Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Industrial strength funeral suck (long)

Collapse
This topic is closed.
X
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • Industrial strength funeral suck (long)

    My workplace catered a funeral gathering awhile back. Someone from the funeral home called us to set everything up, we delivered the order to the funeral reception site (a hotel), and that was that. Or so I thought...

    An hour or so after we deliver the order, I get a call:

    Me: XXX Catering, this is CC, how can I help you?
    Hotel Manager: Yes, you are catering a funeral reception that is going on here right now, but there are no servers.
    Me: Let me see... <I look over the catering order, no mention of servers or a service fee.> I'm sorry, I don't see any mention of full service on the order.
    HM: So you just drop off food and make other people do all the work?
    Me: Well, since it's mostly cocktail sandwiches, we typically don't provide servers unless they are requested.
    HM: Well, my employees are taking up my time to make your company look good, and you need to get somebody over here now to serve this food.
    Me: I really am sorry, but since full service was not ordered, we don't have the staff to accommodate that.
    HM: Well, that shouldn't be my problem. Right now my employees are doing your work.
    Me: I apologize, and I will have my manager call you right away. <I say most of this to a dead line, having been hung up on.>

    Servers for finger food? Can't people pick up miniature sandwiches and carrot sticks by themselves? I guess I should know better than to ask that question. Anyway, I send someone to call the boss (no calling out on our phone), and another call comes in. This time it's the mother of the deceased. She says that more people came than she thought, and we need to get another 100 sandwiches over there RIGHT NOW!!! They also need 10 more cases of assorted sodas.

    Well now, it seems that these folks can feed themselves! So I alert the deli that we need 100 sandwiches, then send someone to load 10 cases of soda into the catering van. Deli calls over some reinforcements to help prepare the sandwiches, and the order is on its way.

    Our driver has been gone about 10 minutes when another call comes in to us back in the kitchen: It's Mom again, saying the funeralgoers have left because there was no food or drink, so she doesn't want it anymore. Our driver left her phone at the store, so we can't alert her to this new development. She arrives, unloads the soda onto a cart and wheels it up to the hotel door.

    There are a bunch of high-school kids standing around outside the door. Seeing our deliverywoman and her cargo of soda, a couple of them ask her, "Hey, where's the beer?" Har har, that's hilarious. As she continues to wheel the cart into the building, some of the kids run by and grab 12-packs of soda off the cart!

    Did I mention that this funeral was for a kid who was driving drunk and killed a classmate in the crash? Way to honor your buddy's memory, asshats, even if he was behaving badly when he died.

  • #2
    Nice family.
    That's such utter disrespect, no matter how the kid died.

    "Oh my son has just passed away. Should I mourn? Should I spend time with close family and friends? Or should I call the caterer and complain about something trivial like finger sandwiches, carrot sticks and diet Pepsi? Yeeees, that last one seems about right."

    Comment


    • #3
      I don't blame the Hotel Manager for being upset, but I wouldn't have allowed my staff to be servers if I was him.

      I'm hoping my funeral goes nicely. I want a big ass party and fireworks because my ashes are going to be stuffed into a little rocket and blasted into space.
      Ridiculous 2009 Predictions: Evil Queen will beat Martha Stewart to death with a muffin pan. All hail Evil Queen! (Some things don't need elaboration.....) -- Jester

      Ridiculous 2010 Predictions: Evil Queen, after escaping prison for last years prediction, goes out and waffle irons Rachel Ray to death. -- SG15Z

      Ridiculous 2011 Prediction: Evil Queen will beat Gordon Ramsay over the head with a cast-iron skillet. -- FireHeart

      Comment


      • #4
        Based on my conversations with the mother, I'm sure that the manager was catching a lot of hell from her as well. He must've felt like he had to do something, so he put his staff to work and took it out on us. What's funny is that the funeral home, who placed the order to begin with, probably didn't hear a word about the whole mess. Well, except maybe when the family saw the catering portion of the funeral bill, with the stolen soda on it. I never heard anything about that.

