Posted on 01/23/2008 11:31:08 AM PST by HD1200
I've got news for you. That is exactly how her car WAS moved. And I'll put $1000 on a tow truck arriving before a cop in a scenario like this.
I guess you would rather start a war than settle a small problem. I sense you have more respect for laws and authority than you have for people. Handle it your way. This will result in a BIG settlement, and the cop will be reprimanded. If not, the public relations nightmare will inflict even more damage to the city and to McDonalds.
What I see here that is SOOOOOO un-conservative is all the whining about the victimhood of the cop and other diners that were “trapped” and “inconvenienced” and horror of horrors, had to “wait.” Oh my.
But then again, maybe I am being “obtuse.”
Now, there you go. All the bullies here should feel ashamed.
Now, that is funny.
“She had gotten her food according to a report yesterday. She still refused to budge out of stubbornness...I guess.”
That clarification puts this story in a new perspective. It had originally seemed that she was waiting for her order, as instructed. If not, that removes any justification for her blocking traffic to a place of business. Which, though I don’t know for sure, sounds like something that potentially really could be a crime.
“Tell her that if she moves again, free meal, free coupons. Almost always works. Much cheaper than lawyers and public relations nightmares like this”
You know, I used to work for a Chick Fil A. There were three or four customers who would call the store and say that their food wasn’t right, and demand coupons. Problem was, we never saw them ever buy food. We were convinced that they were scamming us for free food.
Finally, one day one of the ladies called, saying we forgot her fries the Sunday before. Of course, Chick Fil A’s national policy is to be closed on Sunday. I tried to give the lady an out, asking her if she was SURE it was Sunday. “Oh yes, me and my family came by there right after church”. I told her we were closed on Sunday, and then she told me I was a racist for calling her a liar. My Vietnamese girlfriend at the time thought THAT part was funny. :-)
To make a long story short, my boss gave her coupons, even though she had just confirmed that she had been stealing all along. He said it was bad for publicity to argue, but I always thought that his policy made it easy for people to be rewarded for bad behavior.
So I figured “why fight it?”. So I told my sister, who drove a lot at the time, “If you ever are short of money, just call the nearby Chick Fil A and say that they left out food”. Easy meal, without spending a penny.
Apparently, people on this thread have the same idea. Reward an old hag, while the patient customers behind her get punished with a 20 minute wait. Yes, that makes sense. And so does gun control, Socialism, and High Taxes.
Bingo!
That makes for bad parenting, bad public policy, and especially bad foreign policy.
The description is the problem. Here is what I suspect (no proof) happened: MD's manager asked the woman to move up to a curb area marked as no parking or standing. She complied. The curb area was a fire lane (fire marshall) or was covered in an agreement between MD's and the municipality, either would give the officer jurisdiction even if vehicles could get around her. The MD manager did not have authority to direct her to park there, but she did not know that. Stubbornness on all parts prevailed and the situation escalated.
If, on the other hand, there was no fire lane or agreement, the MD manager has authority to designate parking or withhold it (trespass), and the officer responds to his directive.
These two different situations engender different consequences for the woman, the officer and the MD manager.
Great post!
It’s true. Roy Rogers, Tyson’s Corner Mall, McLean, VA, circa 1979.
We actually had two people on each cash register, one taking the orders and punching them in, while the other took money and made change. The instant the cash-handling cashier was done giving change to one customer, she slammed the drawer, hit “Total” (since the next order had already been punched in by the order-taker) and dealt with the next customer’s payment and change. The line was moving way too fast for one person to both punch in an order and handle the cash. Each line had a food-grabber, a food-bagger (who filled the bags with the food that the grabber had just pulled off the food line as the names of the items came out of the customer’s mouth), at least one person running the soda fountain for each line plus an extra soda person just pre-filling/capping all 3 sizes of Cokes to supply both lines, and one person at the shake machine/coffee machine station.
