This is a long one, but I need to rant it out. I also work at a licensed store.
The closest full service Starbucks closed, so lately we’ve been getting all of their customers, which is fine, we just don’t carry as much as a full service store, and we only have 1-2 people working at a time.
On Sunday morning, I opened. My steam wand wasn’t working and had en error code, so I turned the machine off and on, then ran a cleaning cycle. By the time I opened, the wand was still not working, just sputtering and blowing out streams of water, not steam. So, a guy and his gf come in, im like “hey, how are y’all? Just so you know, I’m unable to steam anything, so most espresso drinks I have to make iced at the moment if that’s okay?” The guy says he wants a free drink then or “I’m calling corporate and causing a scene”
His gf was laughing, and he was too, so I just kind of laughed it off as well. So I ring them up, gf wants an iced latte, he asks for 3 shots. Easy enough. While I’m making his drink, he tells me he wants a Breve. I was like, oh, a breve latte? Or do you just want some breve with your 3 shots? He tells me idk what I’m talking about, and goes on this looooong lecture about how latte is just the American version of a breve. Breve is French, so he wants a breve. In the end, he got a grande breve latte, extra shot, vanilla bean added, and some other stuff. He didn’t say any of this when I rang them up and he paid, so he only paid for 3 shots. My store is pretty strict about how we ring people up, and how it has to be correct, but he was already so annoying that I just did not say anything so he’d leave faster. His attitude and arrogance the entire interaction really bothered me.
Fast forward to Tuesday. I’m working with a friend, J, and she’s on register, Im making drinks. The guy comes in again, this time alone. I let him know the steam wants back in business. He orders two drinks, then he starts to order his complicated drink again. He is doing the whole spiel again, so J is confused. I asked him if he wanted what he got yesterday, just hot now and he said yes. So I told her he essentially wants a grande breve latte, extra shot, and all the other additions. That’s not a cheap drink. He asks J “How did you ring me up?” So she tells him, latte, extra shot, breve, etc.
This man says no no no no, you ring me up as 3 shots and that’s it. I was like, I’m sorry, we can’t just charge you for 3 shots, you’re ordering a latte (He even told me breve was a French latte), and we will get in trouble for ringing up the wrong prices, and we will get in trouble for it. Other coworkers have been talked to about it before. He’s now mad. He’s going off about how he doesn’t want a latte (he wants a breve, the supposedly French latte with vanilla bean and a bunch of other stuff) so don’t charge him for a latte. He’s throwing a fit, so we’re like alright maybe we’re like really misunderstanding what he wants. I ask him “Do you want 3 shots with breve poured in like a creamer or do you want a breve latte, where I steam the breve and fill your cup up?”
He responds “I want you to quit arguing with me and ring me up how I tell you to, or I’m going to call corporate and cause a scene!”
......
Usually I can handle rude people, but this was the exact same thing he had said to me Sunday, threatening to call corporate and make a scene.
J told him we aren’t arguing, we’re trying to clarify what he wants exactly, and he goes off again. I’ve never in my 5 years at Starbucks have been demeaned and talked down to so badly. I finally took his two other drinks that were already finished, I dumped them out into the sink, J voided his order on the POS, and I told him “I’m sorry sir, we cannot help you. Have a nice day.”
He’s still going. I told him that if he wants to call corporate or get a manager that it’s fine, but we cannot help him if he’s going to talk to us that way. He finally left.
Thankfully my managers backed me up, and they said we can just deny him service if he ever comes in again.
Usually the rude people are older, this guy was my age, young 20s. I’ve never met somebody act that entitled over coffee.
To end it all, the food in my oven started catching on fire????