Jenn patronizes what is possibly one of the fastest Burger King drive-thrus on record. That doesn’t mean the fast food joint serves customers food quickly. She says its workers game the drive-thru timer system by asking people to pull off to the side after they order and wait to be served.
The practice is widespread and not specific to Burger King, but Jenn’s Whopper factory seems like a particularly egregious offender.
She writes:
Today I stopped by my local Burger King store number #[redacted]. I usually try to avoid this particular BK as they have a habit of asking cars going through the drive thru, to pull over to the front to wait for their order. However, my brother wanted some food so I went through the drive thru. The problem started when I reached the window to pay and receive my food. The worker ignored me for a few moments and then without even opening the window, asked me to pull around to the front for my order. I tried to let her know I hadn’t paid yet, but she wasn’t facing me, so I pulled around to the front. When I got there, 3 other cars were waiting for their orders and had parked in between 2 lanes, on the side of the curb, etc. All are places you’re not supposed to park. The last time I had to pull around, there were so many cars trying to move in and out or wait on the side for their order, that a car almost hit me.For today’s order, a worker came out after a few minutes and asked me for my receipt, to which I told him I never received one. He seemed to be listening to his headset and then said I didn’t pay for my food and simply stood there silent. I explained to him that the other worker had asked me to pull around without taking any payment and that I could pay now. He stayed silent until I asked him how much the total was and I gave him some cash. It wasn’t until after I had left that I realized the worker who took my payment never gave me my change, which while it wasn’t much, was still something.
It’s likely that the BK workers are trying to beat the timer, but by asking me to pull around to the front, even when there’s no one else in the drive thru, I feel like there’s no point in even using it. It’s certainly not convenient for me to order then have to pull around to try to find parking and then do a back and forth with the worker. In addition, if I were paying with a credit card, how do I know the worker won’t be copying down my card number on his walk back to the restaurant? At least when I actually pay through the drive thru, I can see the card the entire time. Overall, bad service and poor policies will keep me from making this Burger King a regular stop.
What do you suspect your drive-thrus of doing to cheat their timer systems?
Previously: Burger King Drive-Thru Workers Try To Cheat The Timer System
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I suspect they do the same thing. I understand being asked to pull ahead if you have ordered 7 combos, and all of them are special orders, but when I roll up and say “give me the number 1 with a coke”, why am I am moved off to the side to sit for 5 min, wondering if someone will remember to bring my order out?
I agree. Special orders or large orders are one thing. But ordering one or two common items should not require being asked to pull around.
If you are ordering 7 combos that are all special orders, you shouldn’t be in the drive through.
How then do I order at 1 am?
Oooh…the stoner express!
My g/f works at a Wendy’s and tells stories of when she used to do latenight drive through the carloads of stoners coming through with the cliche “Uhhh…one second man…” to the back seat “Ok, what do you want? Nuggets?”
“Yeah, gimmie two..no, no..three nuggets…and a frosty…”
…repeat with each passanger…then two more orders for people too stoned to come or didn’t fit in the car….
She said it ceased to be fun after the third or fourth repeat of the cars and they’d just start fucking with the orders of anyone obviously fucked up to pass the time.
You wanna talk stoner express??? Taco Bell after 10 pm! It is unbridled hilarity. Like your own personal cheech and chong movie!
They may have you pull over to beat the timer. Typically if it’s lunch rush (12-1) the corporate headquarters monitor the average drive through times and often offer incentives to the stores with the best times. Usually they only “park” you if something in your order isn’t going to be ready in under a minute. When I worked at McDonald’s this was usually someone ordering a 20 piece nugget which inevitably we’d only have 19 left and someone just put another batch in the fryer which takes like 4 minutes.
I’ve never heard of them doing it without taking the money first though, but in this case that seems like it was a miscomunication as the worker who came outside seemed surprised the OP hadn’t paid.
Well, the only real “incentive” is “you get to keep your jobs.”
I worked at BK for a while. We had a bucket on a pole that we would use to lower the times when there were no cars. You place the bucket on the pressure plate over and over again to make it think that cars are going through it. I didn’t like it, but I management said I had to. I think it is like grade inflation, all the BK’s are doing it in some way.
lol, when I had a job there, there was an after lunch shift where your job was to just drive laps around the drive-thru until we got the clock down to a suitable number…
BK corporate asks for such low numbers because all the chains cheat the system and they don’t know what an actual realistic time is now, leading to more cheating the system.
when I worked for Wendy’s we were the fastest in the district and did NOT cheat! we were a well oiled machine let me tell ya! We got jackets and free food and trophies etc. Even an autographed pic of Dave Thomas(this was when he was alive)
The new one that opened down the street did this to me, but there wasn’t much room to pull over so there was next to no room for others to pass. Needless to say others weren’t happy for the 12 minutes i sat there waiting for my food.
