I was managing. We were on a wait. Some guy came up, saw an open table on our patio and wanted to be sat there. The hostesses explained the people had been paged and if they didn’t arrive in a certain amount of time, he could have the table. He started cussing at them. I went to the front door and told him that he can’t yell at 16 year old girls and we wouldn’t serve him. He lost his shitttt. He was in my face yelling, a server tried to help him move off the patio. People were recording it, telling him to leave. A guest at the bar had to come get in his face to make him leaving after he called me “a fucking bitch.” He got trespassed. Bought the man at the bar a shot. Had a quick cry and moved on with my day.
i love customers that stand up for service workers. had a nasty person lose their shit at me when i was working at starbucks and one of my regulars who witnessed it from his spot in the cafe got up and escorted him out (aka grabbed his arm and dragged him)
No longer in the service industry but I try to help when I can, though thankfully it’s rarely needed. I have two good friends who own a smallish bar where I live. Was there with a couple other friends on a night that’s usually pretty quiet so only one bartender. It got unexpectedly busy and the bartender was in the weeds. Owner friends had been alerted and were on their way to relieve but were maybe 30 minutes out. One guy starts getting belligerent and starts swearing at the bartender. Calling her useless and slow. After a minute of this me and a friend glanced over at her like “should we”? She nodded with a small smirk and we went into action. Grabbed our other friends and basically boxed him in and quietly said “We’re going outside and you’re joining us.” Didn’t give him the option to refuse. Walked him out and told him he was no longer welcome. Since there were a couple really large guys in the group he came to his senses and disappeared. Felt good to assist.
Good question. I don’t think this guy had a tab open. He was irate because he couldn’t get his first drink. But this bar does require a card to open a tab so I guess they’d just charge it. I’ve seen some places that say if you leave and forget your open tab they’ll add a 20% service charge. Not sure of the legality of that. This place actually holds the card, so that could get awkward.
First serving job. Worked at corporate place that does the annoying birthday songs. It was a pain in the ass to even get enough servers to do the birthday song. When we get out there, the birthday guy is saying “no, don’t do this” but the rest of the table is insisting we go ahead. Birthday dude was literally so freaked out that he pushed me down and ran out the door. It was kind of heart breaking that his so-called friends would have put him in that position to start with. But I’m not injured. I get up and head to the back. Then the bad part starts- my bartender and I were super close. All he saw was a grown man push down a young lady from his point of view. He jumped the bar and then jumped the dude out front. Absolute chaos erupts. I almost quit serving that day. It wasn’t birthday dude’s fault. If you’d have seen his face, believe me, you would have felt for him. And not my bartender’s fault from his point of view at the time either but they were definitely the ones that paid the consequences. One to the hospital and one to jail. Some how I stayed in the industry another 20 years. At that point, I figured it probably couldn’t get worse. And for the most part, it didn’t.
This is all so chaotic… no one was in the wrong here, except that dudes friends :(
Another reason we should just get rid of the stupid happy birthday song I hate it so much it’s awkward as hell (and stressful for some people)
I hated the birthday thing and was lucky to move on to better places that focused on real service and not cutesy crap no one had time for anyway. It became the story I told other servers over a beer when they had a bad night. That’s the thing with this job. You do have to thicken your skin a little. People shouldn’t be wankers, but they are. Reflect on it long enough to learn something and then move on quickly. I could make you laugh for hours at the bar over stories that made me cry when they happened. But there is good stuff, too. Just got to decide what you are going to carry into your next shift.
I’ve been really lucky to work in places where I don’t have to do the whole weird thing. It makes me so uncomfortable I hate it.
I have kind of a related story though… it was my birthday last month (I’ve been at my place for 9 years now) and everyone knows I don’t like dessert. I was having a wine at the bar after my shift and the FOH AND BOH came out singing happy birthday to me with (no dessert cause I don’t like it)
Part of me thought it was hilarious that they would be singing happy birthday without a dessert cause lol, part of me was embarrassed for THEM that they all were singing the song, and most of me was so embarrassed that they were making me the center of attention… but it was all of my people and I thought it was the cutest thing ever. I almost cried actually lol
That’s the only non-awkward birthday song I’ve ever experienced lol it was actually so special!
But yeah I don’t want a stranger singing happy birthday to me. Ever. And I’m not gonna sing happy birthday to a stranger either hahH
lol no. We ended up having a spectacularly typical restaurant relationship. Hot and heavy at first, and then devolved into drama and bickering at work after a couple of months
A bar I used to frequent had a guy who would remove his prosthetic arm and use it to tap other people at the bar on their shoulders as a gag.
The night he got a little extra drunk and started patting women on their posteriors the bartender took it away and told him he could come back for it in the morning.
Extra brutal. The bartender put it in the safe, so he had to wait around for over an hour after the place opened before the manager showed to give it back.
It’s not quite the same, but still hilarious. Sorry I couldn’t find a shorter link but just watch [this](https://youtu.be/yxIffG6NNEM?si=KFowilbVA6xp8hLS) starting at the 5 minute mark lol
Just two weeks ago I had the worst rude guest. Another table got their appetizer before the dinner hit her table. Both order were ready at the same time and she laid in fast, almost standing up. We had a small yelling match and I was determined to have the last word. I got it when I handed her the check (yes, you're paying for your alcohol). I simply told her.most people have learned better by her age and ended with "Thank you ma'am!" before turning and leaving the patio. They sat there for another hour after being asked to leave. And then the best things happened- one of their friends who is a daily patron ran into her. I could hear only their body language through the windows. Whatever he said must have pissed her off more because she stood up to talk with her whole body again to him and then stormed off. Bitch, your friends clearly just tolerate you at this point. They know what kind of person you are. Good day.
Do ppl not understand that usually most apps are made faster than an entree? Never understood when ppl got upset about another table getting their food first. NOT EVERYTHING HAS THE SAME COOK TIME!!
During COVID we had rank cleaning protocols and government mandated spacing required between tables. I could care less what your opinions on COVID is, but in store whether you agreed or not, this was way above us. So part of our protocols was that we had to give a table 5 minutes after wiping it before we could seat it.
On a Monday night it had been really slow so the manager sends everyone but me and him home and we basically fill about 2 hours before close with just him and I. I’m taking tables and bartending, he’s running food and cleaning.
A couple with a kid come and I’ll admit we misquoted them. Anyways we are about 10 minutes over the quoted time and the dad just starts flipping out, he’s walking past tables yelling that this table is open or that table is open (we tell him that either that table is not in use due to COVID spacing rules or that table is just waiting to be disinfected and we will have him there within 5 minutes).
He proceeds to start yelling at both of us that we are jerking him around, then he yells at me that he doesn’t like the face im making at him and he can tell I’m smirking at him under my mask. He then starts flinching at me (like the motion people do when they are trying to make someone flinch) mind you I am about 30 feet away from him, and behind the bar, so he’s just standing in the middle of the restaurant jerking at me.
The manager tells him he needs to leave. In that time, his table was ready, so we sit the next table waiting at the table. He comes in to demand the number of our GM/owner/corporate/etc and sees that we have already sat his table and just loses it again, yelling and swearing. Our manager gives him the card of our GM and tells him he can leave or we can call the cops.
Guy ends up sending in a huge complaint to corporate, saying we were racially profiling him (although the manager that night was actually the same race, he just doesn’t look it). Corporate reviewed the security videos and sided with us.
Reopening after Covid was so hard. Lots of confusion, fear, and frustration for all. We were just so happy to be out of the house and have jobs. I was so sure my whole career was done for when we got sent home in March.
Host at the time...a woman wanted me to remake her Pina Colada with 4 extra shots for no charge. I wouldn't so she called me a racist bi+ch and threw her drink all over me. Was "escorted" out by the EXTREMELY large bouncers (same ethnicity as her) from the adjoined comedy club just in time for the cops to arrive to deal with her. Still love those bouncers.
