These customers were a nightmare, but they ended up getting what they deserved.
“He Throws His Card At Me And…”
“I work at Starbucks. One day as I was working the drive-thru, we were having longer than normal wait times, as we were short-staffed. This one guy gets up to the window in a huff and starts yelling at me/complaining about his wait. I apologize and tell him his total. He literally throws his credit card at me, and it bounces off the bottom of the window directly underneath his truck. We look at each other for a second, and then he sends his daughter out of his truck to look for it. I inform them it’s right under their truck, so he moves his truck up a bit, gets out, picks it up and hands it to me softly without making eye contact (as he is squeezing himself between the tail end of his truck and the wall of the building), being pretty embarrassed as everyone behind him is watching; It was pretty satisfying.”
“You Get All Kinds On The Late Shift”
“As a teenager, I was working part-time at a convenience store. I was being trained by the late night cashier. This dude comes in and grabs a bunch of cans of vegetables and such, and comes to the counter and stacks the cans in a very specific way, like a weird kind of pyramid on the counter.
As the experienced cashier (my trainer) takes each can off the pyramid and rings it up, she reaches the end of the stack and we realize that the weirdo has his junk out and has it laying on the counter behind the cans.
Without saying a word, the trainer grabs one of the big heavy metal cans of beans and slams it down as hard as she can on the guy’s member. He screamed an incredible scream of searing pain, grabbed his crotch, and ran out of the store.
She to me: (calmly) ‘You get all kinds on the late shift.'”
He Was Showing Off In His Mustang: Big Mistake
“I was working at McDonald’s overnight on the weekends when the bars let out. This location was pretty busy with people who partied a bit too hard, so cops sat in the parking lot of a church across the street. One night, this wasted jerk comes through the drive-thru in a Mustang. He’s being obnoxious, revving his engine and honking his horn because he has to wait in line. The cops notice and come around. They tell him to pull into a spot so they can talk to him. They end up arresting him because he has obviously been drinking, but the best part is he parked in a handicap spot and ended up getting a $400 ticket for that.”
Serves Him Right
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“A guy comes in and is being a complete jerk. He was not wanting to show ID to buy a 6-pack even though he looked 20 at the oldest, and was constantly yelling and swearing. He also had parked in the handicap spot despite not having handicap tags or plates on his car. One of my regular customers, who is a sheriff’s deputy, was also in the store at the same time. He saw how the guy was acting. He saw where he was parked. So he went out, got his ticket book, and wrote the guy a ticket. When the guy realized he wasn’t getting his 6-pack, he went outside to find he was also getting ticketed. I could not stop laughing.”
Spilled Milk
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“It was the best day of my life. I work in a small café, it was about 10:30 am on a weekday morning, nice and quiet. In comes this woman (must be about 58-62) and her husband and their grandchild. The wee boy was adorable, and the grandmother was all over him. He sat beside her and she constantly talked to him, ignoring her husband. Everything is fine, someone takes their order and then I go to take stuff over. The wee boy’s milk is ready first, just milk in a Styrofoam cup with a lid and straw. He must be 2 or 3 and that’s just what we do for kids that age. I take it over and she looks at me like I’ve put a turd on the table. She says she wanted it in a cup and I explain the only cups we have are coffee mugs, they’re heavy for a small child, and it’s easy to spill stuff out of them. She says she wants it anyway, so I go back to the bar area. When I go back up another girl is taking over a latte and another coffee. The woman goes crazy, screaming, ‘DO YOU NOT USE CUPS IN HERE?’ because she got a latte glass, so we bring that back too. Just as I’m about to take the milk in a mug back her sandwich is ready, so I take it over with the milk. She looks at the sandwich like it’s the last straw. ‘That’s not chicken, that’s revolting!’ I explain that, as it says on the menu, it’s chicken and parmesan mayonnaise. She shakes her head like I’m an idiot and just thrusts it back at me. I ignore her, don’t ask if she wants something else, I just walk away. Then I hear a yell and a crash. The wee boy picked up the mug of milk, it must have been too heavy because he dropped it, soaking both himself and the grandmother and smashing the cup on the floor. Sure, we had to clean it up, but my smugness was as close as I dared get to ‘I told you so.'”