That’s not your problem and don’t lose sleep over it. Management needs to get their act together and start pushing their employee’s to move faster and work harder.
Has anyone but me noticed that in this country, the norm is businesses is to constantly asking us to “do something” for them. Keep a mental checklist everytime you go out whether its the bank, Kohl’s, Target, KFC, BK, it’s fricking everywhere. We’re spending our money, but, you need to appease our ineptitude and give us something in return. I don’t like being a jerk but sometimes I’ll be one in such a case and I”ll say “No”. Why are we so afraid in this country to saying “No”. It’s your money so make them work for it.
ever work fast food? they push their workers way too hard for what they’re paying them. the problem is they never staff enough of them.
That’s not a fast food problem, that’s a service industry problem in general.
Management needs to get their act together and get rid of the timer, more like.
That will never happen because what else will managers be able to rib each other over at they’re district meetings?
ugh… their. [need coffee and an edit button]
stay in the drive-thru and ask for free food, see what you can get away with
I’d imagine based upon my experience with fast food employees you’d get food that may have been tampered with AKA spat upon.
You mileage may vary.
In this case I think you should not redact the location. Shame them.
I agree, Lets all know what location it is and call up corporate and complain about it.
I was just about to write the same thing. I have NEVER experienced or even heard of this (I have been asked a handful of times by different restaurants to pull off to wait for fries after receiving the rest of my meal. Each time I was warned in advance of purchase and given approximate wait time) and I think this particular restaurant should be called out since this seems to be a regular practice specific to this location rather than something frequently done at Burger King’s nationwide.
Thirded.
Glad My burger king isn’t like that. In fact I got a free whopper coupon I’ll go there for lunch!
That would work if “shame them” translated into “people politely, but firmly, expressing their dismay to the manager and to BK Corporate,” but being as this is the Internet, Consumerist is probably trying to avoid setting the BK up for harassment. And if you are about to ask “but why is that a bad thing” that should make it clear why the location is redacted.
What timer are they beating? If they are cheating burger kings internal “best drive thru” competition… It will catch up with them eventually, when people stop going there. Being asked to pull around isn’t THAT big of a deal… yeah, they forgot to ask you to pay, and you got the standard “fast food quality” service from a GED candidate… You still can’t beat their original chicken sandwich… mmmmmm… original chicken sandwich…
There is a timer in store (usually a big red LED) and they are supposed to get the order out (car leaves) before it runs out. This timer can directly affect the managers bonuses. A good friend of mine was assistant manager at a BK for years.
I never pull up at a fast food restaurant unless I’ve ordered a lot of food (which is rare to never).
There is a timer in store (usually a big red LED) and they are supposed to get the order out (car leaves) before it runs out. This timer can directly affect the managers bonuses. A good friend of mine was assistant manager at a BK for years.
I never pull up at a fast food restaurant unless I’ve ordered a lot of food (which is rare to never).
Being asked to pull around isn’t THAT big of a deal
Waiting a long time for your food is a big enough deal to complain about though. The thing about being asked to leave the line is that this is why they don’t get caught at being consistently slow.
Yeah, I agree. If it were just a case of “your fries will be up in 1 min, can you pull ahead?” that is one thing. But do my fries ever come in 1 min? No, they come when they finish off the orders of the 5 people behind me, then someone asks “who’s fries are these?”. Then someone meanders outside to hand me my order 6-7 min later.
I take it youve never worked fast food.
With the drive thru, each order is timed from the time the car arrives at the window to the time it leaves (usually using a ground sensor). The store has a target time that they’re supposed to come in under, consistently. If they dont, and their average starts slipping, they start taking flak from corporate. I believe for McDonald’s is 1:30 (90 secs).
What this particular location is doing is essentially making their thru time less than 20 seconds, if they can. It looks better at corporate when they do their audits because their average time will be well below the requirement.