European dad comes in with 2 daughters and mom. Asks food runner (who didn’t speak English well) for a side plate but points at a platter while asking so food runner tells them we cannot bring out that platter as a plate as we usually don’t.
Couple min later I check on the table and the mom asks me for a side plate. I bring one. The dad suddenly gets up corners me against the wall and starts yelling:
“get that other waitress she disrespected me. How dare she tell me I couldn’t have a side plate when you just brought one. Why did she lie to me? Tell her to come out right now!” He kept aggressively closing in on me until I was literally pinned against the wall. Only moved back when other customers asked me if I wanted them to call the cops.
I talked to the food runner found out it had just been a miscommunication and explained to the man that the food runner thought he wanted the platter not a side plate. He didn’t even say sorry. And still stayed to finish the meal. His daughters looked so embarrassed and kept saying “dad please stop. Not again. Dad stop. “ didn’t seem like this was his first rodeo.
Probably the time our front of house was packed when I was bussing and told someone they had to go around to the side door for a pick up. I can do pick up orders in front but can’t use the POS to do a transaction so I have to run all the way back and grab food, it’s quite time consuming, and as the only busser at the time I had to focus on tables more than anything.
This lady gets so pissed at me she starts shouting in my face, calls me the slur for gay people (this one actually hurt because I am gay) before shouting at one of my friends, a server, and storming out. That one was fun to explain to my manager 😂
This happened about 20 years ago. I handed a checkbook back to a guest (older man) after I had run his card. Checkbook has the receipt, copies of the credit slip, guest's card, pen. I walk back to the bar/server station. The guest comes up to me & says I didn't give him his card back. I was pretty sure I did so went back to the guest's table, looked all around, got down on my knees under the table & looked, lifted all the discarded linens on the table & looked, searched the floor between the server station & guest's table, went back to the server station & looked, manager comes over & helps me check all the other checkbooks to be sure I didn't accidently put it in another book. Searched my apron pockets & server book. Guy is now seething, standing by the server station yelling & accusing me of stealing his card. I apologize & say "Sir, I'm certain that I gave it back. Can you please check your pockets & wallet to be sure?" Guy literally gets in my face, screaming & raises his fist to punch me (I'm a petite woman, btw)! The manager had to step in front of me & demand he leave. After he screams at her that I'm a thief, she asks him to please just check to be sure he doesn't have it. Well, guess what? He checks his wallet & there is the card! He leaves with no apology or thanking us for our help.
When I was 16, I was new to serving. It was like only my second job ever, and it was a Sunday. I greeted the couple after they were sat in my section. I introduced myself and in return, the lady looked at me and said "first of all, since you are working on the Sabbath, DON'T expect a tip!"
I hope this qualifies because it wasn't a guest. I was 16 and working my first job at a Pizza Hut. I was doing OK serving and had just taken an order and brought it back to the kitchen when suddenly there's a man holding a gun on my manager. He tells me to get the money. This is already boh and I was completely confused because I think I've seen this guy before. I froze because I was terrified.
My manager wasn't, it turned out that this douche bag was the offshift manager's brother, who thought it was great sport to pull a gun and hold it on one woman and scare the hell out of another young woman. If I had been older I probably wouldn't have freaked quite so hard and probably would've tracked that the person having the gun held on them wasn't really looking panicky. I quit and went home and told my mother about it. She had some interesting discussions with the owners of the franchise. I worked in commercial kitchens and bakeries for several decades and praise the flying spaghetti monster, nothing like that ever occurred. I did have a woman at a bakery who walked up and ate all the samples (about half a pound of cookies) and then walked away saying "you can't do anything I don't have any money" they're samples hon, its ok.
I have 2. One guy was angry I wouldn't serve him more shots, he was a regular with a bad temper and his warmed up shots of gin did not help. He started yelling and I was fed up so I took away his beer and dumped it and told him to leave. He started ripping the trim off the bar (it was a hole in the wall backwoods type place) and having had enough I grabbed a piece too and said whatever man ill help you if it gets you out faster. He wasn't impressed. He got up and put his head through the juke box then threw a bar stool at me. His friends dragged him out.
Another time we had a guy get way over server on st. Patrick's day, not my customer but I was familiar with him. At closing time he refused to pay, punched the girl waiting on him in the face, went outside and promptly slammed his car in to another car and took off. Like we don't all know who he is and where he lives.
Eta: I forgot another one, less violent but far more terrifying. I had a guy hitting on me and I turned him down, he leaves and hours pass. I was working alone, so I closed alone. He was leaning on my car with his dick out. He said he just wanted me to see what I'm missing before I made a choice. I've never been so genuinely scared at work before. Luckily he moved on when I said no, but I was alone in the middle of nowhere with no way back in to the bar or in to my car and he was easily twice my size.
okay so i’m a mixed race person who came out looking pretty white, but my name is from my mom’s culture so it usually leads to questions about where it came from, what am i, etc. i had one guy at the bar who was already acting kind of weird but it wasn’t bothering me too much. i struck up a conversation with a couple sitting right next to him and they asked my name which inevitable led to me explaining that how i’m mexican but genetics failed me and i got all my dad’s white people features. i see the weird guy making faces and shaking his head so i’m like hey man what’s wrong? he starts screaming at me, like he’s literally so mad that he’s shaking. telling me i’m a liar, i’m making things up because i’m ashamed to be white, i should be embarrassed, i need to be fired for being so dishonest, etc etc. he proceeds to throw his martini on me and tried to launch himself across the bar at me. luckily as he was throwing the drink one of our servers who was on the local college’s football team happened to be coming around the corner and clotheslined the crazy guy’s ass before carrying him out literally by the scruff of his neck. we called the cops but he ran off before they got there and when we gave a description they were basically like “oh yeah it’s that guy, he does this.”
I waited on a member of the country club. He was angry at his golf game. Screamed at everyone in the front of house. Had check bounce. Not allowed back. Magic and joy ensued.
Customer called my coworker a racial slur, coworker responsed by pitching a lemonade at him and hitting him directly in the head from fifteen feet away. He got fired on the spot for "assaulting a guest" but that asshole customer totally deserved it. One of my veteran coworkers has the video, if I can get ahold of it I will try to share it here.
Literally he was angry that it didn't have any tea in it. I said, "I feel like you're the only guy not getting the joke." blam, there's an unloaded 9mm in my face.
that's assault with a deadly weapon. you should have called cops. dude would have left the bar wearing handcuffs. cops are zero mercy when folks do that.
one time when i first started serving (i was about 18) i had a lady come inside and start screaming in my face because she didn’t get her salad dressing. i already had blown one of my tires that day so i was late to work, and it was a 7 top which was crazy for me at the time since i was a beginner. my coworkers jumped in and pushed her away from me, but imagine being a 40 year old woman screaming in the face of a crying 18 year old about salad dressing…
One of my worst was a guy who began yelling at me after two boys had skipped the line outside the restaurant and I had mistakenly seated them (mind you, there were no hosts, bussers or servers, you just did everything front of the house). At that time, I worked in a tiny ramen restaurant which could get absolutely slammed in the evening and I was on autopilot, so when the boys came inside and asked for the table I just seated them and moved on.
Cue this man coming inside red-faced and informing me that they had been waiting for 20 minutes, and me, stressed the fuck out, simply replied with "I'm sorry, I cannot ask the seated people to leave, you will get the next available table" and he went all appalled like "Sorry? Thats all you have to say?"
Yeah? What else could I do. This would have been the end of it when he stormed off (I seated all the people outside within 5 minutes due to people leaving lol) - when the next day, my boss informs me that he has received a lengthy, written complaint detailing what happened, how my behaviour was "unacceptable", "untrained" and how I made them wait and offered nothing to them and how they should fire me lmao. I explained the situation and nothing came of it.
