The Best of "Subway Rants" (long)

[Mazthoril]

I certainly understand why. Although, the kids in the SubWays near my old house were of particularly low genetic quality.

Sad that the 5% of us who can communicate our desires clearly and accurately have to suffer for the 95% who cannot.

As a sandwich artist myself, I can explain to you why this happens.

It's because an overwhelming (at least half or more) of our customers essentially refuse to tell us what they really want.

I've worked at this place for about a year now and I learned long ago that you basically can't trust customers. Until the 5 dollar foot long special hit, I honestly had extremely good customer service, I'll admit it has degraded some since then.

But, even the nicest customers can't really be trusted. Because for every person who says, "I want a turkey and ham with lettuce and tomato and nothing else" there's the person who will SAY that, and then as you are wrapping their sandwich "I WANTED MUSTARD ON THAT!!" With shocked outrage that you failed to read their minds and discern that when they say "lettuce and tomato only" they mean "lettuce, tomato, mustard."

FYI, though, we do about $14,000 in sales a week and probably 2800 transactions per week and I do remember the exact sandwiches of people who come in regularly and get the same thing every time.

[Mazthoril]

SA: Do you want jalapeños on that?
Me: No, that would be a hot pepper...
SA: Ok, how about banana peppers?
Me: *Resists the urge to pound his head on the counter* NO! (I absolutely hate those things)

Eric the Grey

No hot peppers is very, very useless to a sandwich artist. Firstly, banana peppers are mild peppers and even shipped to us labeled as "mild pepper rings"/"banana peppers" (some shipments get one or the other labels randomly.)

You may consider banana peppers hot, that's fine, but don't expect us to discern which peppers you consider hot and which aren't.

In general, yeah, we'll understand that jalapeños are hot, but bananas peppers won't typically fall under that umbrella.

Furthermore, some people who say "no hot peppers" really mean "just green peppers" because they don't like the sweet peppers we have--but because they don't know what they are called they oddly think they are supposed to be lumped in with the term "hot peppers."

I had a "no hot peppers" woman the other day who asked me, as I was putting sweet peppers on her sub, "are those jalapeños?" This isn't the kind of thing I get remotely mad at, but understand why we really can't assume anything when making a sub.

We pretty much have to make sure we know 100% exactly what you want, unless you tell us precisely when you come in, you'll get multiple questions.

[Becks]

Would it be wrong of me to order various footlongs instead of paying hellacious amounts of money for the "party sub"?

[marasbaras]

Would it be wrong of me to order various footlongs instead of paying hellacious amounts of money for the "party sub"?

Don't see why ... as long as you pay for them.

[Mazthoril]

[QUOTE=TheTigress;318275]Over the course of working at Subway I have compiled 6 volumes worth of Subway Rants to help me from going absolutely batty. It's a way of releasing my pent up anger from work in a ranty and brutally honest way.

I almost wondered for awhile if you worked at the same store as me, I've had pretty much all of these annoyances for a long time.

Not telling me initially that you wanted more than one sandwich.

I've gotten to the point now, where someone does this--actually gets to checkout and then nonchalantly says, "oh, I wanted five more footlongs" that I respond, "alright, please go to the end of the line and we'll start serving you when it's your turn." I did this the other day during a lunch rush (I'm the assistant manager but was working with both the owner and manager) and the customer complained, both of them backed me up and explained to the customer that, "we're sorry, but we have people who have been in line for over 15 minutes, we aren't going to make them wait longer because of this." (During lunch rush we've had lines that fold back on itself multiple times over, snaking all the way through the dining room into the restroom area and sometimes outside the store.)

People who change their minds on what sandwich they want after we have already made it.

I usually don't get along well with my owner, but his extreme cheapness is really cool here. If a customer does this to us, we inform them they can pay for the original sub and the new sub. If they don't want to we inform them that we're sorry but we don't want their business.

People who act all suprised and pissed off when we tell them we're closed and we can no longer serve them. (when it's 5 minutes past closing time)

Yeah, this happens to me all the time on Sundays especially. For whatever reason, my owner keeps the store's hours 10-5pm on Sundays. Since I'm the assistant manager I have to run the store on Saturday/Sundays, on Sundays we always start getting really busy right around 4:30pm because people are wanting dinner.

My owner is literally losing hundreds of dollars in potential business a week because of the number of people I have to turn away after 5pm. Our doors do lock from the inside, but when the dining room is full of people and we have a neverending line, I'm not going to lock people in.