90 seconds? Wow, the McD’s drive thru near my house was always horribly slow. I timed them once, and it took 11 minutes from the time I ordered until I actually got my food. They don’t bother asking people to pull over to the side, so I would think someone would notice their huge drive thru wait times. I just go inside now, even if it’s to go. I’m out the door in a minute or two and the drive through line is still right where they were when i went in.
I’m guessing that at night since there is no manager around, they probably judge the performance of the staff based on the time it takes them to complete an order via the drive-thru time. If they get people to pull through then it doesn’t matter if it takes them 3+ minutes to make 1 burger, nobody except them and the customer would be any wiser so they can slack off as much as they want as long as nobody complains.
This happens to me all the time. I don’t like salt on my fries so almost every time, McDonald’s will ask me to pull out to the curb. This usually also happens when we go through the drive thru and order more than 1 of their specialty coffee drinks. I’m assuming they probably get penalized for the extra time each car spends at the window so that’s why they do it but I do find it quite annoying. As the OP wrote, it is frustrating when the parking lot is busy and you are trying to maneuver not only around other cars, but pedestrians as well. It also seems to take them a lot longer to get the food to you when you pull off to the side, almost like they forget about you.
Wait a minute…you go to the McDonalds drive-thru and ask for no salt on your fries? Thanks for trying to hold up the line asking them to fry a new batch just for you. Go inside if you’re going to order something like that.
I don’t think my request is any different from someone asking for a burger with no pickles. They actually have to take the time to make it “fresh” as opposed to just handing you what’s already been sitting up there for who knows how long. New batches of fries are constantly being made so I don’t really think the extra 2 minutes it takes to switch baskets is going to kill anyone.
Uh, haven’t all fast food places switched to making sandwiches to order once Burger King made a big deal over it back in the 90s? Even if I order a hamburger at McDonalds with nothing special I still see the worker look at my order on the monitor, prepare the hamburger, and put it in the bag. Nothing is pre-made and sitting on racks anymore.
In theory, kaotica79, you are correct. However, you are leaving out the time involved in making each of those things.
In the case of the burger, it’s a really simple thing. You just *don’t* put the pickle (or whatever) on the sammich. It eliminates about 1 second (if that) out of the time it takes to make said sammich.
However, in the case of the fries…..the majority of the folks out there like salt on their fries. Therefore it makes more sense to maintain a stock of salted fries. When someone orders no salt on their fries, a new batch has to be dropped into the fryer. Cooking of said fries can take anywhere from 2:00 to 3:30 and the fries have to handled special (can’t be dumped into the bin and mass handled).
So you see…leaving a pickle off actually eliminates preparation time (granted only by a second, if that). Cooking up a whole new batch of fries *just for you* actually adds to the preparation time, and, consequently, the wait time for you.
And everyone else behind you in the drive thru lane.
Just have some common courtesy…just because you have to wait doesn’t mean everyone else should have to wait.
Don’t worry; when someone asks for no salt on their fries, we just take a handful of salted fries and dump them back in the fryer : D What, it washes them! Oh, I’m sorry, you thought they were making special fries for you.. haha, stupid.
Seriously. If you just want fresh fries, ask for them. Fresh fries at are at worst a minor delay, salt free are a major delay and a hassle.
If you ask for fresh, there’s a good chance that there’s already a new batch up (lunch time they don’t usually have a chance to sit, and if the crew is decent at night they won’t keep any up and drop a batch as soon as you pull up) and preparing them is fast anyway. Also muscle memory kicks in and the whole process is much smoother.
If you ask for salt-free, a new batch needs to be made right then and there. They can’t be dropped into the bin for easy scooping, so the kitchen staff has to use tongs to put them manually into your carton. This doesn’t work as well, and you can’t cram as many in and they’re more likely to be damaged. Results are you don’t get as many, and they’re not of the same quality. And you’ve added 3:00 (2:30 cook time, 30 seconds other) to the time it takes to make your order.
And as much as I pushed my team to stick to standards and not slack off, if you get to the window and ask for salt to put on your fries… I wouldn’t blame anyone for ‘forgetting’ to put it in.
Actually, when asking for salt-free fries what they generally do is take the next batch coming out of the fryer, hold a fry container under them, and “catch” fries in the container while they are emptying the rest of them into the large vat. So, no wasted time for anyone and a happy customer.
No they don’t, That oil is 350 degrees and that invites burns. Oil burns are the worst because the oil sticks to your skin and doesn’t wash off. You need to wipe it off and then cool it quickly.