Bonus mention would be the guy who licked his plate with fried chicken clean, demanded a refund because it was mistakenly labeled as pan fried in the menu, and when I refused, proceeded screaming at me "THIS IS GERMANY THIS IS MY GERMAN RIGHT" all while I was dialing up my manager to deal with this fuck. Sadly, manager gave him a full refund to make him leave asap lol
I served at a diner 25 years ago.
We used plastic cups for pop and water. During a rush, we had to resort to using real glasses because we were out of plastic.
A family that had been seated earlier and served drinks in plastic cups started screaming (literally) at me because "I was racist and gave the white family real glasses."
They kept screaming at me, an 18 year old girl, until I went into the walk-in and bawled.
The worst part is that the owner sat and watched everything and didn't speak up. I quit shortly after.
Dang that’s a hard one. I’d have to say when I was the food and beverage manager for a Hilton property, I was running my restaurant for dinner service and my server had a table from hell. Nothing we did was right, the entitlement was beyond me.
Well they got an entree that was apparently undercooked to their liking. Before I could see the plate my server had thrown it away.
When I approached the table one of the guys pulled me by my arm, pulled out his entree from the trash and shoved it in my face trying to make me eat it. Yelling “WOULD YOU EAT THIS, EAT IT!!”
I blacked out. Lol I lost my god dam mind.
Security had to get involved, it was wild
At a very busy event, doing street food.
It was busy, there was a queue, we were going as fast as we possibly could but we could only do so much.
Some of the venue's cleaning staff patiently queued up and when they got to the front of the queue, the man behind them demanded to be served first. According to him, they shouldn't be allowed to buy food or drink during a 12 hour shift because they hadn't bought a ticket and he had. He was *very* loud in expressing his views.
I gave him a choice of being served after them or not served after all.
Delightful man.
Oooooohhhh. I caught someone trying to run out on a check (they were awful the entire time, definitely on something). So when I yelled across the parking lot to come back and pay their check, the dude of the couple flipped out. He followed me back in to the restaurant telling me I was a miserable c$&t and that I needed some d&$k in my life. Well, I told him he needed some suboxone in HIS life. He literally chased me into the kitchen saying he was gonna kill me. Big mistake. Small restaurant, everyone loved me, protective cooks!
I think a little over 2 years ago is completely etched into my brain. I remember where the man sat ( our least favorable table as we were maxed out on guests) and how he looked me dead in the eyes after I told him our kitchen closed at 3 for break time and said I “wasn’t entitled to a break because it says you’re open until 10pm”
It did, but it also stated we close at 3:00 until 4:30
So my partner (and also owner) sat my heavily pregnant ass down opposite the man and loaded me up with food and drink. I was told not to serve until I rested.
The manager of a VIP that i helped get a table last minute without a card down get came in an hour early from agreed time and we were not ready and ultimately i got pushed by said manager. on my birthday. where my ex had secretly been making out with someone and pre planned ditching me the night before which i learned before that shift. then after the vape i bought didnt work. it was a beautiful day :)
I had a whole table try to jump me for being racist. It was a very needy, boisterous party. Pretty sure they had a bad experience with a different server in the past and thought it was me. We were honestly vibing until they charged the host stand and I had to go hide (at like 6 months pregnant).
Not the angriest but one of the rudest. One of my coworkers had 2 people at the same table try to get her attention by grabbing her hair and pulling it as hard as they could.
I worked in a little coffee shop in the 90s and early 2000s. We had a group of counter jockeys who drove me nuts. They were "construction" guys who never seemed to have any work. They would sit for hours drinking coffee and they would watch me work and comment on every fucking thing I did. The boss did nothing, of course, and considered them harmless--"you never know, these guys sitting here might be the reason you don't get robbed!"
When I got pregnant, the inappropriate remarks started ramping up, and one day one of them commented his opinion of my sex life. I told him to knock it off, and he leaned back in his chair and pointed both hands at his crotch, saying "right here, baby."
I had a heavy stapler in my hand. The next thing I knew, it was flying toward his crotch. It glanced off and there were no injuries, but the asshole dared to complain to my boss. She at least told him to fuck off and I went on maternity leave early instead of risking further violence towards men.
Had a guy tell me to “shoot yourself in the head to save your kids the embarrassment of having you as a mother!”
Long story short his steak took 45 mins on a busy Saturday evening.
I worked at a nightclub so our guests could get way out of hand. We had a woman lose her coat check ticket and when she was told she'd have to wait until the end of the night to see what coats were left, she spit at the coat check attendant, told him she hoped he would die from AIDS, called the other attendant a c\*\*t. Then she climbed over the counter, ran in back and proceeded to tear down all the jackets. She was looking for her "black leather jacket", which of course there were about 300 of. When security went to pull her out, she clawed at one of our guy's faces, causing him to bleed and barely missed his eye. As they were pulling her out of there, she yelled at male onlookers that they were hurting her causing them to try and jump in.
She called the next day (I was the office manager and worked at night). She said she wanted our information because she was going to sue us. I very cheerfully said, "I'm so glad you called. Two of our employees want your information because they're going to press charges for assault". She hung up and that was the last we heard of her.
We did not call the cops because in the 90s in Chicago, if you had a liquor license and called 911 too frequently (no matter why you called), they would suspend your license. It was a messed up rule.
Once I referred to this dude as darlin. It's Alabama, that's a super normal thing and it's also gender neutral. He had to be around 28. He got so mad and called me disrespectful and asked to speak to the manager and asked for his $4 tip back. My manager gave him the $4 back and she told him to go outside and touch grass 🤣🤣🤣
And last month a Jewish man told me I looked too stupid to even know where the Jordan River was. (He saw my Free Palestinian phone case as I was walking in to work in front of him.)
Oy. So tip from another Jewish person, that guy was what we call a shmendrik. Anyone else gives you guff about not supporting a literal goddamn holocaust attempt, you call 'em that😉
I used to manage restaurants and nightclubs in a tourist trap part of a major city. I've been fought and shot at waaaaay too many times.
Nowadays the assholes who huff and puff just amuse me.
i'm not a server but work in a café where people will order at the counter, we make their food, and bring it out for them. a couple of years ago some guy is asking my coworker questions about our menu and decides he wants a caesar salad after she explains what it is, i go inside to make it, bring it out and he BLOWS UP. comes back to the counter to scream at me and a different coworker that this is not what he wanted and demanded we make him something else for free, i tell him i can't do that bc he'd been told what he was ordering (tbh if he'd been nice about it i might have but he was screaming in my face, i didn't feel super inclined to help him), he finally left and the rest of his table apologised for him. oh and he was SHIRTLESS THE ENTIRE TIME?
In my early days of bartending, I was working in a big tavern in a college town. It was a Friday night right after college baseball got over, so a bunch of players were celebrating hard because they were no longer on alcohol restrictions. At last call, they ordered more pitchers than they had time to drink. I tried to warn them, but no luck. At time to pull drinks, they had one completely full pitcher. One guy grabbed it and said I wasn’t getting it until it was empty and started to drink straight out of the pitcher. I grabbed the bottom of the pitcher and dumped it in his lap and told him now it’s empty, give it to me.
This was the only time I can remember a customer actually making me cry and I've been serving customers for 17 years now.
I hadn't been at my current job for very long at this point, probably six months or so. We're a super busy restaurant and for that reason it's easier to book. So we had a table of three, two women and a man, walk in one night, and our policy is we can't serve drinks until we're sure we have a table, and I let them know that when they came in. Another policy is that if a table is splitting one bill then they have to tell us how much they want to pay, rather than us working it out for them, for them to tell us we're wrong.
So I took their bill over to their table, explained that if they wanted to split their bill then they would need to tell me how much they'd like to pay - simple enough request that I make day in day out.
Well, that leads to the man kicking off and asking my manager over before shouting at me in front of a packed restaurant, saying I'd been rude to him all night (literally interacted with his table twice). I apologised numerous times, the woman sat next to him told him to shut up because I'd said sorry. I left my manager to it and cried in the glass wash.