What I do start doing is, once it hits 5pm I will only serve people who got in line before 5pm. So as people try to keep coming in I just inform them we're closed and can't serve them. They always argue "but it's just one sub" or "there's people in line" and I just explain to them if I don't stop the flow of business somewhere, I won't close til 2-3 hours after I'm supposed to do so.

People who get suprised when their shit costs a lot after they practically buy the whole store.

Yeah, when I first started working here I would try and explain to them why their order was so much. Now, I just basically repeat the price and ask for payment, I don't consider it part of my job to justify our clearly posted prices to the customers.

People who expect to get a 3 foot or 6 foot party sub made for them on the spot.

Apparently Quiznos somehow makes the giant subs to order on the spot. We have a Quiznos just down the street from us (which we outperform enormously business-wise) and we get a lot of customers asking for this because "Quiznos does it."

People who come in wanting a shitload of sandwiches in the middle of a rush who don't call the order in instead.

Yeah, what we typically do when one person comes in during a lunch rush or other rush and orders a huge amount of sandwiches is we assign one person to that customer. The other two people on shift will work on the rest of the line. We've never had anyone complain about it, but if they were to do so, we'd just inform them that we aren't going to make the rest of the paying customers wait unreasonably long just because they have a big order.

[Mazthoril]

Would it be wrong of me to order various footlongs instead of paying hellacious amounts of money for the "party sub"?

With the $5 special going on, any of Subway's catering options (at least as they are priced at my store) aren't really worth it.

However, in a normal situation, you get more food for your buck if you go with the catering options (party platter or giant sub) than you do by ordering a lot of foot longs.

I have no idea if it's against corporate Subway policy, but my owner has actually refused to make a really big order once. One time there was some function at one of the departments at the university and this guy came down wanting something like 40+ foot longs. The owner just told him we couldn't handle his order and gave him a catering menu and told him if he'd like to next time he could order 24 hours in advance.

[sisyphus]

Ahhhhh!

Heya! I'm a long time lurker, but you made me register and post!

I've worked at Subway for about three years, and I have experienced almost EVERYTHING you stated (except the reward cards, we only have the capabilities for gift cards in Canada IIRC)

Let me just begin by saying the one thing I hated the most: Subway Radio. You are LUCKY if you didn't have it! Extremely old and overplayed songs that I swear I heard every shift, always the same ads about Subway repeating every two or three songs...

I also agree, the phenomenon of everyone coming it at once confounds me just as much! It can be dead for HOURS, and as soon as the first customer comes in, you are just nonstop for like an hour... Often, it's normally not at a regularly busy time so you're the only one working, and then BOOM! In come 5 000 people, who eventually all start bitching that it's taking so long (umm, look at the line you fracker :P)

So, here are some of my rants (some are extensions of yours)!

The Ones Who Think We're "Drones" A Bit Too Much
These people seem to take the idea that we're robotic service drones a bit too seriously. When I ask what I can get them, they say EVERYTHING. "A six inch Chicken, on Italian, with lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, pickles, onions, and peppers and BBQ sauce. And a footlong... And another six inch..." Whoa, slow down there, we don't have infinite memories! I haven't even got your bread. It's OK if you just want lettuce or something, but come on... And then DO NOT get mad at me when I ask you what veggies you want again!

More Cell Phones
The worst about cell phone people is when you ask them a question, and it just so happens that the person on their phone asked them a question too. Something like
Me - "Do you want lettuce and tomatoes?"
Cell Phone Addict - "Yes. No wait! No tomatoes! I was talking to the guy on the phone!"

GAH! Talk to the person in the line, but AT LEAST ask them to hold while I take your order.

I Have A Hand Invincible To Heat, Who Knew?
This happened at night. My store was open late (ok, 24 hours), so we had customers coming in while we had to clean the toaster oven. Which means we had to turn it off a fair amount of time earlier for it to cool down (it's CRAZY hot).

So I'd be cleaning the oven, with my hand INSIDE and wiping the metal parts down with no protection. Then, the customers will want their subs toasted and scream bloody murder when I say it can't be done... You SAW me with my hand in the toaster! You did NOT hear me screaming in pain!

(My hand + it being inside oven - burned limbs) =/= turned on oven, no? But no, that would be logical. And logic is not allowed.

Drunkards (Contains sexual reference in second para, if you find it offensive)

OK, so my store was 24 hours. Meaning, after the bars close, we get inundated by huge amounts of drunks. Loud drunks who can barely form a sentence. Trying to order subs while trying to flirt with the other, sober girl in line behind you who is on her lunch break from working nights elsewhere in the mall. With you smelling of alcohol it overpowers even the SUBWAY smell, come on!