Yeah, I kind of hate this person too.
Just so you know, I don’t ask for no-salt fries to be a douche. Years ago, I found out I had to cut out the salt due to a medical condition. I have since become accustomed to eating little to no salt on my food, including fast food. I will be the first to say that if it’s lunch time and the line is wrapped around the building, I won’t ask for them to be no-salt because I feel bad that they are so busy. I am also not the douche bag that will go in and complain every time I ask for no salt fries and end up with salted fries. I understand that mistakes happen. But if the fast food chains want to maintain a quick level of service at the drive thru, they should clearly state that no special orders can be taken at the drive thru – plain and simple. If that’s the case, I’ll happily go inside for my order. But until then, I have a right to ask for unsalted fries as much as the person behind me has the right to ask for a Big Mac minus pickle, add extra onion, light mayo etc.
So your medical condition limits you to the ludicrous amount of salt in fast food but draws the line at the really ludicrous amount with salted fries?
I’d check your doctor’s credentials , if I were you.
Why is it ok to do that inside but not outside? Is there a “no special order in the drive through” policy I was unaware of?
It’s because you have a special order. It only makes sense that for a special order they will make you pull over to the side. In your case the special order is actually complex (for McDonald’s) and requires time to make, and it isn’t fair to penalize the store for such things. It isn’t as bad if you just don’t want pickles on your burger, because that can be done faster. But no-salt fries, nuggets, and fillet-o-fish are special in that they aren’t even partially ready until someone asks for them.
Special in that they have to take a small amount of fries, fry them up, let them cool, and then put them in a fry holder, instead of just taking the fries from the fry bin like they do for everyone else. Either that, or they have to wait for a fresh order to come up along with an empty fry bin (they can then do your order and salt the other fries after).
Either that or you do it the lazy way like some of the McDonald’s I’ve been to with someone who doesn’t like salt on their fries. Just give everyone unsalted fries. Yeechh…
No salt on your fries? WTF? I have officially heard it all. A typical meal at fast food restaurants has about 3X the recommended sodium with/without the salt on fries. Seriously, no way would I fill that order. Do you also ask for a flat Coke? If so, how long does that take? I mean, same thing right?
Tough shit, counter monkey – it’s not that unreasonable a request. I ask for no salt on my fries every time (well, the very rare times I can actually stomach the horrible mcdonalds food). Its not so much a concern for how much salt I’m getting (although sometimes – McDonalds sometimes salts the everlivin fuck outta their fries), but more me trying to get fries that havent been sitting there for half an hour and are stone cold.
I frequently ask for no salt on the fries. My local McDonalds has a habit of literally POURING salt on – I mean, shaking that shaker for over 10 seconds. I actually like to taste the fries, strangely enough.
No salt on fries? That’s “officially hearing it all”?
If you’re ordering fries with no salt, you should be ordering that inside. The rest of us would like to get our food today, you know?
Well thanks for that bit of wisdom. If you want to lower your salt intake, dont you dare make tbax929 wait a second, tbax929′s time is more important than your health.
My time too, and the rest of the people behind you in line that you’re pissing off. If you are going to ask them to make fresh fries just for you, it’s going to take like 5 minutes, so go inside.
Recently I got asked to pull ahead and wait for a smoothie, double QP meal, and a drink. They gave me everything but the drink and I didn’t realize till I was halfway home that they missed the drink. Another risk of pulling up ahead and waiting (usually longer, like you said)–you might forget what you ordered, haha.
It’s pretty rare that any fast food window has asked me to pull ahead–and usually it’s only if I order something unusual. Like. Chicken strips. But that hasn’t happened in aaages.
This burger king certainly sounds like they’re trying to cheat their system; it certainly sounds like unusual behavior. But these days it often seems faster and chepaer to just park, walk in, order, and then leave, rather than wait through the drive-through with your engine idling the whole time.
Its funny the BK by me does the same thing … The one time they forgot to tell me to pull off to the side and tried to get me to pay twice for two different orders (I’m assuming the person behind me).
They need to get rid of these things. They do nothing but piss people off.
The Wendy’s near my house does this all the time. If you order, lets say, 2 baconators. You usually have to wait by the door. They say it’s to cook them and to let other people behind you go.
Unless things have changed since I worked there in HS, an “acceptable” time is 90 seconds. We only asked people to pull into a parking spot during the old 39 cent burger/49 cent cheeseburger insanity specials.