Just Following Protocol
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“Lady comes into the restaurant and after I tell her we aren’t serving food, she makes a face at me but still sits down at a table. She orders a drink, then sees the cook is still there (in the back, cleaning up the kitchen after the night is over.) She walks up to the bar, says, ‘Excuse me, you’re being unprofessional, I see someone in the kitchen, you lied to me, you can have him make me some food. You need to be re-trained on your job.’ I smile politely, and say, ‘I’m sorry, the kitchen is closed for the night, the cook does need to go home because we aren’t open all night.’ She then says, ‘No wonder you don’t have a real job’ and storms back to her table, finished her drink, and leaves. Of course, leaves me no tip – shocker. As soon as she’s out of earshot, all the people at the bar verbally attack her and commend me on keeping my cool, which felt great on its own. But the best part? We’re in an airport, and she left her bags behind. The official protocol which I HAD to follow even though hers was the only and last flight out? Calling the police, having them take her bags to another terminal for inspection, meaning there’s no way she had them for her flight. It was like a movie scene where the bad guy destroyed himself I was so happy.”
Finger Lickin’ McChicken
“I worked at McDonald’s for just under 5 years. We had this one guy who was a regular. Probably in his late 30’s, early 40’s. This guy came almost every day and ordered a small black coffee (which baffles me, McDonald’s coffee tastes so bad). Well, this guy had a very short fuse. He would get pretty flustered very easily, and he is one of those people that seem to hate the nice people the most.
One day I was working the hole (passing food out the window) and grabbed his coffee. He seemed to be in quite a hurry that afternoon, and when he went to grab his coffee, the lid popped off and the majority of the coffee went all over his lap. Freshly brewed coffee, at that. What happened next made me question my employment as he flew off the handlebars and proceeded to lash out at me. ‘IDIOT, YOU JUST SPILLED HOT COFFEE ALL OVER ME! YOU BETTER BE READY TO HEAR FROM MY LAWYERS! I HOPE YOU’RE READY TO BE JOBLESS!’ I just stood there and took the verbal beating because I didn’t want to lose my job. All I could do was bite my tongue and apologize, as I was a very friendly teenager. After he peeled out of the parking lot, I informed my manager of the altercation and he told me not to worry about it, he had my back if this guy tried to take any sort of legal action (he never did). After this, he became known as the ‘coffee guy.’
Fast forward about 6 months later. I was blessed with not having to encounter this monster for quite some time. It was a beautiful summer day, and I’m taking drive thru orders. Being the creative young mind that I was, I liked to create my own advertisements for the order speaker. Today, my advertisement was, ‘Welcome to McDonald’s, would you like to try a finger lickin’ McChicken?’ Most of my customers got quite a chuckle out of my enthusiasm. I liked my job, oddly enough. Well, sure enough, the coffee guy rolls up to the speaker. I couldn’t see him, and we didn’t have the camera system, so I went ahead and cheerfully announced my advertisement. There was about a 10-second silence, then I heard a firm ‘no’ come over the mic. I thought to myself, ‘Well man, okay.’ I then proceeded to ask him to place his order. He ordered a small coffee. My heart hit my feet. I gave him his total and finally saw his face as he pulled ahead far enough to where I could confirm that it was him. I watched in fear and agony as he stared at me in through the window, waiting in the line of cars. Finally, it was time to take his money. Unknowingly to him, I had grabbed my manager (luckily the same one who was working during the coffee incident) and had him stand right around the corner, out of sight but still in earshot. The coffee guy handed me the money, then the following conversation ensued:
Coffee guy: ‘So, what is that? What is a finger lickin’ McChicken?’
Me: ‘It’s the McChicken, sir.’
Coffee guy: ‘No, finger lickin’. What does that even mean??? Finger LICKIN’ That sounds unsanitary and unappetizing. I don’t know if I can even drink my coffee now.’
Me: ‘I’m sorry sir, I thought it was engaging and exciting.’