And THE PEOPLE who make stupid sexual remarks when I ask if they want a footlong sub... "Well, I have a footlong, but I can just have a six inch tonight" Ugh, not funny the first time you hear it, certainly not when you hear it every weekend. (Besides, I'd be willing to bet money these people couldn't go near the 4-inch mini subs, if you get my drift)

Ahhh, but some drunks made it all worthwhile. Genuinely funny people who aren't too loud and can actually make a joke. And that guy who tipped me $5 for dealing with his drunk friends.

More Tales of "Everything"
We had some sort of promotion advertising putting everything on one's sub, for some reason. This of course excluded green olives and banana peppers. We were then trained that when someone says "Everything", we put everything but the olives and peppers. Sufficed to say, it caused more problems than anything. They'd get mad when we don't put them on, saying "I said everything, didn't I?"

And for those of you who wonder why we have to ask if cheese goes on a sub such as "Steak and cheese", there were enough customers who got pissy if we did put it on, so eventually management told us to always ask, all the time. Most customers understood this and laughed along, something like "A steak and cheese just isn't the same though!"

Well that's all I can think of for now. I'll go sit in the corner now and happily munch my white chip macadamia cookie. Mmmm.

(FYI: I no longer work there)

[BookstoreEscapee]

Apparently Quiznos somehow makes the giant subs to order on the spot. We have a Quiznos just down the street from us (which we outperform enormously business-wise) and we get a lot of customers asking for this because "Quiznos does it."

What do you want to bet these people go to Quiznos and say "but Subway does it"...

mm...chocolate chip...

[SubwayGirl]

I have ranted those same rants. It is so nice to know that I am not alone!

My biggest pet peeve with this $5 footlong promotion. Two big yellow signs on each side of door, one huge yellow banner going across the front of store, big yellow menu panel- all of these say $5 footlongs. Yet, we still get tons of people coming in "you still doing the $5 footlongs?"

We have been doing this promotion since the end of March. It was supposed to end April 20 and it got extended to May 11th (I cried a little inside when I found that out). Our sales are up almost 50%. I have not had a day off since March 23 I am working about 70 hours a week. I am tired and cranky, but I am trying so hard to maintain great customer service and keep a good attitude for my crew.

Last night, I am ashamed to admit, when I was asked the dreaded question, "you still doing the $5 footlongs?" I looked at one window, then looked to the next, then looked at the banner and then turned my head and looked up at the menu. Said, "nope, sorry". He ordered a 6" instead. After he left I felt really bad and gve myelf a stern talking to. After all, I do want to the customers. That is how I get paid. But, jeesh. WHY DON'T CUSTOMERS READ THE DAMN SIGNS!

[NightWatch]

All I can say is, Ugh!! I worked at a subway inside a gas station for awhile... We closed at nine, and at 9 o'clock, I would shut off ALL the lights. Menu lights, open sign, overheard lights, generic lights, giant sign that said 'subway', EVERY. single. light. If you walked into the gas station at that time, the subway portion just looked like a big black gaping hole of nothingness. Furthermore, within 3 minutes I would have all the food bins removed from the front area to store in the back fridge for the night. Some moron would waddle up and stand there for a while squinting at the menu, then ring the little bell to get my attention. I'd finish what I was doing and wander over to see what the hell they wanted.

me: Can I help you?
sc: *attempt at a chuckle* Well, I don't know. I can't read your menu board! haha!!
me: *trying not to leap over the glass and throttle sc* Sir... it's 9:20...
sc: Yes? And?
me: We closed at 9.
sc: Well that wasn't THAT long ago, could ya make me something anyway?
me: *looking at empty food bins* And how do you propose I do that, sir?
sc: *stunned like they did not think of this, leaves*

This happened more then once, with the exact same conversation... It got old fast.

[Eric the Grey]

No hot peppers is very, very useless to a sandwich artist. Firstly, banana peppers are mild peppers and even shipped to us labeled as "mild pepper rings"/"banana peppers" (some shipments get one or the other labels randomly.)

You may consider banana peppers hot, that's fine, but don't expect us to discern which peppers you consider hot and which aren't.

In general, yeah, we'll understand that jalapeños are hot, but bananas peppers won't typically fall under that umbrella.

Actually, I've never tasted them. The smell of banana peppers is enough to turn my stomach. I've always just assumed they were "hot peppers."

Furthermore, some people who say "no hot peppers" really mean "just green peppers" because they don't like the sweet peppers we have--but because they don't know what they are called they oddly think they are supposed to be lumped in with the term "hot peppers."