Someone from corporate or the franchise will realize that an average of 15 seconds isn’t right.
I was at a BK in my home town that used to do the same thing. One day, we pulled up to the window at an off peak time, and the cashier took our money and asked us to pull forward and park (we had a simple order like an order of chicken fingers and a hamburger for the lids). As we were the only ones in the drive-thru and we were not delaying anyone elses order, I refused and advised that if/when another patron pulls in behind me and their order was complete I will gladly pull ahead, but until then I will sit where I am. The store manager came over and demanded that I move, again I repeated my position when she informed me that “the timer is still counting and we are graded on our time”. I responded that perhaps if she was being graded on her time that she should get in the back and start getting our order together instead of standing at the window arguing with me about how I was hurting their business and inconveniencing other customers. 5 seconds later my order was in my hands.
We sent an E-mail to BK Corporate to advise them of how the store was attempting to artificially increase their efficienct rating. They replied back appoligizing and thanking me, and to this day, I have never been asked at that store to pull ahead
You give your lids hamburgers?
5 seconds later, there was spit on your food.
That’s why I don’t mess with them….
“That’s why I don’t mess with them…”
good grief, show guts and stand up once.
I hope you enjoyed the big honking loogie that they added to your burger for being such a special customer.
I was in an SUV so I was sitting higher and had a clear view of the manager and the Drive Thru attendent throughout the situation. The rest of the crew had no clue (and probably didn’t care) what was going on. I did inspect the food before giving it to the kids however just in case.
Oh, if they did something like that to my burger (and yes, after a confrotnation, I’d CHECK) … I most assuredly WOULD enjoy it.
…
All the way to the Health Inspector’s office.
They may nothave beat their timer for service – but they might just set a new speed record for being SHUT DOWN for HEALTH CODE VIOLATIONS.
>:)
Good for you for standing your ground. This shits gotta stop with these places. I am not going to appease inept managment so they can earn “brownie points” because frankly, I don’t care. Not my problem. If more customers did this then this would not happen because these places would be forced to pick up the speed and work faster. We have gotten too complacent in always doing something for inept management. Stand your ground and say no. The problem is that these folks aren’t used to hearing the word, “No” because we’re in the habit of saying “Yes” all the time.
While yes, this is an awesome case of standing your ground, and I applaud it, I feel like there’s a bigger problem – why the priority on the drive-thru?
I was at a BK last week and was low on gas so parked and walked in. There was one guy who had just finished ordering, and no one waiting in line. It took well over seven minutes for me to get my food. In that time, at least three cars passed through the drive-thru.
Do these guys just drop everything when a drive-thru order comes in? They need some sort of system to track counter times as well: print out a ticket when you order, then scan it as you hand it back when your food’s ready.
What’s this timer of which you write?
It’s inside the store and related to production times.
Most people don’t understand that fast food places are not restaurants but point of service food manufacturing mini-factories and run similar to factories that make products.
Apparently, Taco Bell expects its workers to be able to make a plain taco in about 2.7 seconds. They have portion controlled scoops and dispensers for pretty much every step of the process.
Get out of your cars! How far have we fell we can’t take a short walk to get our food. I think it is quicker to go inside anyway. I also like I can check the freshness of the fries if I go in. If I see them coming outbI order them, if I see I would be getting older ones I don’t.
When you got a car full of kids, you don’t want to hassle them out after going someplace and just want to bring the food home.
Yup, drive through use exploded with the universal adoption of car seat laws and seat belt laws.
The logistics of getting two car seated children out of the car and into the store make the un-belted and un-car-seated “hopping out” of yore seem like a speed sprint.
And then throw in the fact that most young children have to be helped up into a mini-van or suv and the drive through is a great thing for parents and caregivers…
Unintended consequences of car seat and seat belt laws: obesity.
Forgot to mention that mom/dad/adult also has to release/open the child’s/children’s door(s) due to door safety interlocks. Yet more time.
Sometimes you just don’t have the time. Walking around the park for a while and letting the kids play a bit longer before you gotta go to work, don’t necessarily get the time to cook and need to do a quick pop through and a meat factory.
“Unintended consequences of car seat and seat belt laws: obesity.”
Low causation.
Yep. I’ve noticed that if we are coming home after a long day of being out and about or coming back from vacation, our habits have gotten worse.
