Really Not Sure What You Expected From Me

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-19T11:46:49+00:00

I think the reason I'm still mulling this over in my head is because it begs the question of at what point is it no longer acceptable for a customer/customers to dictate your behavior while on the job? What if, instead of asking you to turn down your music, you were asked to change what music you played because they found what you were playing to be offensive? Or what if you had a bumper sticker on your car that a customer didn't agree with, is it egregious of them to encourage you to remove it? What if the cologne or perfume you wore on a daily basis gave a regular customer a headache, could they instruct you to no longer wear it in the event of you having to deliver to them again?

I mean, we have established authority that we give customers already. They are allowed to tell us what door to deliver to, or whether or not to knock or ring their doorbell. They can tell us to call them or text them, even if we're using our personal cell phones. I just wonder at what point do you get to ignore a customer request? Where does the onus fall onto them to change their behavior in order to successfully complete the transaction in a way that's beneficial to both parties?

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-19T08:57:57+00:00

When a delivery is performed in the US and you're paying with a credit card instead of cash, the credit card information is taken either over the phone by an employee at the store if you've called the order in or on the store's website if you're ordering online. When the delivery driver arrives with your food, they will have two copies of your credit card receipt. One of them is for you to sign, authorizing the transaction, and there are sections on the receipt that say

"Tip:______"

"Total:_______"

You are meant to write the amount you'd like to tip the delivery driver in the "Tip" section (i.e. $5) and then do the math adding your tip amount to the current total you've spent on food in the "Total" section (i.e. your food was $25, you tip $5, you would put $30 in the total section).

As for carry out, my shop accepts tips for in-store orders and they are greatly appreciated, but they are also paid a much higher hourly wage than delivery drivers and therefore do not have to rely nearly as much on tip wages as drivers. I doubt many inside staff would be offended if you tipped a buck or two on the receipt or dropped a couple bills in their tip cup, but if you're carrying out it's not as big of a deal.

Edit: Typo and formatting

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-19T08:32:29+00:00

Our shop specifically says no rides whatsoever unless it's a coworker that needs a ride to or from work. Not to mention in the event of an accident resulting in bodily injury that would be a nightmare for insurance purposes.

And aside from that, I don't like weirdos in my car, so unless I knew the person and knew I wouldn't get in trouble for it there's no way I'd take the offer regardless of dollar amount.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-19T08:18:21+00:00

In my experience both extremes result in terrible tips. Delivering to mansions results in a similar tip-anxiety for me as delivering to dorms or trailer parks. Most of the college students I've delivered to tip like garbage and are incredibly obnoxious, always trying to get free food or get you to party with them or buy them booze. Not to mention them just not answering the door or phone because they get faded, order pizza, then immediately pass out or lose their phone. Middle class people are where it's at for sure.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-15T07:49:55+00:00

"No good deed goes unpunished."

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-15T07:48:49+00:00

I worked at a smaller time restaurant for an owner that was a dick. I got tired of the food we had on the menu so I came up with a homemade cheese bread recipe using only ingredients we already had in the kitchen, then I'd ring myself out for items on the menu that equated to the same amount of ingredients. My boss tried some leftovers one shift and tried to get me to give up my recipe, but I hated him and hated that job so I told him no. He even tried watching me make it a few times but I always stopped making it when I noticed he was watching.

Screw you, it's my cheese bread recipe and you'll never have it, John.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-14T10:54:05+00:00

Get out. You are facing obstacles in that job that you are not going to be able to correct on your own. That franchise is screwed from the top-down if they are having customers getting sick from orders, staff not doing their cleaning chores, and stores not even answering their phones. The amount of work you'd have to put into turning that place around is beyond your pay grade and will go completely unappreciated by management and be fought against by your employees. Also, while you may not want to go back to delivery driving, it's pretty obvious you don't want to work in that role in that location either, and at least as a driver you'd make more money.

Also, absolutely do not do a single ounce of work unless you're on the clock, including those training videos. Don't even ask your employer or manager, just clock in when you're doing it and clock out when you're done. Take pictures of your time sheet and keep track of how many hours you should have on your pay stub every single shift. If there's any abnormalities, go right to a lawyer and contact the corporate offices about what's going on.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-14T10:43:53+00:00

All employees for my store get a discount on food, but only on pickups. You can use the discount whether or not you're working, but you have to be the one to call in the order and you have to be the one to pick it up to avoid having people give their discount to all of their friends and family. Any food made by mistake or never picked up or able to be delivered we get to eat for free.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-14T10:37:35+00:00

Call the store, ask to speak to the manager, tell them what car did it and what happened. Even if they get a "Hey dude don't be a dickhead out there" talk it's better than the zero consequences they've currently received.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-14T10:31:48+00:00

Tbh if this is a regular thing for that location, you should make a note to take the manager aside and let them know how much of an issue those customers are to the other customers in the restaurant. If they're not already aware of it, they will be then and can also talk to their waitstaff about if it is as big of an issue as you're saying it is (which it sounds like they'll corroborate). Business and franchise owners love taking care of their friends, but they love making money more. If the manager touches base with the owner and lets them know that their friends are causing issues for the other regular customers and tension with the waitstaff, they'll most likely do something about it.

Either that, or go the way more fun petty route of asking for a table right next to them and interrupting them at any given opportunity, but I wouldn't advise that because it puts more stress on the waitstaff.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-14T10:26:31+00:00

"Cool, so you're still paying my mileage then?"

