Cynics Unlimited

Toronto may never be renowned for it customer service, but some employees are determined to raise the bar in terms of sheer ignorance.

Two guests and myself went to a restaurant for a meal we had enjoyed many times in similar restaurants. The waitress, forgoing the inconvenience of a greeting, proceeded directly to take our orders. After the two ladies ordered she turned around to me and hastily shot out “and you?”. A minor faux pas, and so the order went in.

45 minutes passed, and this waitress managed to utter not a single word to us. This stood in stark contrast to her treatment of the other primarily-Hindi tables, where “please”, “thank-you” and smiles could be found in abundance. As always, we ordered too much food and asked for the food to be wrapped up. A guttural snarl was the best the waitress could afford us (again contrasting with the hospitality shown to some of the other tables). Finally I’d had enough and asked for the check. The waitress came out with 2 – one which was placed on the table with a kind “thank you” and one that was dumped on our table with a heavily muted “thanks” and no eye contact. Splendidly enough, the waitress’ worst act of rudeness occurred just before it was time to determine her tip, and the tip … let’s just say it involved a lot of English and a single-digit numeric value.

There’s little sense in speculating about the waitress’ motivation for such outlandish behavior. A more poignant question is why so many people have experienced similar treatment in an increasingly service-oriented economy.
From retail stores to telephone banking, the complaints remain consistent:

• Service is rude or condescending
• Workers are abrupt and try to dismiss you as soon as possible
• Employees allow the quality of their service to be influenced by personal prejudices and/or workplace politics
• Completely unknowledgeable and/or disinterested employees

Anyone who’s been shopping in New York knows that customer service in Toronto is generally boorish and hostile. One wonders what it will take before Toronto consumers as a whole demand better from its restaurants and boutiques. Perhaps these stores should be maligned in cyberspace as badly as Earthlink or AOL?