Rules on Food Servic Etiquitte (STRONG Language) (Work In Progress)

[Seshat]

Okay people - so far, the tipping thing is staying mostly calm. But I encourage you all to read the tipping thread on Fratching. If you have anything that isn't calm and civil to say about tipping, say it there, not here. I'm also curious - if there's some point to make that's not already there, I'd personally like to see it there.

Also, please remember that there are cultures where tipping is the expected way to pay servers, and cultures where the server gets a decent wage (and the price of service is included in the price of the food) and tipping is a reward for exceptional service. A more detailed explanation of each culture type can be found in the Fratching tipping thread (link above).
It will help keep the thread civil if you note in your post which culture type you're speaking from.

As for the 'sweetie' and 'hon' thing: if you're a Southern person in the South (*), go ahead and do it. If you're a Southern person anywhere else, it's probably a good idea to be ready to explain to the server. Some will understand immediately from 'Oh, sorry, I'm from the South . . .' and probably say 'that's fine, honey' or some such. Some will need a more complete explanation - and some of those will still feel awkward when you say it.


(*) I know it's a cultural thing, and the designation is 'south relative to the north of the country' but it feels so wrong calling a place that's so far north of me 'The South'. I'm just barely north of the Southern Ocean, you see.

[Lace Neil Singer]

I find it depends on the person giving the greeting; I have been called "sweetheart", "pet", "duck" and "sweetie" by either old ladies, Yorkshire and thereabouts people and polite people who obviously are not meaning anything bad by it and I don't honestly mind. However, if some drooling pervert calls me "sweetheart" while leering at my bust, I hate it. -.-

[Becks]

Drive throughs ARE for people being lazy.

:raising eyebrow: Jester...I use the drive-thru because the lobby closes at 10 pm. That's the same time I get out of work.

Not all of us are lazy for going through the drive-thru.

Oh, and it can be quicker, too. DT-in and out in five minutes, tops. Inside-at least 10 people in front of you (as a large group, all together), but each one has to order and pay separately, making many revisions to each order.

[Jester]

:raising eyebrow: Jester...I use the drive-thru because the lobby closes at 10 pm. That's the same time I get out of work.

Not all of us are lazy for going through the drive-thru.

No, not everyone is lazy for going through the drive-thru. But that is why they were invented, so people COULD be lazy. And that is not a bad thing. I have often exercised my laziness at a drive-thru.

And the reason they close the lobby as early as 10? Is because they have the drive-thru that can remain open while they do all the other closing stuff inside.

[BookstoreEscapee]

Actually, I don't. That was just the archetypical example. If I do eat fast food, it's usually Wendy's. And even that's getting rare.

McDonald's is an Arch-type? Haha.

<sorry >


I don't do drive-thrus. For the simple reason that, for the occasional fast food craving (usually McDonald's) I figure, if I'm gonna eat all that grease and salt, I'm at least gonna get my butt out of the car. But then when I do get fast food, it's usually for lunch or dinner, not late at night, so the lobby being closed is never an issue for me.

[tropicsgoddess]

Don't forget these...

PLEASE call ahead if your reservation will be changed (i.e. late, more or less people in group) or canceled! It screws us up if other customers want to sit down or make a reservation! Don't get pissed if you come in late without calling to hold your table, because your lack of foresight is not my fault!


Don't constantly badger the Host(ess) about when it's your turn to get a table or to bump you up the waiting list. There's plenty of other people behind you and in front of you that want to get a table, but are not acting like whiny children about it! You WILL be seated when it's your turn and we will CALL your name when it's your turn, just be patient!

[ForestDragon]

I used to work at a pizza place and the pet hate of everyone there pertaining to large orders were idiots who'd ring up and say, "Can you make me 20 pizzas for midday?" at 11:30 when we opened. -.- No idiot; we can't pull 20 pizzas out of thin air in half an hour.

So if somebody needed a metric crapload of pizzas like that, what would be the correct procedure? I'm thinking call up the night before, like you're ordering Peking Duck (I still wonder what in the world they do to Peking Duck that you have to order it the previous day. Marinate it probably).

[Lace Neil Singer]

Ring up the night before, or at the very least, a minimum of 2 hours before you need them, 3 on weekends. A lot of the SCs who did this didn't seem to understand that not only do we need time to make the pizzas, cook them and slice them up, we also have other orders to deal with. If you ring up plenty of time in advance, then we can make your order in between making other people's smaller orders. Dunno about other places, but our pizza place was pretty small, with usually just two people there during the day plus one driver and four in the evening plus the same amount of drivers. The pizza oven took about 10 minutes on a conveyor belt thing to bake a pizza, then it had to be sliced and boxed. You couldn't just shove them all in the oven after making, cuz the person on the other end wouldn't be able to keep up and would end up with a backlog; ie, the pizza getting stuck and burning.

[TryNotToBeThatOne]

I thought that you'd need time to make the dough for that many pizzas, that's why you'd call ahead. After all it's normal business + 20 pizzas, whether normal business = 20 pizzas or not.

In my memory there have been 2 (get that 2 whole occasions) where somehow the hostess forgot us or skipped us on the list. Other than that, you wait however long the hostess said that the wait would be, wait a few more minutes and then ask where you are on the list (next, 2nd, 5th?). The Hostess does not control how fast the earlier patrons eat or how fast they leave.

Although there was one occasion........but that's for another thread, I think.

And some fast food places are learning. They have a menu for drive through customers to read before they get up to the mike to place their order.

[Lace Neil Singer]

We used to get the dough already made and frozen; just needed to be defrosted overnight.