Everybody had to listen as the customer spoke and get what they ordered to the counter almost immediately; the food bagger would repeat items that the customer hadn’t said very loud or had waffled about, because if the customer said “hamburger”, by the time s/he said “no make that a cheeseburger” a second later, the food grabber was already over at the burger chute and might miss the change. Shakes were the slowest because the flavors weren’t pre-mixed — we had to fill the cup with plain shake mix, then add a squirt from the right flavor pump, and stick it under the spinner to mix it — took about 30-40 seconds, which was FOREVER in this setting. There was also a person assigned to keep re-stocking cups, lids, plastic utensils, ketchup packets, etc on the front line, because there was no way anyone could leave the line to go grab more of these items as they ran out. And another person who did nothing but relieve others for meal and bathroom breaks.
Customers grasped what was going on and got with the program because they had a minute or so when they were close enough really hear and see what was going on on the front line before their turn to order. By the time they were face to face with the order-taker, nearly all of them realized that they were supposed to hurry it up. And God help the person who got to the front of the line without having decided what to order, if they happened to land in Arlene’s line. Arlene was a big, tall, smart, fast, confident, black high school student, and she’d basically tell the muddle-headed customer what they were going to have and few of her victims dared to challenge her :-) I saw more than one of these unfortunate souls walk off peering into their bags, with a look on their face clearly indicating that they wondered what might be inside and were already resigned to eating whatever it was. The peer pressure of a line of 100 or more hungry people trying to get fed persuaded most of them not to complain.
The average time for one customer, from the time they opened their mouth to start saying what they wanted, to the time they walked away with their food and drink and was probably close to a full minute, but they were passing through the cash register point (which was automatically recording the ordering process) at the average rate of one every 14 seconds.
It was actually pretty cool, though I really liked it better when I was one of the worker bees, than later on when I did a stint in that shop as a manager (the 14 seconds per customer day was when I was a worker bee). Big wigs would sometimes come out from headquarters (Marriott, headquartered in nearby Maryland) and stand by the wall on one side of the line and just watch in amazement.
I was surprised to see she was driving a Lincoln. Would have thought this jerk drove a Cadillac.
By referring to her as an “old hag”, you are showing a distinct bigotry toward older citizens. Did you ever stop to think that others will treat you as bad or worse if and when you get to that age? Respect for people begins with respect for your elders. Do you disrespect your parents too?
Often, instead of blaming one person or another, you need to move on. You are being as stubborn about not moving on as the woman may have been about not moving her car.
It’s not the Middle East. And there are few people who would take advantage of the coupons all the time. You’ll always have a few people like that. Just identify the repeat offenders.
There are plenty of businesses that I no longer frequent due to bad service. One is an office supply national chain. They are out well over a thousand dollars in business since they refused to satisfy my complaint. Another national chain now has that business.
Any business in Florida should be well prepared to deal with older Americans.
After Reading the police report...The lady definitely precipitated the event...
She wanted to keep the fight going after getting her food.
I’m sure the cop wrote the report to put himself in the best light but the witnesses back him up.
I’m not saying the police report is 100% accurate but 2 witnesses back the cop up.
She got her food and then leaving the vehicle parked where it was got out of the car and went back to the police car to continue the argument.
No matter the situation prior to this , from this moment on she was definitely in the wrong...and deliberately provoking a situation..
If you read the police report she had plenty of room to move...She just wouldn’t..
After she was cuffed the officer pulled her car up and allowed the other customers to move..
I’d bust her for false arrest. She prevented the officer and presumably others from going about their business. Actually, she sounds like a case of senile dementia to me.
The ordinance says nothing about 'endanger . . vehicles', it says not to 'endanger the safe MOVEMENT of . . vehicles.' Clearly she endangered the MOVEMENT of the vehicles behind her.
Honestly, yes I do. I don't think its "ludicrous" to say that she is exempt from the city's obstruction statute due to her age.
Feel free to dial back if you calm down. ;-)
Evil lives!
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