        Comment


        • #5
          so the mourners left because the food ran out. What great people.
          Yes. I know my typing sucks but I have a large orange cat sitting on my keyboard and a small disturbed dog trying to sniff his butt

          Comment


          • #6
            Bill should have stolen soda AND the sandwiches, IMO. Who else is buying 100 fresh sandwiches with cost of delivery at that given moment. Yeah, that seems pretty irritating and the kids grabbing sodas were rude as hell.
            A lion however, will only devour your corpse, whereas an SC is not sated until they have destroyed your soul. (Quote per infinitemonkies)

            Comment


            • #7
              Quoth Evil Queen View Post

              I'm hoping my funeral goes nicely. I want a big ass party and fireworks because my ashes are going to be stuffed into a little rocket and blasted into space.
              My mom doesn't want any flowers. She wants balloons.
              I don't go in for ancient wisdom
              I don't believe just 'cause ideas are tenacious
              It means that they're worthy - Tim Minchin, "White Wine in the Sun"

              Comment


              • #8
                Quoth BookstoreEscapee View Post
                My mom doesn't want any flowers. She wants balloons.
                my mum wants a green funeral ..... but she wants shells instead of flowers

                when I try to explain that taking shells away from the sea is enviromentally damaging she "cant" understand.... sigh
                I wasnt put on this earth to make you feel like a man ~ Mary Bertone

                Comment


                • #9
                  Quoth Evil Queen View Post
                  I'm hoping my funeral goes nicely. I want fireworks because my ashes are going to be stuffed into a little rocket and blasted into space.
                  Same here! Some friends the deceased had.....
                  I don't get paid enough to kiss your a**! -Groezig 5/31/08
                  Another day...another million braincells lost...-Sarlon 6/16/08
                  Chivalry is not dead. It's just direly underappreciated. -Samaliel 9/15/09

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    I want a Viking funeral.
                    Burn the land and boil the sea, you can't take the sky from me!

                    I like big bots and I cannot lie.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Quoth rerant View Post
                      Nice family.
                      That's such utter disrespect, no matter how the kid died.

                      "Oh my son has just passed away. Should I mourn? Should I spend time with close family and friends? Or should I call the caterer and complain about something trivial like finger sandwiches, carrot sticks and diet Pepsi? Yeeees, that last one seems about right."
                      As one who has had very close loved ones die, I can tell you that people cope with death in ways we find strange. One way is to occupy themselves with things that otherwise would seem trivial - like how many sandwiches are needed for the reception. It allows their minds to think about something other than the anguish they really are feeling. Their grief often can manifest itself as Anger focused toward people and situations that do not deserve it.

                      When my sister died suddenly, all my mom could focus on was getting a collage of pictures put together to display at the service and making sure everything was set up properly at the funeral home for the visitation. You would not believe the minutia of detail she fussed about. It was her way of taking care of my sister one last time. After the funeral, burial and reception were over and she had nothing else to do in that regard, she collapsed into full mourning.

                      How people in the funeral business keep their sanity is beyond me.
                      "Ignorance is no excuse for a law."
                      .................................................. ..................- Alfred E. Newman

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        This is my plan: http://www.lifegem.com/

                        I figure, if we can get enough of us to do it, in a few generations the 'family jewels' will be worth something.

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          WOW..........Seems like she turned what should have been a solemn day of remembering her son's life into an unessecary fiasco that very very easily could have been and WAS being solved!

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Quoth South Texan View Post

                            How people in the funeral business keep their sanity is beyond me.
                            Well, let's see about my funeral home folks...

                            A has ADHD, E is a hypochondriac, J is an unrepentant screaming SC Type-A personality, L has a massive persecution complex, M refuses to allow technology into her funeral home, H has wild bouts of OCD, V smokes pot while she's waiting on the embalming to finish...

                            Annnnnnd then there's me, so...

                            I'd say most funeral folks come pre-equipped with some level of not-completely-sane.
                            "Maybe the problem just went away...maybe it was the magical sniper fairy that comes and gives silenced hollow point rounds to people who don't eat their vegetables."

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              I don't want to be buried or cremated. I like the Zoroastrian style: place me on the top of a tower and let the vultures take care of things. Actually, I'd like to be dumped on a mountain and let all the creatures clean up the body.
                              Labor boards have info on local laws for free
                              HR believes the first person in the door
                              Learn how to go over whackamole bosses' heads safely
                              Document everything
                              CS proves Dunning-Kruger effect

                              Comment

                              Working...