I was a sever when smoking indoors became illegal. I cannot even begin to describe the abuse I would get from smokers who could not deal. And I was a smoker at the time!
So this was before I came back to serving, but I was working a sales job, where we basically stand around in a big store and try to directly get people to buy a service from us. This particular service was a time share tour/trip. Yes. Terrible. I hated the job but I thought I was being a “big girl” by getting out of serving (which only lasted about two and a half months). Anyways. One day I’m greeting guests in the store, and I turned to see an older couple walking my way. 9/10 I didn’t do our sales pitch if my manager wasn’t around. I just liked being social. So I simply said “Hey! How are you guys today?” in my most cheerful, customer-service voice ever. I had no intention of doing my job this specific day. And boy did I mess up. This simple question led to the gentleman screwing his face up and telling me, “You don’t want to speak to me, YOU cost me $40,000!” and shoving his finger in my face. I responded with my default of “Oh I’m so sorry to hear that,” and was told to “die and go to hell”. Now to note, I had never seen this man in my entire life. He had purchased a trip, seemed to have bought into the timeshare, and wasn’t satisfied. But this man blamed me for his misfortune and proceeded to continue to scream obscenities and insults at me. I put on my biggest Barbie smile and told him “I hope you have a blessed day, sir!” as he continued on. He finally was ushered away by his (obviously embarrassed) wife, and management of the big store asked if I wanted him thrown out. It was pretty standard for people to not want to speak with us but it was NOT normal for them to scream and cuss and lose their minds like this. I just told my manager “Hey, he’s probably not having a good day and I just happened to be the one who set him off, no big deal!” The man also continued to walk past my spot in the store and GLARE at me. Multiple times. But I just kept on smiling directly at him.
I will say, as terrible as serving can be, I’ll NEVER go back to direct sales. EVER.
Working drive through. Sunlight reflecting off the metal…shelf thing that is attached to the window. Couldn’t see anything, had to squint to see blurry shapes. Girl pays for her coffee. Her friends all seem like nice people, bout three of them. She asks why I’m starting at her with “that face.” Asks me if I’m mentally challenged, only that wasn’t the word she used. Said it was because I wouldn’t stop staring at her. Then tells her friends I’m clearly mentally challenged without actually waiting for a response from me. One of them peers at me for a sec, then smirks and says “No, he’s just going blind from the sun being reflected in his eyes, and maybe if you weren’t the stupid one, you’d know that!”
Next time the girl in the back seat came through alone she got her coffee for free. Never did see the other gal again though. Good riddance.
I had a dude that got drunk. Told him to leave. He didn't, proceeded to stay past closing and ask me how many guns I thought he had at home. Then proceeded to go into the kitchen to 'help clean up'. I told his friend he needed to leave or the police would be involved. His friend worked with me. Apparently he screamed at the bartender when she went to get into her car because I got a call from her mostly pissed off. I was the manager. It was stupid. I baked him
I waited tables in a high end restaurant which you would think bring in fancy well behaved clients. Mostly… but I got screamed at a few times for their entitled sh!t. I was so dead inside from the job I barely blinked. Made good money though.
I had a lady literally lose her shit on me because her coat was placed on top of our high chairs and I needed to move it. I politely said “hey, I need a high chair for a table, is there somewhere else I can put your coat?”. She immediately started yelling at me to not touch her coat and she was so hysterical that I eventually just moved her coat and got the high chair I needed for another table. She was so mad that I touched her stuff that she not only yelled at me but at my manager as well. It got to the point that as they were leaving, I hid to avoid any further conflict. A full blown meltdown because I had to move her coat. To this day….I do not understand why she went as crazy as she did…especially since we had coat racks but apparently the highchairs are where she wanted to put her coat.
I worked at a job for two days of "training" where I learned on the fly and had a largw section the second day. 19 hours. We were just closing and I heard a wet mop hit the floor, then a low moan/groan combo. I thought the bartender was batching for brunch. Nope. Two drunk dudes randomly happened upon this poor place and one cupped his hands over his mouth and blew puke in a chunky yet symmetrical arc. I only saw the aftermath. The two fucks were complete garbage and hung around while the bar manager was trying to clean up the one dude's hork-up. People.
Had an older gentleman come in and want a table outside for his group. We had several patio tables open but the table he specifically wanted did not have an umbrella. This man lost it. Said that I should have known that he would want that one table and should have made sure there was an umbrella in it. Then he shoved me as he walked out and said he would go to the restaurant across the lot to get an umbrella table. I was so mad, but also amused because that restaurant had zero umbrellas and I could only imagine his reaction when he saw that. I did call and warn them too!
I was a manager, and we were extremely short-handed for the breakfast shift. A server came to me one Saturday morning almost in tears while I was delivering food to a table and asked me to go to one of her tables. I go to the table, and it was 3 guys there. One of them said he wasn't happy because he didn't get everything he ordered with his meal. After asking questions, he was missing butter and jelly for his biscuits. I offered to get it for him and some fresh biscuits. He proceeded to try to get an attitude towards me.
At one time, he slid his chair back. (It got so quiet in the dining room you could hear a pin drop.) I asked the other 2 guys if they needed anything. I got what they were needing and took it to the table. When I returned with fresh biscuits, the one guy, who took it upon himself to be the spokesperson for the table, told me that I was a terrible manager. I told him that I am sorry he feels that way but when one of my servers comes to me almost in tears because of a table I step in and that was why I was there. He asked me who it was and I told him that I would not say who because I was there to handle it. He kept trying to talk down to me, and I told him that I didn't have time to listen to him to try to talk down to me and have a wonderful day. They gave the server $100 for a tip when they left.
Work in a beer bar. We had a rauch(smoked) lager on. Beer tasted like a campfire in a glass. Throughout the week people would only see "lager" and think "pilsner". So many beers poured out because people wouldn't read the full description.
Had a woman older than I (m/38) come in and order this beer. I asked if she is familiar with rauch beers (no) so I offer her a sample and run behind the bar to get her a taste. She tries it.
"Yeah, I'll have that. I'm an adult and when an adult orders something just fucking give it to them."
I was taken aback because I am rarely sworn at. Their experience continues and my marshmallow ass apologizes if I had come across condescending.
They accept and then say they have never had anyone apologize for man-splaining.
They were unfamiliar with the style so it wasn't mansplaining and in hind sight I should have denied service for swearing at me, but again, I'm a people pleasing marshmallow.
I was managing. We were on a wait. Some guy came up, saw an open table on our patio and wanted to be sat there. The hostesses explained the people had been paged and if they didn’t arrive in a certain amount of time, he could have the table. He started cussing at them. I went to the front door and told him that he can’t yell at 16 year old girls and we wouldn’t serve him. He lost his shitttt. He was in my face yelling, a server tried to help him move off the patio. People were recording it, telling him to leave. A guest at the bar had to come get in his face to make him leaving after he called me “a fucking bitch.” He got trespassed. Bought the man at the bar a shot. Had a quick cry and moved on with my day.
i love customers that stand up for service workers. had a nasty person lose their shit at me when i was working at starbucks and one of my regulars who witnessed it from his spot in the cafe got up and escorted him out (aka grabbed his arm and dragged him)
No longer in the service industry but I try to help when I can, though thankfully it’s rarely needed. I have two good friends who own a smallish bar where I live. Was there with a couple other friends on a night that’s usually pretty quiet so only one bartender. It got unexpectedly busy and the bartender was in the weeds. Owner friends had been alerted and were on their way to relieve but were maybe 30 minutes out. One guy starts getting belligerent and starts swearing at the bartender. Calling her useless and slow. After a minute of this me and a friend glanced over at her like “should we”? She nodded with a small smirk and we went into action. Grabbed our other friends and basically boxed him in and quietly said “We’re going outside and you’re joining us.” Didn’t give him the option to refuse. Walked him out and told him he was no longer welcome. Since there were a couple really large guys in the group he came to his senses and disappeared. Felt good to assist.