Coffee Guy: ‘No, it’s just disgusting. Finger lick- does corporate tell you to say that? Are you instructed to say that?’
Me: ‘No sir, it’s something I made up.’
Coffee guy: ‘Something you made up. Well, that’s just disgusting. I’m going to be giving corpora- Wait, you’re that idiot who spilled the coffee on me! And now you’re trying to sell food in a dirty manner? OH you’re totally done. I’ll be calling corporate and telling them everything. This is RIDICULOUS. What’s your name??’ (Apparently he can’t read name tags). I told him my name and he told me to get my manager.
It’s at this point that my manager comes around the corner and proceeds to slam down the hammer of justice on this scumbag. I didn’t get to hear the whole conversation, but I remember hearing my manager call this dude something along the lines of ‘an obnoxious jerk’ and telling him that I did my job outstandingly well. He told the coffee guy, a regular customer, that he was never allowed back at this McDonald’s. It was that day that the darkness cast by the coffee guy finally met a fitting end, and we all worked happily, underpaid after.”
“My Old Buddy”
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“I was a server during college at an upper-scale restaurant. I rarely had problems with customers and am overall genuinely friendly. I had a table for 4 with only 3 patrons there, an older couple with their adult daughter. I served them beverages and was told we were to wait for patron #4 the son. About 40 minutes and 2 refills go by. I say ‘I bet you guys are starving by now, would you like me to bring you our lettuce wraps, they are small enough to not ruin your appetite, or are we still waiting for my buddy?’
The father said, ‘We are going to wait, and he isn’t your buddy. Frankly, you don’t know him, he’s a hard working man and will be respected.’
‘You’re right sir, forgive me.’
‘He actually has a real job.’
‘I understand sir, it won’t happen again.’ When I come back for refill number 3 the son was arriving. The son happened to be an old high school friend, and before taking a seat he gave me a hug right in front of his dad. I looked at the father and said, ‘small world, huh, I can’t believe you’re in my old buddy [name]’s family, I’m surprised we’ve never met before with [name] and I spending so much time together in high school.’
It’s too bad our restaurant didn’t serve crow.”
Holding Up The Drive-Thru
“Working drive-thru at a Tim Hortons and some jerk in a massive black truck parked too far away from the window and expected me to lean super far out to give him his change. He was real impatient and just really rude. I just shook my head and so he gets all pissed off and finally gets out of the truck and the door shut behind him. It was locked and he sat there for like 15 minutes and we had to call a tow truck. Sure it pissed off everyone behind him but at least they were all pissed off at him and not us! He acted like it was the biggest embarrassment of his life.”
Her Manager Wasn’t Having It
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“I worked at a restaurant that was very popular for brunch and Mother’s Day was probably our busiest day of the year. I had a customer call the evening before and asked for a table for six and he was incredibly rude when I informed him that this would simply be an impossibility. He kept getting more and more worked up, asking me to speak to my manager. At first, I didn’t want to pass the phone over (my manager wasn’t the nicest guy and we were in the middle of a busy dinner shift) but my manager came up behind me and demanded to know why I had been on the phone for so long. I was like, ‘Forget it, this customer isn’t going to listen to me anyway’ and gave the phone to Mac. Mac asked how he could help, listened for about 15 seconds before telling this dude something like, ‘So, you’re tying up my hostess in the middle of dinner even though she’s already told you nicely that we can’t fit you and your stupid family in the night before our busiest day of the year? Eff you, buddy!’ And hung up the phone.”
Sorry, Wrong Number
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“I used to be a night time manager at a pizza place downtown. We were literally around the corner from a direct competitor. They had a carry-out window and offered that service all night. We did not and closed our doors at 10:00 and only offered delivery service after that. It’s worth mentioning we were quite friendly with the local PD and they frequently sat in our parking lot at night to catch up on paperwork, watch for wasted drivers, etc. One night at about 11:30 I had a woman and a man start banging on our door. I politely (but loudly) told them through the door we close carry-out at 10. The woman goes ballistic and starts screaming and hitting the door while the man just stands there watching trying to look hard. I ask another employee to keep an eye on me in case the situation escalates and step out another side door, in order to be able to actually converse with them. This woman is absolutely nuclear at this point, screaming, cussing. I let her finish and I inform her that if she called and ordered it was probably our friendly neighbors with the carry-out window. I get accused of calling her stupid and ask her to check her phone and tell me which number she called. She says, ‘I don’t have to, I know I called y’all and YOU took my order!’ At this point, I informed her that there is absolutely no way I took a carry-out order after we closed carry-out.
