We have some a group of pretty regular customers who only come in 10-15 minutes til close. They are wasted every time, rude, and will stay at least an hour after close every night. Since they come often and spend decent money, I ignore the shitty behavior and make sure they enjoy themselves.
I’ll provide a little info on the customers to help paint the picture. The woman of the group is a pretty prominent lawyer in the town. Very loud, very unpleasant, very drunk. Seems to view restaurant workers as beneath her and treats them like servants. Obviously we are there to serve people of course, but with most customers there is a way to do that and still feel respected at the end of the night. Not with her though, if that makes any sense.
Her husband/bf sits there like a log and appears to dislike her and feel embarrassed by her behavior. Decent and inoffensive. They come in with a friend who I’ve been told has a history of bad interactions with women. I’ve only been told this though and can’t confirm it, so i don’t let it effect the service. However, he is a drunk asshole so I wouldn’t be surprised.
So one night they come in 5 minutes to close. I wasn’t happy to see them, but we were still open so I treated them well and took their order, disappointed knowing that an extra hour at least had been added to my night. But hey that’s the job.
Fast forward 2 hours later. The kitchen is clean, the register is done, everything is done. Everything except the dining area because they are still there. Completely aware that we have been closed for 2 hours, but not giving a fuck that we can’t go home. Customers staying after close is a part of the job and while it bothers me at times, I deal with it. 2 hours after though was starting to push it though. We aren’t fine dining and we pay by the hour, so payroll was going up and there was no end in sight.
Finally, I did what I never do and decided to politely say something. I said as nicely as I could manage, “hey guys, sorry to cut the night short, but we are going to be closing up soon(2 hours ago actually).” They didn’t even glance in my direction. I know they heard, but ignored the shit out of me. So a little louder I say again that we are trying to close. This time, without looking at me the woman says “good luck with that”. Something about the way she said it with utter disgust and didn’t even bother looking at me set me off. It was the first and only time at work that I lost my cool.
I said “what did you just say to me? Did you just tell me good luck?” Still without even glancing towards me she laughs and tells me to calm down. At that point I wanted them gone before I said something really bad, so I told them i would refund their money, but that they needed to leave. This set them off. She came to the register demanding to see the manager(me), telling me she is friends with the owner and is going to have me fired(unaware that Im actually the majority owner). I tell her to call the next day if she has a problem she would like to discuss with the owner.
Her creep friend then comes to the register and tries getting in my face, which makes me uncomfortable because as pissed as I am I really don’t want to beat the crap out of a customer. No matter how rude or drunk they are. I step back and he tries to wave me forward, an attempt at intimidation I think. I keep my distance and he tells me if I keep being this rude I will get my ass kicked some day. I say alright bud and tell him to go.
20 minutes later I start getting Facebook messages on our business page from the woman. She is demanding to speak to the owner, saying she has basically suffered verbal abuse by one of our employees. I respond by giving her the owners phone number(mine) and telling her to call tomorrow.
I assumed she would sober up and not call, but I was wrong. The next morning my phone rings and it’s her. She doesn’t recognize my voice immediately and I ask her to explain the situation. She goes on to lie about every detail. Claiming they were only there 45 minutes past close, that I walked out to her table and yelled at them to fuck off, that I yelled at them for not tipping(no clue where that came from), and that when they left I flipped them off. Every word of it lies. She said she will never come back unless the employee was fired and that she would tell everyone not to come.
That’s when I break the news to her that I was the employee and that I would not be firing myself. I had calmed down by this point and instead of angry I was almost amused by her insane version of events. I said, “mam, you had a bit to drink but we both know that isn’t it happened and you could have cost someone their livelihood if i didn’t know you were lying. But, i am sorry you felt mistreated and I will buy you a drink next time you are in”.
She wasn’t ready to back down though and got pissed I said she was drunk. She said she would never come back and would tell her son not to come either. I wanted to tell her how much of a fuck I didn’t give, but I just said alright mam, sorry to lose you as a customer.
2 weeks later the bitch was back lol. They showed up an hour before close and was so much nicer than she ever was before the incident. She was drunk again so I felt uncomfortable buying her a drink, but I gave her an appetizer and told her to enjoy her meal. Neither of us mentioned a thing about the night and we haven’t since. She is still in at least once a week and now treats me like her best friend. The best part though is that they never stay longer than 15-20 minutes past close now.