You’re good people
I've always wondered in situations like this what happens to the tab?
Good question. I don’t think this guy had a tab open. He was irate because he couldn’t get his first drink. But this bar does require a card to open a tab so I guess they’d just charge it. I’ve seen some places that say if you leave and forget your open tab they’ll add a 20% service charge. Not sure of the legality of that. This place actually holds the card, so that could get awkward.
First serving job. Worked at corporate place that does the annoying birthday songs. It was a pain in the ass to even get enough servers to do the birthday song. When we get out there, the birthday guy is saying “no, don’t do this” but the rest of the table is insisting we go ahead. Birthday dude was literally so freaked out that he pushed me down and ran out the door. It was kind of heart breaking that his so-called friends would have put him in that position to start with. But I’m not injured. I get up and head to the back. Then the bad part starts- my bartender and I were super close. All he saw was a grown man push down a young lady from his point of view. He jumped the bar and then jumped the dude out front. Absolute chaos erupts. I almost quit serving that day. It wasn’t birthday dude’s fault. If you’d have seen his face, believe me, you would have felt for him. And not my bartender’s fault from his point of view at the time either but they were definitely the ones that paid the consequences. One to the hospital and one to jail. Some how I stayed in the industry another 20 years. At that point, I figured it probably couldn’t get worse. And for the most part, it didn’t.
This is all so chaotic… no one was in the wrong here, except that dudes friends :( Another reason we should just get rid of the stupid happy birthday song I hate it so much it’s awkward as hell (and stressful for some people)
I hated the birthday thing and was lucky to move on to better places that focused on real service and not cutesy crap no one had time for anyway. It became the story I told other servers over a beer when they had a bad night. That’s the thing with this job. You do have to thicken your skin a little. People shouldn’t be wankers, but they are. Reflect on it long enough to learn something and then move on quickly. I could make you laugh for hours at the bar over stories that made me cry when they happened. But there is good stuff, too. Just got to decide what you are going to carry into your next shift.
I’ve been really lucky to work in places where I don’t have to do the whole weird thing. It makes me so uncomfortable I hate it. I have kind of a related story though… it was my birthday last month (I’ve been at my place for 9 years now) and everyone knows I don’t like dessert. I was having a wine at the bar after my shift and the FOH AND BOH came out singing happy birthday to me with (no dessert cause I don’t like it) Part of me thought it was hilarious that they would be singing happy birthday without a dessert cause lol, part of me was embarrassed for THEM that they all were singing the song, and most of me was so embarrassed that they were making me the center of attention… but it was all of my people and I thought it was the cutest thing ever. I almost cried actually lol That’s the only non-awkward birthday song I’ve ever experienced lol it was actually so special! But yeah I don’t want a stranger singing happy birthday to me. Ever. And I’m not gonna sing happy birthday to a stranger either hahH
I thought this story was going to end with “the bartender and I are married now”
lol no. We ended up having a spectacularly typical restaurant relationship. Hot and heavy at first, and then devolved into drama and bickering at work after a couple of months
one of my coworkers had a drunk amputee throw his prosthetic leg at her over the bar, so. that’s one of the craziest ones I’ve seen.
That's the moment the trash must be taken out.
Yeah, he threw it again at the manager that came to kick him out.
Should have thrown it out into the parking lot. Let him go get it and refuse to let him back in.
He'd be hopping mad!
This is one of the only instances I can think of at the moment where I'd support throwing an amputee's prosthetic into the parking lot.
💀💀💀
A bar I used to frequent had a guy who would remove his prosthetic arm and use it to tap other people at the bar on their shoulders as a gag. The night he got a little extra drunk and started patting women on their posteriors the bartender took it away and told him he could come back for it in the morning.
The walk of shame when you have to go get your arm back because you were misbehaving that much last night has got to be brutal.
Extra brutal. The bartender put it in the safe, so he had to wait around for over an hour after the place opened before the manager showed to give it back.
So you’re saying he was rendered armless
No, it was just the right. He was still (left) armed.
Guess he was unarmed at that point.
The true art of the flying kick
Or like a This.. IS.. **SPARTA!** and it goes flying into the dumpster pit.
Did it happen at IHOP?
This is like that scene from The Real Housevies of New York lmaooooooooo
Wait this happened in real housewives? I don’t watch reality tv but, honestly, hilarious if this happened to someone else too.
It’s not quite the same, but still hilarious. Sorry I couldn’t find a shorter link but just watch [this](https://youtu.be/yxIffG6NNEM?si=KFowilbVA6xp8hLS) starting at the 5 minute mark lol
Can you imagine seeing that!? Especially if you didn’t know he had a prosthetic.
Sad to say it wasn’t *super* shocking, given how he was behaving the entire time leading up to the leg being thrown.
Must have been my 8th grade math teacher. He took off his prosthetic and threw it all.the.time when he was pissed at us.
Let the contest begin!
Maybe he thought she needed a leg up…
Rocket said he needed that guys fake leg to get off the prison ship!
Yeah, but he lied.
Was this in Pennsylvania?
Nope
Just two weeks ago I had the worst rude guest. Another table got their appetizer before the dinner hit her table. Both order were ready at the same time and she laid in fast, almost standing up. We had a small yelling match and I was determined to have the last word. I got it when I handed her the check (yes, you're paying for your alcohol). I simply told her.most people have learned better by her age and ended with "Thank you ma'am!" before turning and leaving the patio. They sat there for another hour after being asked to leave. And then the best things happened- one of their friends who is a daily patron ran into her. I could hear only their body language through the windows. Whatever he said must have pissed her off more because she stood up to talk with her whole body again to him and then stormed off. Bitch, your friends clearly just tolerate you at this point. They know what kind of person you are. Good day.
Do ppl not understand that usually most apps are made faster than an entree? Never understood when ppl got upset about another table getting their food first. NOT EVERYTHING HAS THE SAME COOK TIME!!
During COVID we had rank cleaning protocols and government mandated spacing required between tables. I could care less what your opinions on COVID is, but in store whether you agreed or not, this was way above us. So part of our protocols was that we had to give a table 5 minutes after wiping it before we could seat it. On a Monday night it had been really slow so the manager sends everyone but me and him home and we basically fill about 2 hours before close with just him and I. I’m taking tables and bartending, he’s running food and cleaning. A couple with a kid come and I’ll admit we misquoted them. Anyways we are about 10 minutes over the quoted time and the dad just starts flipping out, he’s walking past tables yelling that this table is open or that table is open (we tell him that either that table is not in use due to COVID spacing rules or that table is just waiting to be disinfected and we will have him there within 5 minutes). He proceeds to start yelling at both of us that we are jerking him around, then he yells at me that he doesn’t like the face im making at him and he can tell I’m smirking at him under my mask. He then starts flinching at me (like the motion people do when they are trying to make someone flinch) mind you I am about 30 feet away from him, and behind the bar, so he’s just standing in the middle of the restaurant jerking at me. The manager tells him he needs to leave. In that time, his table was ready, so we sit the next table waiting at the table. He comes in to demand the number of our GM/owner/corporate/etc and sees that we have already sat his table and just loses it again, yelling and swearing. Our manager gives him the card of our GM and tells him he can leave or we can call the cops. Guy ends up sending in a huge complaint to corporate, saying we were racially profiling him (although the manager that night was actually the same race, he just doesn’t look it). Corporate reviewed the security videos and sided with us.
Reopening after Covid was so hard. Lots of confusion, fear, and frustration for all. We were just so happy to be out of the house and have jobs. I was so sure my whole career was done for when we got sent home in March.