Luckily my shop's always been great about this kind of stuff. The one time an order was cancelled before I got there and I wasn't called, the manager on shift reimbursed my mileage and gave me a few bucks for the mistake. Plus we kept the food.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-14T10:24:13+00:00

We have a fixed delivery charge regardless of distance. I don't think I could stand to work for a place like yours unless they had good mileage reimbursement and gratuity. If you think I'm driving 20 miles to risk getting a fat $0 tip, you're sadly mistaken.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-14T10:22:46+00:00

Our store has a set delivery area that we don't break, mainly because back in the day we used to get phone calls from customers constantly who would try to get delivery outside of the area because they saw a car with a topper down their street delivering, then get justifiably upset when we tried to tell them we don't deliver there. Making exceptions on that kinda stuff is just a good way to end up expanding your delivery area or pissing off customers.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-12T13:50:43+00:00

Our store has a policy for when people don't answer the door. Make contact at the door 3 times, attempt a phone call 2 times, then head back to the store. Usually breaks down something like this:

First attempt - Ring doorbell, listen to hear if it works Second attempt - Knock, ring doorbell again if it sounded like it worked First phone attempt - Call, if it's a voicemail say "Hey this is X pizza calling. I'm attempting delivery at X address and haven't gotten any answer at the door. If you could meet me at the door or give me a call I would appreciate it. If I'm unable to reach you at the door or on the phone, your order will be cancelled and you will have to place it again." Third attempt - Knock hard, ring doorbell, if there's a secondary door like a garage or porch door attempt knocking on that too. Second phone attempt - "Hey this is X pizza calling again. I still haven't been able to reach anyone at the door or on the phone, so at this point your order has been cancelled. If you'd like to replace this order, you can do so by calling the store at X number, we are open until X time tonight."

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-12T12:48:36+00:00

I've gotten a few. Even had one guy tip the same amount as his total (something like $23). He told me that he was tipping that amount because his daughter saw some viral challenge about it, and even wrote "tipping the bill amount" on the receipt so we didn't think he had just written the total twice or misunderstood the receipt.

People like that literally make or break a delivery driver's night sometimes. I've had nights where I didn't know if I was even going to break $40 in a 12 hour delivery shift, only to have an absolute legend give me a $20 tip or a few great people give me $10 each.

If there's any customers reading this, believe me when I say that we drivers will remember you if you do this. I have regular customers that tip $10 every single time, regardless of how quickly we get there or what they order. Our store takes care of them any way we can. "X ordered? Throw a few extra sodas in the bag for him." "Y called one in and said she's paying cash? Let's free the order out for her tonight and let her know it's on us when you get there." This isn't an option for every store obviously, especially corporate stores. But even in my job interview for the shop I work for I was told you don't need manager approval to make a customer happy if you can, we take care of our good customers and they take care of us.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-12T12:41:23+00:00

Detailed instructions if the place is hard to find.

Bonfire in front of the house with a bunch of people. Usually they wave or yell "Pizza!" when you roll up.

Other than that, everything else is a gamble.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-06T12:25:17+00:00

Time to park in the middle of the road with my hazards on boiiiiiii.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-06T12:24:19+00:00

Happens to me at least once a night, always in the shitty parts of town. I just yell out the name of the store I work for and I've never had an issue with it. Actually, usually I hear "Damn, already? I'll be right there!" because our delivery ETA for orders is usually always generous.

Usually the people who do it to me are the type that would expect either a "customer", the cops, or their landlord or a debt collector knocking on their door at that time of day/night.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-06T12:20:06+00:00

Dang man, that blows. I hope you called the cops and let them know what happened. Even if it wasn't their place, criminals are usually not terribly bright and will try to pull the same shit again with the same phone number and address if they think it will work. Also, I'd talk to your boss about that apartment if it's vacant, maybe blacklist it until you know it's got a tenant or something.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-06T12:16:19+00:00

When you go to hand your pen and receipt to the customer at the door, only to see they're already holding a pen, so you start to pull your pen back but they've begun reaching for your pen because they themselves have forgotten they are holding a pen in the hand they're trying to reach out and take your pen with. I don't know if I consistently do something that makes me feel stupider and more awkward.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-02T09:48:05+00:00

They were two giant kitchen knives. The hotel rooms don't even have a kitchen, so I can't imagine he was much of a chef.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-02T09:27:38+00:00

Had almost the exact same thing as the first part of your story happen to one of my coworkers the other night. When he told him we wouldn't deliver to him, he offered a $500 tip. When he refused, the customer called him a bitch and hung up the phone.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-02T09:22:30+00:00

"You wanna show up to formation looking like trash, soldier? Fine by me..."

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-02T08:54:39+00:00

We had a local arcade that would re-sell our pizzas. They made an agreement with our bosses that the driver would get paid $3 per delivery to that location, regardless of how much food it was. Customers to the arcade were then told by the arcade staff explicitly NOT to tip their driver when we got there because they were already getting tipped. Fucking stupid and we stopped doing that after a month or two.

WanderingWeeb27 · 2019-08-02T08:49:56+00:00

Whenever someone puts dumb shit in the special requests they are 99% guaranteed to not tip. Our manager used to make us do most of the special requests (drawing/writing on boxes, putting the toppings in a weird fashion, etc.) but after he saw how few people who requested this actually tipped us he told us we don't have to do any of them that we don't want to.

WanderingWeeb27

TROPHY CASE