Saturday, March 22, 2014

More From the Service Industry

Hello, ever-present internet! I'm not dead, despite my absurd absence this year. Things have just been busy and exhausting and lazy and lots other things that really come down to "Rachel hasn't been blogging, because she does that sometimes." Though since I finally got a new job (and quit my old one), my schedule has been totally different, which is often the result of switching from primarily evening and night work to early morning and mid afternoon work, but I'm still adjusting to it.

Bonus: the worthless scourge that is Daylight Savings (saving no one daylight since 1930) has had no power over me. Taking one puny hour from my life cannot control me when I've been getting up at four in the morning rather than going to bed then!

Anyway, I thought I'd take a few minutes to blather online about a few of the things that have been floating around in my head that make me go, "hey, I should write a post about that," but then, as you may have noticed the past few months, I never do. I also have like three or four snarky list posts floating amongst my mental debris (by which I mean safely saved in note form on my phone, because I can't remember that kind of thing), but they'll wait for a different day.

So at my new job (I now work at a coffee/bagel shop rather than a pizza place), we have these surveys that all the cashiers are supposed to tell the customers about so that they can tell Corporate how satisfied, or dissatisfied, they were with the service, and now as added incentive, everytime someone mentions an employee by  name in their surveys, that person gets a sticker on this chart in the back, and as if stickers weren't reward enough, after so many stickers, you get free stuff.

Though, I'm at a distinct disadvantage there, since I don't take orders right now. I just make them and bring them out to people, so even though I now get a name tag (at my old job, we were all faceless drones), I don't really interact with customers enough to be memorable.

My thought today, though, was that there should be customer review surveys for the employees. I had a huge group the other day (from a well- known Christian organization, no less *coughcoughHCJB*), and they were super messy, rearranged all of my tables, and then just left everything there, and it was super annoying and inconvenient, so I was thinking how unfair it is that customers get to treat us in the service industry like crap and then complain about the service, and all we can really do is bitch about how awful they were back in the kitchen.

Seriously, guys, a friendly customer or a good tip can totally make someone's day. I go out of my way to pre-bus tables and leave at least 25% tips whenever I go out to eat.

Anyway, there should be a system where service people get to review their customers, and then the good ones can get discounts or something, and we can unnecessarily inconvenience or charge the people who suck, because there should be consequences for being a dick to people just because they're paid to take your money in exchange for bringing you goods or services.

The fact that you are the customer doesn't make you better, or entitle you to being an inconsiderate cur.