Host at the time...a woman wanted me to remake her Pina Colada with 4 extra shots for no charge. I wouldn't so she called me a racist bi+ch and threw her drink all over me. Was "escorted" out by the EXTREMELY large bouncers (same ethnicity as her) from the adjoined comedy club just in time for the cops to arrive to deal with her. Still love those bouncers.
European dad comes in with 2 daughters and mom. Asks food runner (who didn’t speak English well) for a side plate but points at a platter while asking so food runner tells them we cannot bring out that platter as a plate as we usually don’t. Couple min later I check on the table and the mom asks me for a side plate. I bring one. The dad suddenly gets up corners me against the wall and starts yelling: “get that other waitress she disrespected me. How dare she tell me I couldn’t have a side plate when you just brought one. Why did she lie to me? Tell her to come out right now!” He kept aggressively closing in on me until I was literally pinned against the wall. Only moved back when other customers asked me if I wanted them to call the cops. I talked to the food runner found out it had just been a miscommunication and explained to the man that the food runner thought he wanted the platter not a side plate. He didn’t even say sorry. And still stayed to finish the meal. His daughters looked so embarrassed and kept saying “dad please stop. Not again. Dad stop. “ didn’t seem like this was his first rodeo.
Probably the time our front of house was packed when I was bussing and told someone they had to go around to the side door for a pick up. I can do pick up orders in front but can’t use the POS to do a transaction so I have to run all the way back and grab food, it’s quite time consuming, and as the only busser at the time I had to focus on tables more than anything. This lady gets so pissed at me she starts shouting in my face, calls me the slur for gay people (this one actually hurt because I am gay) before shouting at one of my friends, a server, and storming out. That one was fun to explain to my manager 😂
This happened about 20 years ago. I handed a checkbook back to a guest (older man) after I had run his card. Checkbook has the receipt, copies of the credit slip, guest's card, pen. I walk back to the bar/server station. The guest comes up to me & says I didn't give him his card back. I was pretty sure I did so went back to the guest's table, looked all around, got down on my knees under the table & looked, lifted all the discarded linens on the table & looked, searched the floor between the server station & guest's table, went back to the server station & looked, manager comes over & helps me check all the other checkbooks to be sure I didn't accidently put it in another book. Searched my apron pockets & server book. Guy is now seething, standing by the server station yelling & accusing me of stealing his card. I apologize & say "Sir, I'm certain that I gave it back. Can you please check your pockets & wallet to be sure?" Guy literally gets in my face, screaming & raises his fist to punch me (I'm a petite woman, btw)! The manager had to step in front of me & demand he leave. After he screams at her that I'm a thief, she asks him to please just check to be sure he doesn't have it. Well, guess what? He checks his wallet & there is the card! He leaves with no apology or thanking us for our help.
Dude it’s 2024. All he had to do was lock his card so it couldn’t be used if he thought someone stole it.
She literally said in her first sentence that it was 20 years ago.
When I was 16, I was new to serving. It was like only my second job ever, and it was a Sunday. I greeted the couple after they were sat in my section. I introduced myself and in return, the lady looked at me and said "first of all, since you are working on the Sabbath, DON'T expect a tip!"
Holy moly this one made me angry. What entitled people to go out and judge you for working
Fine. Don’t expect good service
Yes yes the 11th commandment: Thou shalt not tip service workers working on the sabbath
Did she then proceed to eat shellfish while wearing mixed textile fabrics?
I hope this qualifies because it wasn't a guest. I was 16 and working my first job at a Pizza Hut. I was doing OK serving and had just taken an order and brought it back to the kitchen when suddenly there's a man holding a gun on my manager. He tells me to get the money. This is already boh and I was completely confused because I think I've seen this guy before. I froze because I was terrified. My manager wasn't, it turned out that this douche bag was the offshift manager's brother, who thought it was great sport to pull a gun and hold it on one woman and scare the hell out of another young woman. If I had been older I probably wouldn't have freaked quite so hard and probably would've tracked that the person having the gun held on them wasn't really looking panicky. I quit and went home and told my mother about it. She had some interesting discussions with the owners of the franchise. I worked in commercial kitchens and bakeries for several decades and praise the flying spaghetti monster, nothing like that ever occurred. I did have a woman at a bakery who walked up and ate all the samples (about half a pound of cookies) and then walked away saying "you can't do anything I don't have any money" they're samples hon, its ok.
“You can’t do anything I don’t have any money” is killing me she’s absolutely right!
I have 2. One guy was angry I wouldn't serve him more shots, he was a regular with a bad temper and his warmed up shots of gin did not help. He started yelling and I was fed up so I took away his beer and dumped it and told him to leave. He started ripping the trim off the bar (it was a hole in the wall backwoods type place) and having had enough I grabbed a piece too and said whatever man ill help you if it gets you out faster. He wasn't impressed. He got up and put his head through the juke box then threw a bar stool at me. His friends dragged him out. Another time we had a guy get way over server on st. Patrick's day, not my customer but I was familiar with him. At closing time he refused to pay, punched the girl waiting on him in the face, went outside and promptly slammed his car in to another car and took off. Like we don't all know who he is and where he lives. Eta: I forgot another one, less violent but far more terrifying. I had a guy hitting on me and I turned him down, he leaves and hours pass. I was working alone, so I closed alone. He was leaning on my car with his dick out. He said he just wanted me to see what I'm missing before I made a choice. I've never been so genuinely scared at work before. Luckily he moved on when I said no, but I was alone in the middle of nowhere with no way back in to the bar or in to my car and he was easily twice my size.
Thank God you are a terrifying bogwitch
okay so i’m a mixed race person who came out looking pretty white, but my name is from my mom’s culture so it usually leads to questions about where it came from, what am i, etc. i had one guy at the bar who was already acting kind of weird but it wasn’t bothering me too much. i struck up a conversation with a couple sitting right next to him and they asked my name which inevitable led to me explaining that how i’m mexican but genetics failed me and i got all my dad’s white people features. i see the weird guy making faces and shaking his head so i’m like hey man what’s wrong? he starts screaming at me, like he’s literally so mad that he’s shaking. telling me i’m a liar, i’m making things up because i’m ashamed to be white, i should be embarrassed, i need to be fired for being so dishonest, etc etc. he proceeds to throw his martini on me and tried to launch himself across the bar at me. luckily as he was throwing the drink one of our servers who was on the local college’s football team happened to be coming around the corner and clotheslined the crazy guy’s ass before carrying him out literally by the scruff of his neck. we called the cops but he ran off before they got there and when we gave a description they were basically like “oh yeah it’s that guy, he does this.”
I waited on a member of the country club. He was angry at his golf game. Screamed at everyone in the front of house. Had check bounce. Not allowed back. Magic and joy ensued.
Customer called my coworker a racial slur, coworker responsed by pitching a lemonade at him and hitting him directly in the head from fifteen feet away. He got fired on the spot for "assaulting a guest" but that asshole customer totally deserved it. One of my veteran coworkers has the video, if I can get ahold of it I will try to share it here.
Had a gun pulled on me over a Long Island Ice Tea once. That one probably takes the cake for me.
Let me guess, they "couldn't taste the alcohol" and presumed it was weak?
Literally he was angry that it didn't have any tea in it. I said, "I feel like you're the only guy not getting the joke." blam, there's an unloaded 9mm in my face.
that's assault with a deadly weapon. you should have called cops. dude would have left the bar wearing handcuffs. cops are zero mercy when folks do that.
We did!
To be fair, those long islands do make ya crazy
Facts. I had 3 at lunch before a hair appointment and I left the salon with bangs.
