I can recall the exact moment that I snapped. It took place in a popular restaurant in my city at 6:41 p.m. on a Friday evening in late summer of 2021. I was crouched in a corner next to the host stand, patiently waiting for my takeout order. On a bench across from me sat a man and a woman with face masks pulled down to their chins, exchanging looks of indignation with one another.
“We made a reservation — they have to honor it. It’s 6:41! We should have been seated 11 minutes ago,” he huffed.
“It’s unacceptable. There are only two waitresses working on a Friday,” she concurred, a tiny bit of spittle flying from her mouth. She whipped out her phone and raised her eyebrows. I watched her lips turn into a grin as she sneered, “I’m going to leave them a bad review.”
That’s when I lost it.
Though I was a fellow patron at that moment, I’ve worked in the service industry most of my life. I’ve assembled Whoppers, folded T-shirts into perfect squares, waited tables at high-end restaurants, bartended, crafted coffee drinks and checked people into a hotel.
Today, I still have a foot in the customer service industry as an executive within a hospitality group. I know firsthand that customer-facing roles have always been challenging, and bad reviews have forever been an obnoxious and unavoidable part of the job. But to leave a scathing review during a pandemic over a minor inconvenience is not only unacceptable — it’s cruel.
“Excuse me,” I said to the couple, my raised voice muffled by my N-95 mask. “In case you haven’t noticed, we are in the middle of a pandemic and a socioeconomic crisis. Everyone is short-staffed. People have to call out from work because they don’t know if their sore throat is because of allergies or the plague. Have some compassion or stay home!”
In perfect timing, the host walked over right in the middle of my rant. Wide-eyed, he handed me my dinner and said in a hushed tone, “Thank you for saying that.” I wanted to hug him. Instead, I nodded, thanked him and slowly turned back to the waiting couple.
I was embarrassed, as public outbursts aren’t my modus operandi. But I also felt an inkling of triumph when I noticed the woman had tucked her phone away.
I work with several hospitality professionals, and every single one of them entered the field because they love people. They love meeting people, talking with them, making them smile and curating memorable experiences. Sure, some go into the service industry because it’s a convenient option, but most of the people who serve your dinner, check you into your hotel room or make sure your seatbelt is secured preflight are doing so because they enjoy the interactive nature of the work.
But then the pandemic hit. Some genius with legislative power decided that the people who work at grocery stores, restaurants and hotels should take on the burden of imposing public health rules. Retail and service industry employees were labeled essential workers and told to ignore guidance about staying home to be safe. Instead, they were instructed to continue doing their customer-centric jobs while enforcing haphazardly designed safety policies with little direction from the people who created them.
Just when it seemed like we were all finding our groove with social distancing culture, the supply chain broke apart, inflation boomed and the Great Resignation came along.
Not everyone joined the Big Quit. Many service and retail professionals continue to stick it out. Gainfully employed at grocery stores, coffee shops, restaurants, budget motels and fancy resorts, they work hard shift after shift to give the rest of the world some semblance of normality. Then there are the independent contractors, the ones who bravely go where app users won’t, instantly fulfilling virtual cart wishes and delivering food, groceries and household items right to our doorsteps.
Throughout each wave of the pandemic, retail and service industry professionals have put on their uniforms and name tags, and served others with smizes gleaming above their masks. Are servers, cashiers and baristas as cheery as they were in 2019? Maybe not. It’s pretty tough to turn on the charm when half your crew is out with COVID and you’re working six double shifts per week. It’s nearly impossible to show enthusiasm for the dinner specials when you’ve just lost your grandma to the coronavirus or learned that your kid’s day care is shutting down — again — due to COVID exposure.
And do we celebrate these steadfast retail and hospitality professionals? Not anymore. In fact, should they dare to fail to meet our pre-pandemic expectations, we might smite them with an ”I want to speak to the manager” or, as was the case with the couple at the restaurant, a bad review.
The very idea that someone might see the empty shelves, the COVID numbers and the “Help Wanted” signs and still be shocked to find that the quality of service is lower than it used to be is something I can’t comprehend.
I stumbled upon one of these particularly harsh reviews when I was looking up the hours of operation for a nearby grocery store.
“The lady behind the counter in the bakery department lacked customer service skills or hated her job, I couldn’t tell,” reported the unhappy customer before dramatically ending with, “I won’t be back.”
Curious to hear the other side of this review, I reached out to an employee at this same grocery store who works in the bakery department. She takes pride in her profession, posting social media photos of the bakery displays, and celebrates her team’s ability to survive unprecedented circumstances — like the disposable pie container shortage that occurred around Thanksgiving last year. I asked the employee what she would say to the reviewer if she had the chance to reply without fear of repercussions.
“We are exhausted. First, we were terrified not only for ourselves, but for our families. We all have kids. Then the schools shut down and we began pulling even more of a double duty. Now, after three years of this, there’s no room for fear, there’s no room for joy. We are just obliterated,” she told me. “We are in survival mode.”
I have several friends and colleagues in the service, retail and hospitality industries who have been pushed to their limits. I personally left my previous customer-facing management role because I was burnt out and mentally spent. In my own little community of service industry workers alone, I know of two suicide attempts, six mental health facility check-ins, three denied efforts to check in to a mental health facility due to insurance issues, and countless new anti-depressant prescriptions.
So, yes, if you leave a bad review right now, you are an ass. Everything everywhere has changed. There will be longer lines. Your reservation time is now an estimate. They are out of avocados. They are short-staffed. They are exhausted.
Instead of leaving a bad review, give a shout-out to the person who helped you, especially if they seem emotionally depleted. Put your damn shopping cart back where it belongs. Tip 25%. If you go on vacation, bring the flight attendants a treat bag and leave your hotel housekeeper a solid tip. If you see an employee having a bad day, tell them you appreciate them.
To the people who are already taking these extra steps to be kind, you are making a bigger difference than you know.
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