Customer eats employee lunch

[nomas]

We had two refrigerators in the coffee room . One of the Linemen that worked a lot of OT would browse the fridges and figured that anything there after 5 pm on Friday was fair game . A maintenance foreman came in early one Saturday morning for a scheduled outage and put his container of BBQ chicken wings in the fridge and then went out in the yard to supervise the loading of some equipment . He came back an hour later and found Pete , the lineman , enjoying a meal of wings ..
He never let Pete forget about the stolen lunch ..

 

[crashz]

Was it the same lady that claimed damage to her dead-battery BMW? Seems on brand.

 

[ATex7239]

Approximately 20% of adults (60 million people) experience mental illness or disorders representing 1 in 5 American adults. And roughly 50% of adult Americans fall below the median IQ score (100) on the bell curve. Meaning statistically speaking when dealing with the general public 1 in 5 have mental issues and half are below average intelligence. To be honest, I’m kind of shocked it doesn’t happen more often.

 

[wavinwayne]

I used to think people were generally good.

 

[Pablo]

I have a lunch sack theft gag but I can’t repeat it here. It involves a “bologna” sandwich made with saved circumcision foreskins.

 

[Pablo]

I used to think people were generally good.

You put a platter of frosted brownies out and you know what motivates people

 

[SC Maintenance]

Someone already mentioned it, but I would bake in another hour of shop time. Expensive lunch.

I mean he needs to go home and make a new lunch? Reasonable.

 

[edhackett]

Since it was in the waiting room, where various snacks and drinks are available to the customer, I'd say the customer just made the assumption anything in the refrigerator in the waiting room was fair game. I can think of numerous repair shops and dealerships who do this.

I'd say your shop employees learned a lesson about where to keep their lunch.

I agree with this. It was a commercial product, unlabeled, in an area that contained what was clearly for the customers. I'd not jump directly to malice in this case. It could have been an honest mistake.

If employees are putting their lunches in a public fridge, they should be labeled. Better yet, they should be in a labeled bag or container that would make it clear that this isn't just for the taking. That won't stop the scumbags, but would go a long way to preventing someone from making an honest mistake.

The Exlax trick is not urban legend. I was party to that trick in high school. My best friend was having his lunch taken several times a week by a certain individual. We dissolved at least 6, maybe the whole box of Exlax pills and injected them into his carton of fruit punch. The lunch was taken. His lunch was never taken again. No words were exchanged.

Ed

 

[wavinwayne]

You put a platter of frosted brownies out and you know what motivates people

Even Jean Valjean couldn't resist.

 

[Passport1]

Lunch makes me sleepy and sluggish in the afternoon.

When I worked in a shop I'd skip it, finish my jay oh bee and beat the flat rate. Punched out hungry ready for dinner with more $$ in my pocket.

If I did eat lunch it was usually a tin of sardines and nobody would pilfer that.

 

[crashz]

I respectfully disagree. Drinks and bagged snacks look like public items. A solitary pre-packaged chicken salad does not. That screams lunch. But to further sweeten the deal, being a pre-packaged salad means that the owner did not have his grubby hands in it. So its clean (relatively).

I still think it was Karen the broken Beemer lady.

 

[paulri]

Approximately 20% of adults (60 million people) experience mental illness or disorders representing 1 in 5 American adults. And roughly 50% of adult Americans fall below the median IQ score (100) on the bell curve. Meaning statistically speaking when dealing with the general public 1 in 5 have mental issues and half are below average intelligence. To be honest, I’m kind of shocked it doesn’t happen more often.

 

[edyvw]

We have a small refrigerator in our shop. We also have one in the waiting room along with a coffee pot and various snacks.

The one in our shop gets full so we often put our lunches in the one in the waiting room.

Never occurred to us that someone would eat it.

One of our guys put a store bought chicken salad in the refrigerator in the waiting room.

The office girls were busy doing their stuff and didn't notice a customer getting into the refrigerator.
A few minutes later one noticed a customer eating the employees lunch.

Who does that?

That customer who brought you a BMW with a dead battery?

 

[02SE]

As I said the refrigerator in the shop was full.

I understood that.

My point is that if you have a refrigerator in an area designated for customers, along with snacks and drinks for said customers, I could easily see a customer assuming anything in said refrigerator was fair game.

I'm thinking of one shop where a friend works, where they have all sorts of snacks, drinks, and other food items, some in a refrigerator, for their customers.

How you or the employee who lost their lunch proceeds, is up to you.

You can call out the customer:

Maybe they'll only be embarrassed when informed of their possibly honest mistake, and will insist on making things right with the employee.

Maybe they'll be offended by being accused of stealing, when they thought they were just eating something they thought was offered, and will cost the business customers by posting on social media how they were treated by the business.

Maybe the shop tacks on the cost of the lunch to the bill. Doesn't say anything, and employees go forward knowing the risk of placing items in a refrigerator in the customer waiting area.



When I was a business owner, I would've given the customer the benefit of the doubt, and not said anything to the customer. I also would let employees know of the potential risk of losing their lunch if placed in a refrigerator in the customer waiting area.

If I were an employee, I'd likely not take something to work that required refrigeration, knowing of the potential issues of doing so.

 

[skyactiv]

As I said the refrigerator in the shop was full.

The shop owner should have a larger fridge for the employees.

 

[#18FAN]

The shop owner should have a larger fridge for the employees.

Ding this is it problem solved

 

[Finklejag]

If it was in a brown lunch bag that is something, but a prepackaged store salad, that’s on the employee.

 

[IndyIan]

I hope that customer left a good review, "Even provided a free lunch!"

 

[02SE]

The shop owner should have a larger fridge for the employees.

Or move the fridge in the customer waiting area back with the employee area fridge. No longer having a fridge in the customer waiting area.

 

[Chris142]

I mean he needs to go home and make a new lunch? Reasonable.

Thats not an option. Not everyone lives across the street from work. My commute is only 11 miles 1 way but with traffic I doubt I could go home and back in an hour.