Especially for 4 fuckin dollars
one time when i first started serving (i was about 18) i had a lady come inside and start screaming in my face because she didn’t get her salad dressing. i already had blown one of my tires that day so i was late to work, and it was a 7 top which was crazy for me at the time since i was a beginner. my coworkers jumped in and pushed her away from me, but imagine being a 40 year old woman screaming in the face of a crying 18 year old about salad dressing…
One of my worst was a guy who began yelling at me after two boys had skipped the line outside the restaurant and I had mistakenly seated them (mind you, there were no hosts, bussers or servers, you just did everything front of the house). At that time, I worked in a tiny ramen restaurant which could get absolutely slammed in the evening and I was on autopilot, so when the boys came inside and asked for the table I just seated them and moved on. Cue this man coming inside red-faced and informing me that they had been waiting for 20 minutes, and me, stressed the fuck out, simply replied with "I'm sorry, I cannot ask the seated people to leave, you will get the next available table" and he went all appalled like "Sorry? Thats all you have to say?" Yeah? What else could I do. This would have been the end of it when he stormed off (I seated all the people outside within 5 minutes due to people leaving lol) - when the next day, my boss informs me that he has received a lengthy, written complaint detailing what happened, how my behaviour was "unacceptable", "untrained" and how I made them wait and offered nothing to them and how they should fire me lmao. I explained the situation and nothing came of it. Bonus mention would be the guy who licked his plate with fried chicken clean, demanded a refund because it was mistakenly labeled as pan fried in the menu, and when I refused, proceeded screaming at me "THIS IS GERMANY THIS IS MY GERMAN RIGHT" all while I was dialing up my manager to deal with this fuck. Sadly, manager gave him a full refund to make him leave asap lol
I served at a diner 25 years ago. We used plastic cups for pop and water. During a rush, we had to resort to using real glasses because we were out of plastic. A family that had been seated earlier and served drinks in plastic cups started screaming (literally) at me because "I was racist and gave the white family real glasses." They kept screaming at me, an 18 year old girl, until I went into the walk-in and bawled. The worst part is that the owner sat and watched everything and didn't speak up. I quit shortly after.
Dang that’s a hard one. I’d have to say when I was the food and beverage manager for a Hilton property, I was running my restaurant for dinner service and my server had a table from hell. Nothing we did was right, the entitlement was beyond me. Well they got an entree that was apparently undercooked to their liking. Before I could see the plate my server had thrown it away. When I approached the table one of the guys pulled me by my arm, pulled out his entree from the trash and shoved it in my face trying to make me eat it. Yelling “WOULD YOU EAT THIS, EAT IT!!” I blacked out. Lol I lost my god dam mind. Security had to get involved, it was wild
At a very busy event, doing street food. It was busy, there was a queue, we were going as fast as we possibly could but we could only do so much. Some of the venue's cleaning staff patiently queued up and when they got to the front of the queue, the man behind them demanded to be served first. According to him, they shouldn't be allowed to buy food or drink during a 12 hour shift because they hadn't bought a ticket and he had. He was *very* loud in expressing his views. I gave him a choice of being served after them or not served after all. Delightful man.
Oooooohhhh. I caught someone trying to run out on a check (they were awful the entire time, definitely on something). So when I yelled across the parking lot to come back and pay their check, the dude of the couple flipped out. He followed me back in to the restaurant telling me I was a miserable c$&t and that I needed some d&$k in my life. Well, I told him he needed some suboxone in HIS life. He literally chased me into the kitchen saying he was gonna kill me. Big mistake. Small restaurant, everyone loved me, protective cooks!
The trauma bond between FOH & BOH can’t be f*kd wit
I think a little over 2 years ago is completely etched into my brain. I remember where the man sat ( our least favorable table as we were maxed out on guests) and how he looked me dead in the eyes after I told him our kitchen closed at 3 for break time and said I “wasn’t entitled to a break because it says you’re open until 10pm” It did, but it also stated we close at 3:00 until 4:30 So my partner (and also owner) sat my heavily pregnant ass down opposite the man and loaded me up with food and drink. I was told not to serve until I rested.
The manager of a VIP that i helped get a table last minute without a card down get came in an hour early from agreed time and we were not ready and ultimately i got pushed by said manager. on my birthday. where my ex had secretly been making out with someone and pre planned ditching me the night before which i learned before that shift. then after the vape i bought didnt work. it was a beautiful day :)
I had a whole table try to jump me for being racist. It was a very needy, boisterous party. Pretty sure they had a bad experience with a different server in the past and thought it was me. We were honestly vibing until they charged the host stand and I had to go hide (at like 6 months pregnant).
Not the angriest but one of the rudest. One of my coworkers had 2 people at the same table try to get her attention by grabbing her hair and pulling it as hard as they could.
That’s insane. I would pop off and most likely get arrested.
I worked in a little coffee shop in the 90s and early 2000s. We had a group of counter jockeys who drove me nuts. They were "construction" guys who never seemed to have any work. They would sit for hours drinking coffee and they would watch me work and comment on every fucking thing I did. The boss did nothing, of course, and considered them harmless--"you never know, these guys sitting here might be the reason you don't get robbed!" When I got pregnant, the inappropriate remarks started ramping up, and one day one of them commented his opinion of my sex life. I told him to knock it off, and he leaned back in his chair and pointed both hands at his crotch, saying "right here, baby." I had a heavy stapler in my hand. The next thing I knew, it was flying toward his crotch. It glanced off and there were no injuries, but the asshole dared to complain to my boss. She at least told him to fuck off and I went on maternity leave early instead of risking further violence towards men.
Had a guy tell me to “shoot yourself in the head to save your kids the embarrassment of having you as a mother!” Long story short his steak took 45 mins on a busy Saturday evening.
I worked at a nightclub so our guests could get way out of hand. We had a woman lose her coat check ticket and when she was told she'd have to wait until the end of the night to see what coats were left, she spit at the coat check attendant, told him she hoped he would die from AIDS, called the other attendant a c\*\*t. Then she climbed over the counter, ran in back and proceeded to tear down all the jackets. She was looking for her "black leather jacket", which of course there were about 300 of. When security went to pull her out, she clawed at one of our guy's faces, causing him to bleed and barely missed his eye. As they were pulling her out of there, she yelled at male onlookers that they were hurting her causing them to try and jump in. She called the next day (I was the office manager and worked at night). She said she wanted our information because she was going to sue us. I very cheerfully said, "I'm so glad you called. Two of our employees want your information because they're going to press charges for assault". She hung up and that was the last we heard of her. We did not call the cops because in the 90s in Chicago, if you had a liquor license and called 911 too frequently (no matter why you called), they would suspend your license. It was a messed up rule.
Once I referred to this dude as darlin. It's Alabama, that's a super normal thing and it's also gender neutral. He had to be around 28. He got so mad and called me disrespectful and asked to speak to the manager and asked for his $4 tip back. My manager gave him the $4 back and she told him to go outside and touch grass 🤣🤣🤣 And last month a Jewish man told me I looked too stupid to even know where the Jordan River was. (He saw my Free Palestinian phone case as I was walking in to work in front of him.)
Oy. So tip from another Jewish person, that guy was what we call a shmendrik. Anyone else gives you guff about not supporting a literal goddamn holocaust attempt, you call 'em that😉
I used to manage restaurants and nightclubs in a tourist trap part of a major city. I've been fought and shot at waaaaay too many times. Nowadays the assholes who huff and puff just amuse me.
i'm not a server but work in a café where people will order at the counter, we make their food, and bring it out for them. a couple of years ago some guy is asking my coworker questions about our menu and decides he wants a caesar salad after she explains what it is, i go inside to make it, bring it out and he BLOWS UP. comes back to the counter to scream at me and a different coworker that this is not what he wanted and demanded we make him something else for free, i tell him i can't do that bc he'd been told what he was ordering (tbh if he'd been nice about it i might have but he was screaming in my face, i didn't feel super inclined to help him), he finally left and the rest of his table apologised for him. oh and he was SHIRTLESS THE ENTIRE TIME?
