I've said it before on beehaw but I work pizza delivery. You'd think it would be an easy job, just drive around and drop off pizzas and enjoy music, but holy shit the amount of pure hatred I've gotten from customers over the dumbest little thing is just insane. I had a guy call me, a white-male, a racial slur because we have a $5 delivery fee. I've had people scream swears at me because I forgot their food, or call back demanding I get fired for it.
And then I went on reddit to vent about it on my company's subreddit. I know reddit is normally pretty toxic but there's really no "pizza delivery" analogue that I can find on beehaw or lemmy in general, and there's just so much hate and vitriol on that subreddit that I can't even bother opening it. Customers telling me that I should "find a new job" or "quit working entirely" because they can't stop being mean about food. Not only is it just pizza, it's fast food! My company is even globally known for giving people free refunds on a whim so I just don't understand why they would hate me so much for venting about my job?? Do people not like being reminded that people like me go through so much shit on a day-to-day basis? It's so fucking insane to me that it's just a commonly accepted thing to be told to "get over it" after being called a slur for something that's not even my problem. 99% of the time when an order is fucked up it's not even my fault? I just delivery them!
I really want to understand why people are SO rude about pizza delivery but I Just can't! I've never in my life even considered cussing out a food service worker but these people are just doing it like its their job!
For anybody that says it, I'd have quit by now if I wasn't making so much money. You try making $16/hr + upwards of $100 in tips a day (yay US tipping culture). I've got so much money now I don't really have a whole lot to do with it, compared to my last jobs at least.
(I also desperately want to scream back at these people so much but I know I can't do that. I know my manager's got my back but if I do it in the store I'll most likely be fired.)
Yeah I know :( Too many bad managers who just don't want to deal with it. The best manager I had worked retail with me and she would always say "My employee here did everything right, they were holding up the rules, and did not deserve you yelling at them for doing what they were taught to do. I am going to make a 1-time exception for you this time, but that will be it, I know you now and this will not happen again." Which I loved. You can appease the customer to get them to go away, but at the same time you can stand up for your employee. Sometimes exceptions need to be made, but the big part was having the manager actually defend me, standing up saying I didn't do anything wrong. Too many just swoop in and Karens act all snooty like they won somehow.
That seems like a pretty solid approach. It still rewards the asshole, but calls them out on it without being rude and commits to not letting it be repeated. I don't think screaming at someone over a missed fast food order is ever warranted, but I think it's reasonable to be extremely charitable and give the person a chance to recognize and learn from their behavior.