Then man joins in and starts taking a very aggressive posture and tone with me and informs me that I ‘better let them in and get their food.’ I flat out said no.The man then shoves me and I stumble back about three feet, he goes to swing at me and misses. At about the same time the woman attempts to rush me there is a sound of ‘WOOOP WOOOP!’ and flashing blue lights behind them. This doesn’t stop them from continuing to try to assault me, however, the two uniformed police officers that happened to have just pulled in take care of that very quickly. Another squad car shows up, the two have been cuffed and placed in the cars, the officers have been given a copy of the security footage. I ask the officer I’m talking to if, for the sake of curiosity, he could possibly try to convince her to tell him the phone number she called. He walks me back out to the car she’s in and somehow convinces her to do this. She recites the number while glaring at me, with so much vitriol and hatred in her voice. ‘XXX-XXX-7272 you stupid idiot.’ I smile at her and inform her ‘Our number is XXX-XXX-3030. We are Domino’s. That’s the number for Papa John’s.'”
You Don’t Dine And Dash On His Watch
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“More than a few decades ago I worked at Denny’s. I had two male customers that decided to dine and dash. Got their license plate number and reported it to the cops and jokingly mentioned that they didn’t even tip! Later that night they got pulled over for a drinking and driving, cops recognized license plate number from the report, brought them both back to the restaurant and forced them to pay the bill. After they were done paying, the cop just stood there and looked at them and said well? And one of the guys sheepishly handed me my tip.”
“What Are You Going To Do About It?”
Christy Thompson/Shutterstock
“I was standing at the counter of the pizza place I work at. A lady storms in and slams a pizza down on the counter. ‘This isn’t the pizza I ordered, what are you going to do about?’ She asked. I look at the pizza then, at my buddy Nick and turn back to her and say, ‘Nothing.’ She then goes on a long rant telling how we are going to be fired, how stupid and incompetent we were, she actually told me I must be slow, then asked why we weren’t going to do anything? I said. ‘Because that pizza came from the pizza shop across the street.’ I think she actually managed to shrink in size and slink out looking so pathetic and beaten I almost felt bad for laughing until tears dripped down my face as she slunk off.”
“There’s A Reason We Don’t Allow Them Sir”
“Warehouse worker here. Customers have to show a card to shop, and even though we’re not technically a grocery store, we don’t allow pets. One dude tried to power walk past the employee at the entrance door holding a big pit bull puppy on a leash. We stopped him and told him he couldn’t bring his dog inside and he LOST IT. He says he’s our best customer and he’s here 5 times a week and he owns stock. Whatever. He demanded to know why we don’t allow dogs. We explained how it’s a food safety issue, especially with an untrained puppy. At this point, our manager came over and just waved him through because no backbone and the customer is always right BS. Well not even 5 minutes later, this dog squats in the middle of the main aisle and pees, followed by poop. The man turned so red and dragged the dog towards the exit, abandoning his groceries. We stopped him and asked him nicely to please clean up after his pup. ‘That’s the reason we don’t allow them, sir.’ He cleaned it up and it was glorious.”