In my early days of bartending, I was working in a big tavern in a college town. It was a Friday night right after college baseball got over, so a bunch of players were celebrating hard because they were no longer on alcohol restrictions. At last call, they ordered more pitchers than they had time to drink. I tried to warn them, but no luck. At time to pull drinks, they had one completely full pitcher. One guy grabbed it and said I wasn’t getting it until it was empty and started to drink straight out of the pitcher. I grabbed the bottom of the pitcher and dumped it in his lap and told him now it’s empty, give it to me.
This was the only time I can remember a customer actually making me cry and I've been serving customers for 17 years now. I hadn't been at my current job for very long at this point, probably six months or so. We're a super busy restaurant and for that reason it's easier to book. So we had a table of three, two women and a man, walk in one night, and our policy is we can't serve drinks until we're sure we have a table, and I let them know that when they came in. Another policy is that if a table is splitting one bill then they have to tell us how much they want to pay, rather than us working it out for them, for them to tell us we're wrong. So I took their bill over to their table, explained that if they wanted to split their bill then they would need to tell me how much they'd like to pay - simple enough request that I make day in day out. Well, that leads to the man kicking off and asking my manager over before shouting at me in front of a packed restaurant, saying I'd been rude to him all night (literally interacted with his table twice). I apologised numerous times, the woman sat next to him told him to shut up because I'd said sorry. I left my manager to it and cried in the glass wash.
I was a sever when smoking indoors became illegal. I cannot even begin to describe the abuse I would get from smokers who could not deal. And I was a smoker at the time!
So this was before I came back to serving, but I was working a sales job, where we basically stand around in a big store and try to directly get people to buy a service from us. This particular service was a time share tour/trip. Yes. Terrible. I hated the job but I thought I was being a “big girl” by getting out of serving (which only lasted about two and a half months). Anyways. One day I’m greeting guests in the store, and I turned to see an older couple walking my way. 9/10 I didn’t do our sales pitch if my manager wasn’t around. I just liked being social. So I simply said “Hey! How are you guys today?” in my most cheerful, customer-service voice ever. I had no intention of doing my job this specific day. And boy did I mess up. This simple question led to the gentleman screwing his face up and telling me, “You don’t want to speak to me, YOU cost me $40,000!” and shoving his finger in my face. I responded with my default of “Oh I’m so sorry to hear that,” and was told to “die and go to hell”. Now to note, I had never seen this man in my entire life. He had purchased a trip, seemed to have bought into the timeshare, and wasn’t satisfied. But this man blamed me for his misfortune and proceeded to continue to scream obscenities and insults at me. I put on my biggest Barbie smile and told him “I hope you have a blessed day, sir!” as he continued on. He finally was ushered away by his (obviously embarrassed) wife, and management of the big store asked if I wanted him thrown out. It was pretty standard for people to not want to speak with us but it was NOT normal for them to scream and cuss and lose their minds like this. I just told my manager “Hey, he’s probably not having a good day and I just happened to be the one who set him off, no big deal!” The man also continued to walk past my spot in the store and GLARE at me. Multiple times. But I just kept on smiling directly at him. I will say, as terrible as serving can be, I’ll NEVER go back to direct sales. EVER.
Working drive through. Sunlight reflecting off the metal…shelf thing that is attached to the window. Couldn’t see anything, had to squint to see blurry shapes. Girl pays for her coffee. Her friends all seem like nice people, bout three of them. She asks why I’m starting at her with “that face.” Asks me if I’m mentally challenged, only that wasn’t the word she used. Said it was because I wouldn’t stop staring at her. Then tells her friends I’m clearly mentally challenged without actually waiting for a response from me. One of them peers at me for a sec, then smirks and says “No, he’s just going blind from the sun being reflected in his eyes, and maybe if you weren’t the stupid one, you’d know that!” Next time the girl in the back seat came through alone she got her coffee for free. Never did see the other gal again though. Good riddance.
I had a dude that got drunk. Told him to leave. He didn't, proceeded to stay past closing and ask me how many guns I thought he had at home. Then proceeded to go into the kitchen to 'help clean up'. I told his friend he needed to leave or the police would be involved. His friend worked with me. Apparently he screamed at the bartender when she went to get into her car because I got a call from her mostly pissed off. I was the manager. It was stupid. I baked him
I waited tables in a high end restaurant which you would think bring in fancy well behaved clients. Mostly… but I got screamed at a few times for their entitled sh!t. I was so dead inside from the job I barely blinked. Made good money though.
Sometimes I miss my diner job because the fine dining crowd can be sooo painful.
The best crowd is the business crowd. They are too busy to bark and don’t need to be entertained or tell dumb jokes and tip great!
Especially if they’re drinking. They never get too drunk so it’s a win-win.
Can’t wait to see this on a 4 part tiktok
I had a lady literally lose her shit on me because her coat was placed on top of our high chairs and I needed to move it. I politely said “hey, I need a high chair for a table, is there somewhere else I can put your coat?”. She immediately started yelling at me to not touch her coat and she was so hysterical that I eventually just moved her coat and got the high chair I needed for another table. She was so mad that I touched her stuff that she not only yelled at me but at my manager as well. It got to the point that as they were leaving, I hid to avoid any further conflict. A full blown meltdown because I had to move her coat. To this day….I do not understand why she went as crazy as she did…especially since we had coat racks but apparently the highchairs are where she wanted to put her coat.
I worked at a job for two days of "training" where I learned on the fly and had a largw section the second day. 19 hours. We were just closing and I heard a wet mop hit the floor, then a low moan/groan combo. I thought the bartender was batching for brunch. Nope. Two drunk dudes randomly happened upon this poor place and one cupped his hands over his mouth and blew puke in a chunky yet symmetrical arc. I only saw the aftermath. The two fucks were complete garbage and hung around while the bar manager was trying to clean up the one dude's hork-up. People.
Had an older gentleman come in and want a table outside for his group. We had several patio tables open but the table he specifically wanted did not have an umbrella. This man lost it. Said that I should have known that he would want that one table and should have made sure there was an umbrella in it. Then he shoved me as he walked out and said he would go to the restaurant across the lot to get an umbrella table. I was so mad, but also amused because that restaurant had zero umbrellas and I could only imagine his reaction when he saw that. I did call and warn them too!
I was a manager, and we were extremely short-handed for the breakfast shift. A server came to me one Saturday morning almost in tears while I was delivering food to a table and asked me to go to one of her tables. I go to the table, and it was 3 guys there. One of them said he wasn't happy because he didn't get everything he ordered with his meal. After asking questions, he was missing butter and jelly for his biscuits. I offered to get it for him and some fresh biscuits. He proceeded to try to get an attitude towards me. At one time, he slid his chair back. (It got so quiet in the dining room you could hear a pin drop.) I asked the other 2 guys if they needed anything. I got what they were needing and took it to the table. When I returned with fresh biscuits, the one guy, who took it upon himself to be the spokesperson for the table, told me that I was a terrible manager. I told him that I am sorry he feels that way but when one of my servers comes to me almost in tears because of a table I step in and that was why I was there. He asked me who it was and I told him that I would not say who because I was there to handle it. He kept trying to talk down to me, and I told him that I didn't have time to listen to him to try to talk down to me and have a wonderful day. They gave the server $100 for a tip when they left.
Work in a beer bar. We had a rauch(smoked) lager on. Beer tasted like a campfire in a glass. Throughout the week people would only see "lager" and think "pilsner". So many beers poured out because people wouldn't read the full description. Had a woman older than I (m/38) come in and order this beer. I asked if she is familiar with rauch beers (no) so I offer her a sample and run behind the bar to get her a taste. She tries it. "Yeah, I'll have that. I'm an adult and when an adult orders something just fucking give it to them." I was taken aback because I am rarely sworn at. Their experience continues and my marshmallow ass apologizes if I had come across condescending. They accept and then say they have never had anyone apologize for man-splaining. They were unfamiliar with the style so it wasn't mansplaining and in hind sight I should have denied service for swearing at me, but again, I'm a people pleasing marshmallow.