Kolory Cafe - Customer Service

OK, time for a moan - a bit of collective therapy, to get this out of my system. I have been a frequent visitor for 14 years and lived for 2 years in Krakow, a beautiful cultural city full of (mostly) nice friendly people. I have tried, with limited success, not to be either surprised or personally offended by the customer service attitude that sadly still prevails in many establishments. Why do I tell you this?, well today, a minor encounter left even me shocked at the way some people treat their customers. I was in Kolory Cafe, Les Couleurs Cafe, Estery 10, a fine place, in fact a great cafe, a place frequented often by me and my friends. An establishment which was the rightful winner of the prestigious and much sought after Krakow Post Bar of the Month in February last year. Today - I enter, order my usual - duży biały kawa, The , less than charming young barmaid, duly obliged and poured the hot beverage complete with accompanying gratis biscuit. So far, so good. I took my money from my pocket to pay, the note was slightly creased, but being British I smoothed it out and offered it to her with an apology. She said nothing, took , the money then carefully selected the correct amount of change from the till. She then proceeded to take the bundle of silky smooth notes she had taken from the till, and to my utter disbelief, scrunched them up into a wrinkled ball, as you would scrunch up paper before throwing it in the bin. She did not do this discretely below the counter, oh no, she went out of her way to hold her hands at eye level right in front of my face and look me in the eye as she did so, then she threw the crinkled mass of zloty on the counter in front of me. I was so absolutely gobsmacked I said nothing and went to sit down, however the rising fury got the better of me and I returned to the bar. I asked her very calmly and politely why she thought it was necessary to do that with the money, she simply looked at me and shrugged her shoulders. This certainly did not help...I continued... I advised her it was childish, stupid and she should be embarrassed to treat a customer in that way. She replied, "Well it was like the money you gave me" Whilst I did not want to take the place of her poor parents in trying to educate her on courtesy and manners, I did feel obliged to point out that this was the type of response I would expect to get from my son when he was 3. I left, furious and shocked, but not before taking her picture to allow anyone who cares to consider making payment in Kolory in a similar fashion to the way they seem to accept, that is by screwing up your money into a ball and throwing it onto the counter, in fact I would encourage it. If you wish to hire this fine young lady to train your staff in customer service I can provide her photo.... Was I angry, you bet, I know that here in Krakow we have many Princesses, serving in certain bars and cafes, but this girl today was simply showing her own true colours. Bar of the Month, maybe, barmaid of the month, certainly not. Kolory Cafe - she should be red faced with shame and embarrassment, sadly, I know the truth is that she couldn't care less. Meanwhile I am seriously contemplating returning to Kolory with my clothes iron under my arm and proceeding to iron my notes on the bar top prior to making payment. Watch this space for the photos!! — at Les Couleurs

- Posted by -McGoo- from Poland on Jan 24th, 2013