Hi everyone, I really need some outside perspective.
I’m a server at a restaurant and I received my first write-up at work today for “not reading the room” on a supposedly “busy” night because I took one table for about 10 minutes to do my cash out. The thing is, it wasn’t even busy — there were so many empty tables in both the bar and the dining room (half the dining room was empty) and the table I used is actually the usual one the whole team always uses for cash outs.
Later that night, around 10 pm (before I did my cash out) I ordered food for myself. At that time there were only 5 tickets on the board, and I had already gotten the okay from another manager to place the order. Despite that, I was told I shouldn’t have ordered food “in the middle of a rush” and that I should have had a customer-first mindset. But again, the restaurant wasn’t actually slammed.
I also had an issue with my cash out, so I asked a trainee if they had seen my manager, and if they did, to tell her I was looking for her. I got in trouble for that too, and was told I “deliberately asked another server for a manager on a busy night” like I was bothering another server, even though they’re not a server yet they’re in training, meaning the don’t have any tables.
Here’s what doesn’t sit right with me:
I was told this was a VERBAL warning and that next time it would be a write-up, but then I was pressured into signing paperwork. I didn’t know I had the right to refuse to sign, and I’ve never had a write-up before, so I just did it.
If it was really that busy, how did two managers have time to pull me into the office to talk about this? And why did I see both of them standing outside for 15 minutes talking about me prior to that?
I never received any kind of verbal warning about this as this is the first time this has happened and the first time I ever got in trouble for this.
Now I’m left wondering: was this fair? Should I have even been written up for this, or was it more of a misunderstanding that should’ve been handled with just a plain conversation instead?
The past few weeks I have felt like this one specific manager has something against me when we were fine months ago. I feel like she’s trying to think of any reason for me to quit or get fired. I spoke to another manager and other coworkers about this and they agree that this was unnecessary. The manager said she expect more from me as I’m one of the original servers as we reopened the restaurant and hired a whole new set of staff and since I’ve been training a lot of staff the past few months. I’ve always been praised as an excellent server, great team player, and I have regulars who come in daily asking for me. So I truly think she has something against me.
Please let me know your thoughts as I plan to talk to my higher up manager about this tomorrow.