This is why I've always said it like I do. I DO want green (bell) pepper on my sandwich, just not the other two. I guess I'll have to be a bit more specific from now on.


Eric the Grey

[Tuxian]

Apparently Quiznos somehow makes the giant subs to order on the spot. We have a Quiznos just down the street from us (which we outperform enormously business-wise) and we get a lot of customers asking for this because "Quiznos does it."

From what I've seen when I go to Quizno's (not often, as I feel the prices there are a bit too high for the quality of the product I get served), the way they do the bread over there is to make giant 2-3 foot loaves, and then they simply cut off a portion to match the size a customer requests. Thus, they actually do have the larger loaves of bread hanging around, since they use a different model for their sandwiches.

[depechemodefan]

All I can say is, Ugh!! I worked at a subway inside a gas station for awhile... We closed at nine, and at 9 o'clock, I would shut off ALL the lights.

[OT] Since 9/11 the only way the librarians and other staff can get into the library is with a badge. If you forget your badge, you have to sign in a get a "visitor" badge. Considering that the City will always go for the low bid, though, the security company hired isn't a crack team of professionals. Anyway, the security will get on a librarian's ass for not having a badge, even though the librarian in question is the security guard's grandbaby's godmother, But! security constantly let in people who don't have a badge and are not staff. Last week a woman comes in at 8:55am. I don't see a badge so I go up to her and tell her we arnt' open yet. People don't get that the library is open 9am-6pm. She was nice enough but she said, "We'll it's only 5 min. till 9." She was nice enough, she didn't get snotty, but what did she expect me to do, just let her walk around?

[Andara Bledin]

This of course excluded green olives and banana peppers.

Wait, you have green olives there? I'd love to get green olives on my sub! I've only ever seen black olives around here. *pout*

^-.-^

[Mazthoril]

I have ranted those same rants. It is so nice to know that I am not alone!

My biggest pet peeve with this $5 footlong promotion. Two big yellow signs on each side of door, one huge yellow banner going across the front of store, big yellow menu panel- all of these say $5 footlongs. Yet, we still get tons of people coming in "you still doing the $5 footlongs?"

We have been doing this promotion since the end of March. It was supposed to end April 20 and it got extended to May 11th (I cried a little inside when I found that out). Our sales are up almost 50%. I have not had a day off since March 23 I am working about 70 hours a week. I am tired and cranky, but I am trying so hard to maintain great customer service and keep a good attitude for my crew.

Last night, I am ashamed to admit, when I was asked the dreaded question, "you still doing the $5 footlongs?" I looked at one window, then looked to the next, then looked at the banner and then turned my head and looked up at the menu. Said, "nope, sorry". He ordered a 6" instead. After he left I felt really bad and gve myelf a stern talking to. After all, I do want to the customers. That is how I get paid. But, jeesh. WHY DON'T CUSTOMERS READ THE DAMN SIGNS!

Yeah, ours was ending April 20th as well, and was extended to May 11th.

Well, the week before April 20th, since our manager was out of town I had to manage the store for seven days, because the other person we have who is competent enough to come in on weekends and open the store couldn't work that weekend.

It was a horrible week, but the one thing I had to keep me going was the knowledge that come Monday, I was tearing all those signs down and putting an end to this abomination of a special.

Well, sometime during the week our manager got a certified letter from Subway. The franchisee (our owner), despite having owned Subways for over 10 years doesn't really know anything that's going on ever. He doesn't read official communications from Subway most of the time. This certified letter was put in a box in the manager's office for some reason by one of our employees, unopened. They never thought to give it to me because I'm just the assistant manager.

Well, this letter comes in big later. Come Monday, April 21st, I take down the big $5 Footlong banner and all of the window stickers and swap them out for the special Subway was originally going to run ($5 footlongs for 5 of our sandwiches instead of all of them, and $3 six inches for those subs.)

Without thinking, when I put the window stickers up, I folded them together and put them in the big box they came in.

Come Tuesday when our Manager comes back, after a VERY frustrating Monday (explaining to every single customer that the five dollar special is over is not easy) he finds the certified letter from Subway. The letter that tells us we have to reactive the special.

Only problem is, when I took down the window stickers it essentially made them unusable, my manager was so pissed about the whole situation that he just decided he was going to leave the "Big Philly Cheesesteak" window sticker up and not even worry about the rest. So right now we're still running the $5 special, of course, but with no window stickers or banners (our in-store menu still has the appropriate information.)