Sharp Corners

If you been reading here for a while you know that weird things happen when I order pizzas and tonight was no different. I had a really unpleasant experience this evening but at least it will give me the opportunity to prove that I’m only a bitch when the situation warrants it. My children’s school had a fundraiser tonight in conjunction with a local pizza place that is part of a nationwide chain. My attempt at participating in this fundraiser was such a train wreck I was inspired to write the following letter to the company via their website:

Hello,
I am writing to let you know about an experience I had with your store. I do not have their street address but they are located in MyTown, FL, the phone number is (888) 555-1212, and the manager on duty at 7 PM was named Caitlyn.

My children attend Busy Worms Elementary School and "Bad Pizza, Worse Service" approached our PTO (of which I am a member) to do a fundraiser with our school. It was held this evening so I placed my order at 5:00 p.m. and was told to expect an hour’s wait.

At 6:50 p.m. (nearly two hours later) my order still had not arrived. I called the store, said it had not arrived and was put on hold with no explanation for over five minutes. I called back a second time and asked for the manager. After another five minute wait, a woman came on the line identifying herself as Caitlyn. I told her my order had not arrived and she put me on hold for another several minutes, then came back on the line and said, "Well, I guess I could make another one and, like, send it out for free." When I asked how long it would be to receive my order, she said, "Oh, around an hour or so." I told her I had three very hungry children that needed to be in bed by then and the conversation disintegrated from there.

First the manager claimed she "had no idea where the order was, the driver won’t answer his cell phone" then claimed she’d "called the driver and he was running behind" (which I find hard to believe since she was on the phone with me). She snippily told me that they were "like, really busy with this fundraiser, you know" and I said perhaps her restaurant should not have agreed to participate in something they were not prepared to handle. She insisted they were handling the fundraiser quite well but, frankly, I can’t believe that’s the case when pizzas never arrive and drivers mysteriously vanish. She then snottily asked, "like, what do you expect me to DO about this!?" At that point there was no point in continuing the conversation so I told her to remove the charge from my debit card and send me the pizza.

For three days my children have been told at school that they needed to order pizzas tonight to win a classroom pizza party, a giant "Pizza Slice" mascot showed up at the school today, signs were posted everywhere and your restaurant really played up this event. My kids were over the moon about a pizza dinner AND getting to "help their school." Instead they are sitting at the dining room table, eating ham sandwiches and crying.

I don’t know what I am more irate about: the obnoxious manager I had to deal with, a restaurant that hyped something they couldn’t make good on or the fact that my kids are in the other room crying over something everyone promised would be a good experience. Tomorrow they get to go to school and hear their friends talk about fun pizza dinners and my kids will talk about…what, exactly?

To be honest, I don’t quite know what I expect from writing this. A reply, most definitely, but beyond that, I don’t know. Perhaps I just thought you needed to know that my first experience with "Bad Pizza, Worse Service" (one of dozens and dozens of places for me to choose from in my area) was atrocious.

All I ask from you at this point is that you not reply to me with a standard "sorry you had a bad experience" form letter. A phone call from someone in a position of authority would be nice but not necessary. I am undecided about whether to just keep quiet about this or share my bad experience with anyone who will listen. I can tell you, however, if I get a form letter from you, I will definitely opt for the latter.

Lisa Sharp

********

Okay, so how does this prove I’m not a total bitch? You’ll find out when the corporate office contacts me. If they’re friendly, then this is the last you’ll hear of the incident. If not, every word in this post that references the restaurant will be replaced with the name of the pizza chain in a font SOMETHING LIKE THIS.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 12th, 2005 at 8:03 pm and is filed under So there. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.