The McBad experience

I'm pretty sure everyone has consumed McDonalds at least once in their lifetime.

Being a typical youth, the Mcperience has been a weekly affair although everyone knows how sinful and unhealthy it is for your taste buds.

So a typical visit to your Golden arches would encapsulate friendly service, heavenly food and exorbitant prices.

Sadly, enough, the only indulgence any part of my body got, was my wallet. It was happily emptying itself galdly in the hands of the ronald crew.

Let me give you a rundown of what happened.

I ordered an upsized quarter pounder plain meal. The cashier serving me gave me a bewildered look as though like I was some Martian, having their virgin encounter at a fast food outlet.

I knew then and there that something kooky will happen to me.

My pal, Aaron, who was at the adjacent counter was requesting for more chilli sauce. His cashier promptly threw 2 packets of it at his tray. Rather rude and abrupt.

We were aghast at how Aaron was being served but we maintained our composure by joking about the 60 seconds hourglass.

For those frequent patrons, 60 seconds entitles you to a free ice-cream or free bar-top dancing by the cashier. Nobody wants to see a pimply teenager or a senior citizen with dangling dentures dance as they puke and they always have the cold delightful vanila cone.

Anyway, the sand in the hourglass maxed out and so, Aaron was evidently pointing to the countdown which had ended. And also looked over at mine and hinted to the cashiers. Both of which, ignored him

For more accurate information, this "promotion" of promise of 60 seconds was between the time of 6 - 8 pm. We ordered our food at approximately 7.45pm. Furthermore, if a company fails to deliver on their promise of efficiency, and does not compensate, what would a customer think of McDonalds ?

I'm not really a fussy customer and I'm not really hard up on having an orgasmic vanila cone although I was tempted to see them dance.

Despite all that, I faced the worst of the worst. My special order of quarter pounder plain was delivered to my hands. It turned out to be an oversized hamburger.

For the uneducated fast food junkie, that's just bread, followed by a big slab of beef patty and then rounded up by another bread. So, WHERE THE HELL IS THE FREAKING CHEESE ? HELLO ?

Faster than you could recite that 5 second Big Mac chant, I revisited the cashiers. Their manager (from the looks of it) served me and told me to wait back at my seat and they will serve it back to me.

They did serve it back to me in record time of 3 minutes. I was shocked at their sudden change of outlet effiency.

Lo and behold, as expected, (I always investigate my Quarter pounder to feast my eyes on the melting cheese ...) the top cheese merely melted lightly with the bun and the bottom cheese was like a slice that you could take from Kraft's package at the Supermarket counter.

Apparently, all they did was warm up the cheese which wasn't very warm and left the burger cold. So during that time, the whole burger is lukewarm.

Aaron wanted me to go face the burger panelists but I was agitated enough and just could not be bother and just ate the half-cold burger as it is. It didn't taste like heaven as it is but halfway to heaven is good enough.

Both of us finished and Aaron wanted to take some medication. I approached the cashier one last time. I asked VERY politely. "Can I have a cup of cold water, please?"

The response. "Only that ah?". My calm reply was a firm "Yes". Her face turned from a beaming cashier to a very haughty face like I'm some sort of cheapskate customer who is here to drink your plain water. She was just plain rude.

After all that I have gone through, I contemplated whether I wanted to jot it all down.

This is one bad experience but there were so many good encounters with McDonalds staff at other outlets. They knew the meaning of Quarter pounder plain, they won't throw chilli sauce in your face and they will gladly dance on the table top just to please you.

I recall my marketing lecturer once said, one bad experience is good enough to destroy the good impression of the organization. I love McDonalds (actually only their Quarter Pounder plain) but my wallet and I are more wary now.

Having been a part-time sales assistant before, I guess you cannot please all customers. Maybe you can deduce I'm a picky customer but after all, I paid my dues at the cashier for a non-McBad experience.

- Benjamin