A server went above and beyond to make sure a customer was able to pick up her food. But the customer turned out to be a much bigger problem.
In a viral TikTok video, Dean Redmond (@deanredmonds) explained that a woman placed an order at his restaurant at 4:30 pm, and he warned her that she’d have to get there quickly because they close at 5 pm.
She didn’t show up until 5:45 pm, a whole 45 minutes past close.
“I was literally spam calling her, and the first thing she says as she walks through the door is, ‘You don’t think I see you calling me over and over again?’” Redmond remembers.
He says he was repeatedly calling because the restaurant closed 45 minutes ago, and he wanted to check if she was still coming for her food.
She insisted that the last time she ate there, the restaurant was open until 8 pm, but Redmond repeated what he’d already told her: the new closing time is 5 pm.
“Do you have somewhere better to be or something,” she dared to say, as if servers don’t have lives outside of work.
Ignoring this, Redmond told her her total came out to $42. Instead of taking out cash or a credit card, she whipped out two Dunkin’ gift cards as payment.
“Here’s the deal: I lost my wallet, but there’s $22 on this one, and there’s $30 on the other one, which leaves $52. If you just take the card, you can keep the extra $10,” she told him, trying to barter for her food.
As any server would do, Redmond told her they couldn’t take gift cards to a different establishment as a form of payment.
“I’m not feeling well, and my kids need food, and this is the only money I have,” she screamed at him, getting all up in his space and spewing bits of spit as she yelled.
Hearing the commotion, one of the large cooks, who has a knife tattoo on his face, came out from the back to help, Redmond says. The cook told her that Redmond already asked for proper payment twice.
Shocked that she didn’t get her way, the woman left, saying she’d never go back to that neighborhood.
“I gave this man the biggest hug I’ve ever given someone,” Redmond says, concluding the story.
@deanredmonds Wait till the end for a satisfying karen victory #restaurant #customerservice #storytime #customersbelike #serverlife #serviceindustry #serverproblems #restaurantlife ♬ Monkeys Spinning Monkeys – Kevin MacLeod & Kevin The Monkey
The video has garnered over 140,000 views and more than 158 comments as of Wednesday morning.
“I would have just thrown her food away and left,” the top comment read.
“GIRL GO TO DUNKIN??? WHAT,” a comment pointed out.
“She was on late on purpose, hoping you’d just give it to her since it’s after hours. gc’s were a backup plan that didn’t work,” a person specualted.
The Daily Dot reached out to Redmond for comment via Instagram direct message.
