So, we were out and about today and the wife was a bit puckish, so we pulled into her favorite fast food restaurant – McDonald’s.
We’ve been to this location many times, usually to get a bag of ice. The wife likes their ice for some reason. She eats ice like it is going out of style. When we pulled up, there were six cars ahead of us in line. I figured we’d be sitting there about ten minutes or so.
No more than two minutes later we pulled up to the order box, placed the wife’s order, and pulled around to pay. This is the fastest I’ve ever been through a McDonald’s drive thru line. Ever. This is the way to do customer service. Clean, efficient, no problems.
Well, almost. The wife had to make a special order. She wanted a Quarter Pounder with Cheese, with onions, ketchup, and NO mustard. That’s it. Fairly simple.
When we got to the window to pay I forked over the money. The lady asked us if we had any plans for the day, I told her what we were doing, then she said to pull up to the next window to get the food.
I pulled up to the next window. The girl there asked if we had a Quarter Prouder with Cheese, ketchup and onions. I told her that was our order. She asked us to pull around to the side, that they’d bring it out to us in a few minutes.
OK, they were doing well up to that point. I figured it would be a minute or two, they’d bring the burger, and we’d be on our way.
Five minutes later a truck pulled into the spot next to us, also waiting for their order. A few minutes after that I saw an employee walk out the door of the restaurant.
“I think this might be your order,” I told the wife.
The girl walked across the parking lot, and up to the truck next to us. She handed it over to the driver, then walked away. The truck backed out and left.
“You don’t think they gave my order to him, do you?” the wife asked.
“I don’t think so. I’d trust that they’d check the order before bringing it out, and the guy in the truck would check the order before pulling away.”
“Maybe you should go in and ask.”
I get out of the car and go in the restaurant. There are a few people in line at the counter and no one is there paying attention to the customers. Finally a girl comes from the kitchen area and takes the orders.
She asks for my order when I get to the front of the line. I told her we’d already ordered in the drive thru and someone was supposed to bring it out to us but no one had arrived yet. I gave her the order again, she went back to the kitchen, made he burger and brought it out to me. I told her thanks and went back to the car. I had the wife check it before we left. She verified they got it right.
I was really impressed when we first got through the drive thru so quickly. That’s customer service worth talking about. But they soon fell from grace and back to Earth by fumbling in getting the order made and to us.
America’s fast food industry continues to disappoint me.
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