My first bad review in 10 years in the industry and it is insane
I finally got my first bad review after trying to be the best at my job for the last 10 years. I was the only requested server at my old job with MANY regulars. Hospitality means everything to me, but when I saw this review and it MOSTLY mentioning my neck tattoo…I feel so defeated. My looks have nothing to do with my service, and yes, I did mess up, but to come after my looks in this way is insane. Just say I messed up. Tell me I am incompetent, berate me…but this is a very low blow.
For context: this was my first day live on the floor at a new job, and it ended up being one of the restaurant’s busiest Saturdays ever. I was not used to Toast after working in a restaurant for 4 years that used a different POS system. I was still getting used to the new steps of service. Obviously I was overwhelmed as hell. I accidentally rang in the ribeye instead of the short rib for this table. I also accidentally hit fries twice instead of cheese curds and fries (the buttons are right next to each other). I apologized to the table about the curds and sent out fresh ones, but when I saw the ribeye on the table I uncharacteristically froze because I was new at the job and just made a $120 mistake. I told the lead server and he said it was fine and that I could just split it off so we could comp it. Therefore, I didn’t tell the manager; I know I should have, but I was scared I was going to get fired on the spot and yelled at in front of everyone, like my old job would have done. (Shoutout to trauma from a former emotionally abusive job). Obviously I apologized for the mix up, offered the short rib for free, and did not charge the table for the ribeye. However, in the review they said I only offered to comp the difference between the two dishes and lied about other things, like saying I told them “I have no idea what I am doing”. Having a bad review is difficult, but for it mostly to come after my looks actually made me cry. I have now grown extremely insecure about the tattoos on my body because of this.
I will not be posting the whole review because it is probably about 2,000 words long and horribly worded. But yeah, this person made me feel worse than I already did about messing up their table. I talked to my coworkers about how bad I felt that night because I messed up twice and couldn’t find any way to recover their experience. I was pulled into the office during my next shift because my manager wanted to show me this review and talk to me about it.
And yes. This is actually the start of the review, this is not a screenshot from some part in the middle. This person decided to come out swinging like this.
TLDR: I messed up a table’s order twice on my first day live on one of the busiest Saturdays the restaurant has had, tried my best to fix it, and then got my first negative review that mostly made fun of my neck tattoo.