'I waited on the devil himself': Demanding customer leaves surprising tip for waiter

Author image for Remy Millisky
Remy Millisky • Writer and Editor
Jun 26, 2023 3:00 PM EDT

A waiter shared an odd day in their life: dealing with some of the silliest and most demanding customers.

Servers of America, you have my sympathies. It seems like customers are crazier than ever — but at least these waiters know they aren't alone in the war against Karens. On r/Serverlife, u/serverforadecade shared an encounter with one couple who kept them running all over the restaurant to fetch them things and wait on them hand and foot. 

In the comments, people broke down the servers' bullet points, wonder why some things bothered this person. For example, one person noted that a thing that annoyed the server was asking for dressing on the side of his salad. Why is that annoying? Surely that's just a regular request? But I also know that lots of restaurants tend to make gigantic batches of salad premade — they'll literally take trash cans and fill them with Caesar salad ingredients and dressing, mix it up, and serve that for days. So if you ask for salad without dressing, it might be on the waiter to custom-make the dish for you. 

Another commenter noted that the OP shouldn't discriminate against their customers based on age. Of course not every older person is a nightmare to wait on, but based on the OP's telling, this couple seemed to have plenty of free time to waste in the restaurant. 

Next up, this person was only paid for one-third of a website, so that's exactly what they delivered to their stingy client. 

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  • 01
    Purple - '[He] demanded I bring him salad, but refused to tell me what dinner he wanted.'
    via Sandra Seitamaa on Unsplash.com
  • 02
    Font - I waited on the devil himself! I'm a server in the U.S. at a restaurant known for its soup, salad and bread sticks. My first customer last night was an elderly couple, where the man did all the talking. In order, here's what he did:
    via u/serverforadecade
  • 03
    Font - 1. Asked for wine samples. 2. Asked for a bucket of ice for their bottle of wine, but refused to let me wrap the bottle with a towel, so it wouldn't sit directly on the ice. 3. Demanded I bring him salad, but refused to tell me what dinner he wanted. We aren't supposed to bring salad without ordering the dinner first. 4. Asked for dressing on the side.
    via u/serverforadecade
  • 04
    Font - 5. Asked to substitute his pasta for linguine. I told him we don't have linguine. He argued that we have dishes that contain linguine. I said, "Which ones, sir?" He looked and couldn't find any. 6. Wife had no idea what soup she wanted, even after I described them twice. 7. He ordered spaghetti with meat sauce, three meatballs and three sausages. When it arrived, he demanded more meat sauce because he didn't think there was enough, even though he had plenty.
    via u/serverforadecade
  • 05
    Font - 8. The busser warned me that the wife was coughing up into paper napkins. Both my manager and I checked on her, but she insisted she was fine. Later he said, "My wife is really sick. We need to go." The wife started to cough up again. 9. He wanted everything packed up. If his wife was so sick, I didn't feel comfortable touching anything she touched, but he refused to do it himself and said I have to do all the packing. He simply sat and watched the whole time.
    via u/serverforadecade
  • 06
    Font - 10. I told him I have two other booths so it would be a while. He didn't care. 11. I packed his spicy ranch (which he made me get more of), marinara, calamari, bread, salad, soup, her dinner and his dinner, all while he refused to lift a finger.
    via u/serverforadecade
  • 07
    Font - 12. I asked him to put his to-go bag next to him on the seat so I could load it up as there was no room on the table. He refused, telling me to pull a chair over from another server's table and load the bag up on that. Did you guess correctly that ten seconds after doing that, the table got sat and needed the chair back? 13. He refused to use the computer on the table and wanted to pay with cash, asking for a paper bill.
    via u/serverforadecade
  • 08
    Font - 14. He wasn't going to pay until I gave him some chocolate mints. After I gave him six mints, he said, "I want more mints!" 15. After he paid ($89 for two senior citizens), he actually gave me 20% and thanked me repeatedly for the good service. WTF?!?
    via u/serverforadecade
  • 09
    Human body - + ThatIslanderGuy Classic senior citizen service story
    via u/ThatIslanderGuy
  • 10
    Gesture - Legitimate-Meal-2290. Minus the part where he tipped decently
    via u/Legitimate-Meal-2290
  • 11
    Font - MRF1982 That's my favorite part. I was waiting for the obligatory "they gave me 50 cents and said I was the best server they ever had" But WOW. What a twist ending.
    via u/MRF1982
  • 12
    Font - Iamdrasnia Hahahahaha that gave me a good laugh. Sometimes people can just keep the tip but sometimes I think about early stage dementia and stuff and just let it roll off....but that was truly evil! 396 Reply Share serverforadecade OP. It's scary that he truly didn't think he was doing anything wrong.
    via u/Iamdrasnia
  • 13
    Font - + heyy_faraday Classic. You have the patience of a saint. I'm actually really surprised he tipped 20%. They usually just leave $2 on the table and call it good.
    via u/heyy_faraday
  • 14
    Font - TouristOk4096 You waited on a corporate quality checker. They tested how you handle everything, from health regulations, to service, and everything in between.
    via u/TouristOk4096
  • 15
    Font - Honeybuns-23 I'm 66 and always tip well because I worked as a server a long time ago. Please don't be so hard on old people. You will soon realize that life goes by so quickly that you will be old too before you know it. It's so surreal. It seems like it wasn't that long ago I was in my 30's. Each year the time seems to accelerate. Now my husband and I are trying to enjoy the rest of our lives. Sometimes we feel like we're invisible. Some younger people look at us like we're a nuisance.
    via u/Honeybuns-23
  • 16
    Font - We still have a lot to offer even though our bodies have gotten older. My husband and I are warm and friendly and love to have fun. And we are always patient and understanding when you are busy. Please don't put all seniors in the same category.
    via u/Honeybuns-23
  • 17
    Font - Problemsolver1234. Oh ya you think that's bad? How about the people who order endless bowls of soup because they're trying to break your record of how many soup refills you've done for one person and then tip the very minimum
    via u/Problemsolver1234
  • 18
    Font - Normal-Spell5339. Why is it bad that he had his own preference about the bottle and the ice?
    via u/Normal-Spell5339
  • 19
    Font - Stormy_Cat_55456 genuine question: is dressing on the side bad or not acceptable? is it actually a pet peeve of servers to do that?
    via u/Stormy_Cat_55456
  • 20
    Font - kkccola i worked at olive garden and this was just every table Imao. people are weird there but our manager would tell us if someone wanted soup or salad before ordering their dinner it wasn't worth the hassle to say no, you can just ring it in later. also, there's like 3 dishes that have linguine unless you guys were just out? all the alfredo's have linguine.
    via u/kkccola

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waiters funny stories waiter karen-customer customers restaurant customer olive garden dining funny server server life tales from your server
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