table behind me discussing their meals, and one of them asks another what he’s eating, to which he replies, ‘I don’t know, but it’s really good!’ Well, I thought, how the heck do you no know what you ordered?
Another 10 minutes go by, and I’m about ready to leave, when out comes the waitress, plate in hand. She sets it in front of me and asks if there’s anything else I need. I look at the plate and back to her and said, ‘Uh, this isn’t what I ordered. I ordered a beef frajolaki. This is a beef dip.’ She looks at the plate, then quickly looks at the booth behind us.
Yup, mystery guy who couldn’t remember what he had ordered? He was chowing down on my frajolaki. Mistakes happen, and I’m pretty mellow, but when she said, ‘Well, can’t you just eat this instead,’ I asked for the cheque and got up and went outside to wait for my wife before I totally lost it.
To top it off, she tried to charge me for the beef dip.”
Revenge Is Best Served Hot
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“Well one time I was in a restaurant in NY and I ordered some pasta for myself. I was just chilling there, when a waiter tripped and dumped an entire cheese pizza on me. I sat there as the waiter got up. He said it’s my fault and I need to pay for the pizza. I said I would, but when I got my pasta, I went over to him and dumped it on his head and said, ‘You’re going to pay for that.’ And I walked out.”
Their Service Was Terrible…Until They Started Name-Dropping
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“This happened a few years ago to me and my fiancée and our friends. I worked at an Indian restaurant with one of my girlfriend’s best friends. The owners of the restaurant had just opened a new Mexican place, so we all decided to go. It had been open about a week, so it would have been understandable if the food and service weren’t out of this world, but what we got was below our already low expectations. In our group, there were seven or eight of us. Next to us is a group of clearly well-to-do people, maybe six people, or so. Our server has only the two tables.
Our server got our drink order, didn’t bring them for 20 minutes, took our food order, which doesn’t come for nearly two hours. Meanwhile, the rich people next to us get the best service I’ve ever seen. The server was clearly just ignoring us and pegging us as cheap college kids. Finally, our food came, and all the orders were wrong. No one got correct food. One girl didn’t even get her meal until we were about to walk out the door. Oh, also our drinks never got refilled, not once.
So after all of this, we got a manager, who looked blankly at me and walked away without saying a word. Finally we got the General Manager to come talk to us. We explained everything to her. Lastly, we dropped the owners’ names, saying we worked for him and would be telling him everything that happens. The General Manager’s face went slate white. So they knew they were screwed.
After all of this, we just wanted to leave. They gave us half off the entire meal, then the server came up to us and said, ‘My bad guys.’ That was all we got in a form of an apology. We left her a tip of about three cents.
On our way out, the hostesses were all smiles and asked us how the meal was. I turned to the girl, who was clearly unaware of what happened, and just went, ‘It was really terrible.’ Then I grabbed a giant handful of peppermints and walked out.”
No Seafood…At A Seafood Place?
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“I was in Miami a few days ago and we stopped at some seafood place to eat. I saw calamari was on the specials board and it sounded good. When the waitress came to take my order, I asked for the calamari. In a heavy Russian accent, she said, ‘We are out of seafood.’ I asked if she was out of calamari, because that was okay. I could pick something else. She again, without any explanation, repeated they had no seafood. You know…the food group that their establishment features. I asked if that meant every dish containing seafood on the menu because that left about three choices. She said, ‘No SEAFOOD.’ My husband asked her to clarify again and she walked off. Nobody ever came back to our table and after 20 minutes we left. We had some awesome corn tortilla tacos at Crazy Taco instead.”
“Did That Really Just Happen?”
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“My coworkers and I went to a BBQ place for lunch, it was located in a converted garage and looked very shady. Inside was filthy with piles of dirty pots on display out front, a 500-pound lady taking orders, and a dude who looked like Death Himself was preparing the food. This was in an open area, so we could see everything.
As we are watching Death get our order together, he stops, bends over, and vomits into a bucket. I guess he dropped his comb or something because he then reaches into the bucket of vomit and takes something out. He goes in the back and the fat lady had to finish getting our orders. We were in shock and just paid and got out of there. In the car driving back, it was silent until somebody asked, ‘Did that really just happen?!’ We all started laughing incredulously. I ended up throwing out my food.”
“The Small One Is For You Because You Are A Woman, And That Is Polite”
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“I was with a male friend (I’m a lady) at a cafe in Berlin, and the waiter took our order with a bit of attitude, but nothing too unmanageable, this is Europe after all. He comes back out a bit later with our drinks, one in a normal glass and the other in a teeny, tiny glass, which he put in front of me. We asked him about this, as we had just said two drinks and not specified sizes. He said, ‘Well, the small one is for you because you are a woman, and that is polite.’
I gave him my very best wtf face, and said, ‘But I didn’t want a small.’ He looked at me and just walked off, leaving me with my tiny, tiny drink.
My friend is all ‘forget that noise,’ and took my small glass inside to the girl behind the counter, told her that the waiter gave us attitude and a lesson in sexism, and she told my friend, ‘Yeah, that waiter’s a freaking idiot.’ On the up side, it was super fun eyeballing him while we drank our drinks, and we only got charged the price of a small.”
