Employee gets fired for complaining about lack of tip on $170 order

[Crazedclerkthe2nd]

Link

Summary:

Guy works for a food truck. A group of people from a nearby company show up and make a massive order, forcing other customers to wait while the workers make all the sandwiches and whatnot necessarily to fulfill it.

The order totaled $170 and the company did not tip on it all.

Food truck guy complained about the lack of tip on his private twitter account, naming the company who ordered but not the one he worked for.

Two days later he was fired after the company who ordered the food complained to the food truck operator.

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Now, I'm kind of on both sides of this. On the one hand, even though it IS douchey, the customers are not obligated to leave a tip. I think they probably should have tipped since it was a large order that tied the food workers up for awhile.

I also don't think the guy should been fired, especially not because of a complaint from the company he called out. We often joke about when SCs say to us "I'll get you FIRED for this!" because we feel it's almost always an empty threat, but this story proves that sometimes its not.

A reprimand would have been in order, but termination seems a bit over the top. I can't help but wonder if they'd wanted to get rid of him for awhile and used this as a cover reason.

[Andara Bledin]

When you work for a small place and you name and shame the people you're complaining about and it's something that can be traced back with almost no effort, expect to get fired for so doing.

It doesn't really matter that he didn't name his employer; the company he complained about gave them a lot of business, and have the potential to give them a lot more, so public shaming is really unprofessional.

[Greenday]

When you work for a small place and you name and shame the people you're complaining about and it's something that can be traced back with almost no effort, expect to get fired for so doing.

It doesn't really matter that he didn't name his employer; the company he complained about gave them a lot of business, and have the potential to give them a lot more, so public shaming is really unprofessional.

Exactly. If your company is called out for something like this, I doubt there are too many times where the company has all gotten food from a food truck at the same time for that amount of money.

[hinakiba777]

I have to agree with Greenday and Andara. He should have known that naming such the customer company for such a large order would get him in trouble, as he publicly shamed the company mentioned.

I fully understand wanting to vent, but he could have just as easily posted the tweet with no names. He should have known he would get fired for publicly shaming the customer company.

[HYHYBT]

Any chance of separating whether it's *right* to fire someone for this from whether he should have known it would happen and whether they can do it (obviously they can)?

[Andara Bledin]

I don't think the business owner was in the wrong.

What the employee did was unprofessional, at best, and could seriously affect the company's ability to make a profit.

If there's a customer that could probably make or break whether your boss is able to keep his company going, you don't badmouth said customer in a way that can even remotely be traced back to the company. No matter how much they might suck.

[Kheldarson]

Any chance of separating whether it's *right* to fire someone for this from whether he should have known it would happen and whether they can do it (obviously they can)?

If he had kept his rant anonymous in terms of source and target, I would agree that there should be a separation.

However, he did not.

So in this case, it's right that he got fired. Sure, the company could've been lenient on him, but it would've been a final warning, if I were in charge of him. And he had better be a damn good worker that I knew was having an incredibly bad day. Because this type of behavior doesn't just reflect on him, it reflects on his bosses. And they have to be able to say that they are customer-friendly.

His actions were most decidedly not customer friendly. And the Tweet was fairly obvious in who it was from (I mean, it's not like you don't remember a $170 order or the fact that the guy there called you out on not tipping while at the truck) and, on top of that, technically unnecessary and undeserved (sure, it would be nice for them to tip, but a food truck does not run on tips. Those are extra).

So there's no division here.

[Ginger Tea]

If he was the food truck owner as well, he would find himself fired by the customer, he might still have work in the area he parks up at, but although the order inconvenienced X amount of people in the queue, $170 minus costs is profit one might not be able to afford to loose as a regular thing.

That's if it's a regular thing. Having said that, did they phone the order in ahead or did they show up with a huge written or verbal list, advanced warning and a chance to make orders between other customers is better for those not in the huge order, imagine being stuck behind that order on your own lunch break, if they were a regular thing, I might go looking else where for my lunch.