A waitress was left scratching her head after a bizarre interaction with a disgruntled customer who claimed she was acting “un-Australian”.
The worker was serving drinks at a Melbourne stadium where an AFL match was being played when she had a minor communication problem with a customer who wanted to pay for his beers in cash.
When she didn’t realize he was offering her a $2 coin to complete her change, the man began berating her for going against the Australian value of “helping each other”.
“The other night, I told a customer the total amount of their purchase and then told them the EFTPOS, since most people pay by card now,” the worker explained on Reddit.
“He then repeatedly tapped the fifty dollar bill on the machine to make his point (he is paying cash).”
A customer berated a young bartender after he tried to pay cash for his drinks. He became enraged when the worker didn’t see that he was offering him a $2 coin to complete his change.
The worker said the man complained about them not being “responsive” to customers and that they were “un-Australian” for not “helping each other”.
As she received the change from the man, she noticed that he was extending his palm.
‘I thought he was demanding quick delivery of the change, so I told him to be patient, please. ‘This man got upset and said he was just trying to make it easier for me by giving me an extra $2 (the total was $42),’ he said.
‘I said, “You could have said something” instead of waving his hand in front of me. I didn’t see the coin in his hand and I didn’t know what he was doing.
The comment prompted the man to start “preaching” about the Australian value of “helping each other”, which the worker deemed “irrelevant”.
‘(He said) I shouldn’t respond to him because he is the customer and he should just say sorry and move on. I sincerely apologized to get him out of the queue,” she said.
‘I know I didn’t do anything wrong. Did he mention this ‘Australian value’ because I’m not white!? Or it just takes half a year and a half.
Hundreds of people were quick to take the bartender’s side and criticized the customer as “unnecessarily rude.”
“Australian values, he’s the one who doesn’t have them,” one user said.
“Any other normal Australian would have told you he had the $2 instead of expecting you to read his mind,” a second replied.
‘It’s not hard to just say oh, I have the 2 dollars if that helps, rather than just extending your hand. Or not being an idiot by paying with cash instead of card. “You didn’t do anything wrong or be rude, but he was,” another agreed.
However, others thought it was the waiter who was being rude.
“They were both being passive-aggressive,” one man said.
“It sounds like you’re trying to start an argument with him and lecture him,” wrote another.