Is it THAT hard?

As I was reading the comments on today's One Minute Writer prompt, one of them made me think about a pet peeve of mine. POOR CUSTOMER SERVICE!

I used to BE customer service... I was a waitress, many times over. I was a cashier at a movie theater and I was a supervisor at a movie store. I am now a photographer at a portrait study where I have to encounter numerous people in any given day and they may not be that bright or that nice and my day may suck regardless, but that does not give me to the right to treat innocent people like crap. I suck it up and I do my job. I do my job to the best of my abilities and if I have an issue I check with a manager. I never act like I don't want to be there. I never roll my eyes or cock my head in disgust at a customer (at least not right in front of them LoL).

Two nights ago, we went to Burger King. My friend Sarah ordered her food, then I waited. And waited. And waited. And waited. This is my biggest issue. When people think I am with the person in front of me, so they don't acknowledge the fact that I want to order too. This happens ALL the time at Auntie Anne's (the pretzel place in the mall). If the person in front of me orders TWO things (oh no, not that) then the worker automatically assumes I am with them and skips past me to the person behind me. Hello, did you SEE me talking to that person? Umm no, and even if I was, that doesn't mean they are ordering for me. Anyway, back to Burger King. The cashier obviously didn't know what he was doing. We wanted to order a salad in place of our fries (the salad is $1, fries were like $1.25 or something) and he said we couldn't substitute it. Now, if I remember correctly, over 10 years ago when I worked at Burger King, we could substitute the salad for the fries. Twice he had to go get a manager cause he screwed up ringing up the order but not once did he ask about substituting the salad... he just said "I don't think so." as he attempted ringing it up and then said, "no, you can't." I just think he didn't know how to do it. I digress... the manager finally came over to ring up my order because the cashier boy was "busy" and just told him he had to cash it out before ringing up the next order. He forgot and needed the manager to come back and fix it as my food was sitting there waiting to be bagged. We waited, then waited some more. I was getting frustrated. HELLO? I ordered some food and here it sits, just over the counter, too far for me to grab but so close to him that I was ready to scream at him to get my order. I finally said, "Could I get my whopper jr. please?" He grabs the receipt to make sure I actually ordered a whopper jr. then says, "Did you get your salad yet?" Yah, it's of the invisible kind. Finally I get my food so we can be on our way. What happened to, "Have it your way?" Like, with a salad... hot... quick. Guess that went right out the window with "The customer is always right." Seriously, it doesn't take a genius to work at a fast food restaurant, people! I swear, they only hire people with a maximum number of brain cells... that number being 1.

Which brings me to the incident last night with the employee at the movie theater. Really? You had to work, on a Monday night? Awww, I feel bad for you. Really, let me tell you how bad I feel that you actually had to get off your ass and do your job. 730 we arrive at the movie theater, our movie started in 5 minutes. The cashier was nice. She was talking to a co-worker but took the time to actually stop her conversation and say "Hi, can I help you?" when we approached the ticket booth. That is a feat in and of itself in these parts. I got our tickets and gave John some money for concessions while I went to the bathroom. When I came back out, John was still standing at the concession stand, no one helping him. I asked if he was getting anything and he said, "Yah. I'm thirsty. I am just waiting." I was like, wtf is going here. There is NO ONE in the theater and two people working. The co-worker I mentioned earlier that was talking to the ticket booth cashier was now standing in the concession area doing paperwork, not even looking up. Finally, John walked over to her and said, "Is there someone that could help me?" She barely looked up from her paper, dropped her pen in disgust and walked to the cash register. Not a word came out of her mouth. No apology, no what can I get for you, nothing! She just held her head cocked to the side with a grimace on her face. John took about 5 seconds to think about what kind of drink he was getting, then added in some sour patch watermelons for me last minute which obviously didn't make her happy. I mean, jeez, heaven forbid you actually have to DO your job. Talk about some GREAT customer service. At least no one was smoking in the theater this time though.

I get that you may not like your job... I get that you may be having a shitty day... I get that you may have had 23 people come through your line today and you are tired... I get that you probably have better things to do... but THIS is your job. It is YOUR job to leave an impression with the customer. It is YOUR job to treat the customer as you would like to be treated. It is YOUR job to do the best you can to make the customer happy. It is YOUR job to offer a solution to a problem, to greet the customer, to look up from whatever else it is that you are doing, to smile, to at least pretend that you are not the only person that matters in this world, to not make the customer feel like total shit on their BIRTHDAY! You don't know what is going on with me, and I won't pretend to know what is going on with you. I won't take my problems out on you, and you shouldn't take your problems out on me. Suck it up, be an adult, do your job and do it right. Oh, and have a nice day!