Things Not to Say to a Customer
In the spirit of Jennifer's terrific thread on Things Not to Say to a Barista, I'd like to turn the eye of judgment back on ourselves, and discuss things that we should never have said to our customers.
This happened to me three years ago, while I was working at the 'Bux. It haunts me to this day:
The Worst Thing I've Ever Said
Good grief. I'm lucky my pants weren't sued off. So what have you all said to customers that you immediately (or not-so-immediately) regretted?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Alexander Stephen Root on
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It's not on the same level as your incident, but our Schaerer Ambiente had some technical issues and one of our managers came out to fix it. He had the whole thing taken apart on the counter, so we were limited to drip coffee, iced coffee, and tea. Customers came in asking for iced lattes, and we'd respond with, "Sorry ma'am, but our espresso machine is broken at the moment so our menu is temporarily downsized."
It doesn't seem like much of a big deal, but our manager got huffy about it and eventually muttered that we "need to tell them the machine is getting serviced, not that it's broken!" I understood his point and adjusted, but I still don't get why he was flustered. The machine wouldn't steam and the shots came out too runny, so he tore it apart. To me, it's broken.
Good topic!
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Permalink Reply by ryan mcdougall on
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I once said "Hi! How can I do you?" to a pretty lady. It was "obviously"(wink wink) a mistake. She laughed, I laughed, then we got down to business... She ordered a drink and left.
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Permalink Reply by Joona Suominen on
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Nathanael: You may seek consolation while dealing with lawsuits from the knowledge that your video is the funniest thing I've seen this week.
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Permalink Reply by zack burnett on
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Haha. Awesome!
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Permalink Reply by Lisa Kettyle on
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As a manager, I just recently had a similar situation. Our bulk grinder was jammed up, so I took it apart to fix it. I overheard an employee say "We don't have any coffee right now because our grinder is broken" with a negative tone in her voice. It seems small, right? If I was a customer, this is what I think I might have heard "we're inefficient and call ourselves a coffee shop. We don't have coffee." It's all about phrasing and tone with these types of things. Customers understand equipment needs maintenance, but they don't want to be delayed or given a negative connotation of their coffee shop. I asked her to rephrase. "We'd like to upgrade your drip coffee to an americano (for the same price as drip!) while we service our grinder" sounds a lot more beneficial to the customer, I think.
Alexander Stephen Root said:It's not on the same level as your incident, but our Schaerer Ambiente had some technical issues and one of our managers came out to fix it. He had the whole thing taken apart on the counter, so we were limited to drip coffee, iced coffee, and tea. Customers came in asking for iced lattes, and we'd respond with, "Sorry ma'am, but our espresso machine is broken at the moment so our menu is temporarily downsized."
It doesn't seem like much of a big deal, but our manager got huffy about it and eventually muttered that we "need to tell them the machine is getting serviced, not that it's broken!" I understood his point and adjusted, but I still don't get why he was flustered. The machine wouldn't steam and the shots came out too runny, so he tore it apart. To me, it's broken.
Good topic!
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Hilarious. This has happened in our shop in a few different ways.
ryan mcdougall said:I once said "Hi! How can I do you?" to a pretty lady. It was "obviously"(wink wink) a mistake. She laughed, I laughed, then we got down to business... She ordered a drink and left.
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Permalink Reply by Laura Campbell on
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I once asked a regular whose drink order I was learning "so, you're a long black man, aren't you?" He grinned at me and chuckled while I died from embarrassment.
I also once tried to say "far out" and "that sucks" at the same time when talking to a customer with my boss- it came out as "fuuuu...ck..." I was mortified and immediately apologised, my boss just laughed it off...
And finally, we had a massive 7.1 earthquake a few months ago here in Christchurch and during one of the sizeable aftershocks (5.0) I yelled out "JESUS CHRIST!!!" really loud while making coffee- although we're used to the aftershocks a 5.0 is big and in the bottom of a 7 storey building is a nerve-wracking place to be! Once more, I was horrified and apologised to the customers, although my boss did point out there were a lot worse things I could have yelled!
ryan mcdougall said:I once said "Hi! How can I do you?" to a pretty lady. It was "obviously"(wink wink) a mistake. She laughed, I laughed, then we got down to business... She ordered a drink and left.
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Permalink Reply by Nancy Gebralter on
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To tell the truth, I have no idea why I did this, but here's mine:
A very handsome younger guy drove up when I was working at a drive-thru coffee shop. I was single at the time, so of course I flirted a tad. Looking back on it, I probably looked like a desperate and pathetic little thing.
While making some small talk, I went to tell him how much his order was and basically blurted out the beginning sequence of my phone number... "That'll be 541550..." *BLUSH* I'm pretty sure the only reason I did this was because I was imagining it in my head and out it came.
He laughed, I turned bright red and correct myself. He paid with debit and ended up writing his number on the receipt.
I never called him. Which ended up being a good thing. I'm pretty sure he's in jail. O.o
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Permalink Reply by Marshall Fuss on
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Making "clever" comments when a customer orders decaf. Eye rolling counts, too. A food writer who can't drink regular coffee recently told me how mortified she was when this happened to her in a well-known shop.
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YES!
One of the girls in my shop who were recently let go ended up asking someone who has medical issues with caffeinated coffee "Why even bother having coffee?". People can STILL enjoy the taste of coffee. It's not always about the caffeine.Ummmm... Not okay.
Marshall Fuss said:
Making "clever" comments when a customer orders decaf. Eye rolling counts, too. A food writer who can't drink regular coffee recently told me how mortified she was when this happened to her in a well-known shop.
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Permalink Reply by Samantha on
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I was once working bar and register because my boss stepped out for a minute. Instantly of course, five people walked in. After I helped a few people I got to this lady who had been standing in line for a bit. She got a pastry and ordered her drink. I rang her up, but stepped away to make her drink and when I can back I handed her the drink and said, "Oh, Sorry about the wait." (that's w-a-i-t not w-e-i-g-h-t) She looked at me kinda funny and then looked at her pastry she had been eating while she was waiting. Guess I shoulda refrazed that.
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Permalink Reply by Terika on
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I was taking orders when there was a line of about 20 people, and somebody ordered an iced cappuccino. I blurted out, "That's not possible" and started to ask if they wanted a blended coffee drink or something like an iced latte. My coworker standing next to me turned and gave me this horrified look since the company we worked for was quite professional.
Just like some of the other comments on here, there are much more positive ways of getting the order from the customer than to blatantly tell them that their drink doesn't exist. :) My coworkers had a keychain with "That's not possible" engraved on it and gave it to me as a going away present.
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