“I Sat There Holding The Keys And…”
“I am a bartender and server in a popular corporate bar and restaurant. I deal with a lot, but this was a particularly uncomfortable experience. A loser guy and his trashy girlfriend were rude the entire time. Initially, they wouldn’t make eye contact and interrupted my greeting them by ordering two frozen drinks. They took up my table for two hours, ordered a ton of food, drinks and dessert, all the while treating me like garbage (eye rolling, scoffing, generally being aggressive, sent back an appetizer, etc). I dropped off their check hoping they’d leave as soon as possible. I honestly didn’t care if they tipped and I certainly didn’t expect them to. They waited until I bussed another table and went back to the kitchen before they wrote ‘bad service’ and drew all sorts of things on their check. Then they walked out without paying. I discovered this about 3 minutes after they exited the building. By this time, it was 20 minutes to closing. I had no other tables, and to my absolute pleasure, that idiot left his keys and cell phone in the booth. I grabbed my manager and we sat in the booth behind the one they’d just left, knowing they’d either call or have to come back in very shortly. Sure enough, they called, the manager answered and politely and enthusiastically told them to come right in. And when they did, I sat there holding the keys and cell phone with a huge smile on my face, while my manager demanded payment for their $129 tab; Jerks.”
This Takes The Cake
“I work in a bakery and I had a couple order a cake decorated with ‘rainbow colors.’ I make them a tie dye-esque beauty. Next day they come for the cake. I hand it to them. They look at the cake, me, the cake again. They say, ‘We can’t buy this cake.’ I respond, ‘I’m so sorry, is something wrong?’ Thinking it wasn’t up to par even though my manager loved it. They said, ‘This cake has a rainbow. Rainbows support the gays.’ I stared at them thinking it was a joke because first of all, there are NO RAINBOWS on the cake. I didn’t even put the whole spectrum on the cake because it blended horribly! It was red, yellow, green, and blue. And second of all, you ORDERED. RAINBOW. COLORS. So I laugh and shrug it off. This has to be a joke. I tell them to have a lovely day. They ask, ‘Well are you going to replace the cake?’ They aren’t kidding. Now I’m a calm person; I’ve been jumped, mugged, and insulted and it didn’t upset me in the slightest. But guess what? I’m gay! So this insult pushes me to Walter White levels of furious. I’m insulted, angry, and generally not a happy camper. I smile my best fake smile and tell them I’ll get my manager. She tells them what they ordered is what they get. They want to speak to the store manager. He tells us for the sake of his sanity to redo the cake, so my manager dolls up another cake. Family grabs it and starts to leave. As they walk out, the mother decided to whip out her phone and start texting while holding the cake in one hand. Splat goes the cake. Even better? The family is done up in their Sunday best. The cake is in a plastic container, not a box, so it pops right open when it hits the ground and gets icing all over their fancy clothes. They came back to the counter begging for a freebie. We didn’t make them another.”
“They Got Arrested For…”
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“I was working at a restaurant and there was this family who were all extremely trashy and didn’t look like they had a lot of money, despite ordering a bunch of expensive steaks and drinking a bunch of drinks. They were rude the whole time, treating me like I was their butler or slave, then asked for a manager to complain that their steaks tasted rotten (after they had already finished) and that their drinks didn’t taste strong enough (again, finished). They were clearly just trying to get free food. My manager noticed the way they were treating me and knew they were full of garbage and refused to comp their meal as they were demanding. The began yelling and cussing us out and ended up trying to leave without paying only to have their car not start in the parking lot. My manager called the police and one of them got arrested for disorderly conduct and possession of an illegal substance and the rest ended up walking after having their car towed.”
Coupon Fail
“I was grocery shopping when a woman came into the store talking loudly. I look over and she’s talking to a camera she’s holding herself. She’s saying ‘Okay YouTube, here we are, gonna make this a record purchase! Over $300 worth of groceries for less than a dollar! Let’s see what these babies can do!’ while flashing a stack of coupons at the camera. So she goes shopping, talking to the camera the whole time, being obnoxious and way over the top. She gets to the register around the same time I do, and is rung up for about $350, and then they scan the coupons. Final total $312. She goes ballistic, yelling at the cashier and talking to the camera trying to explain how couponing works. She’s going off, and the cashier just waits for her to finish. After she’s done yelling, she shoves the camera into the employee’s face demanding she explain herself. The cashier simply says, ‘We only accept one store coupon per product. You can’t use 50 of the same coupon for a single product.’ The lady froze for a full 2 seconds, shoved the camera in her purse, and ran away, leaving the cart with a ton of toothpaste, mouthwash, protein bars, and dish soap right there.”