It used to be that we would stop at a late hour megamart, pick up some ingredients that we could quickly assemble, and go home. Now, with the hassle of getting the kids in and out of the car, it is easier to leave them in their seats and do a quick drive thru run. We’ve eaten a lot more BK and TB in the last couple years than I has since my time in college.
How far have we fell we can’t take a short walk to get our food.
If they don’t want people using the drive-thrus then they shouldn’t have a drive-thru. It makes no sense to berate the OP for using a service offered by the business.
Besides, the drive-thru is faster in most cases.
I only go to fast food places during very late-night car trips. Some places close the restaurant portion after a certain time, so the drive-thru becomes the only option if I want some fries at 2 am.
Actually, I think the most important thing about going inside is seeing how clean the place is.
Ordering delivery from places that you’ve never stepped foot in can be even worse…
I almost never eat fast food myself (Chick-fil-A->Yay!), but my wife occasionally likes McD’s. I always would go in and order her food since I thought that same way you did, however I noticed that I was waiting a long time while they churned out drive-thru orders. No timer for us inside customers, so I would end up screwed, waiting and waiting for food long after people who went through the drive-thru.
I hate fast food places (again, except Chick-fil-A)…
If everyone went in to get their orders, you’d run out of parking spots and the line inside would be 30 people deep, and you’d wait 15 min to get the food.
*fallen
I AGREE 100%!
Almost every time I visit a fast food place, there is a line of 5-8 cars waiting for the drive-thru while the lobby barely has anyone in it. Why on earth would people sit in their cars???
I park my car, walk in, get my food and pass people who are still waiting at the drive-thru. Makes no sense. at all.
Yeah, go inside and wait on line! With dozens of angry, impatient people and screaming kids!
Brilliant.
But their doors are locked when I typically use the drivethrough
(read: I only use the drivethrough when it’s the only option)
I’ve had drive through places ask me to pull off and wait, normally because they were waiting on fries or something. It doesn’t bother me, since I like hot ass fries, and it doesn’t usually add but a couple minutes to my wait. If anyone stiffed me on change though, or acted this disinterested in my business, I would stop going there at the very least.
If someone stiffed me on my change like that I wouldn’t get mad, but rather I would get even. I would make it a habit of going there, ordering cheap things off the menu and refusing to move forward just to mess with their precious timer. Granted, that would be if I had spare time…
What’s an ass fry and why do you like them hot?
Damn, I was going to reply with this exact response!
you mean you had to sit in your car in front of the building?! how dare they ask you to do that! it’s only appropriate for you to sit in your car at the proper drive-thru window!
Years ago, I was forgotten about when asked to pull up. I don’t do it anymore.
You didn’t read the article at all, did you?
It seems like every time I am told to pull up so they can beat the timer, they forget parts of my order, forget me, forget the order of orders. Also, pulling forward in some locations in my area is dangerous, especially with a drive thru worker screaming at me out the window to pull up further, therefore sticking my nose into traffic.
What does the store’s manager or BK HQ have to say about this? Maybe they would rectify the problem if they knew about it. (Obviously the manager knows about it, but maybe he doesn’t realize how his customers feel)
Call corporate. They are gaming the internal system. Stores will get bonuses and other rewards for maintaining low drive thru times. I bet the corporate overlords wouldn’t be particularly happy to find out they’ve been rewarding a store for pissing off its customers.
You’d be surprised. A lot of corporations are willing to look past things like this if the numbers look good. You have to remember, for the most part they only care about the numbers, not so much what is actually being done to accomplish them.
I disagree – corporate instituted those metrics in the first place because low response times (generally) lead to higher customer satisfaction. Gaming this particular metric has the opposite effect. So I’d bet that the upper levels of management would be pissed.
I bet it would only take a few instances of refusing to park before that BK got the message.
I agree completely. I told my story above how I refused to move when the only reason for me to move was to help the store improve their performance time (the manager asked that I move). I informed corporate (not complaining to ask for anything in return, just informing them of the practice). Since I complained, I have never been asked to pull forward at that store so I suspect that the message was received loud and clear, especially when the average time used to read under 1 minute, and it now reads closer to 2 minutes every time I go into the store.
The King would not be pleased.
My boyfriend wanted to go to Captain D’s (nasty) and they were doing the same thing. People in the parking lot were getting mad because they couldn’t get out of their spaces because no one had anywhere to “park and wait”. We waited 19 minutes (after we paid) and man, was my boyfriend pissed. He finally went inside all mad and got his food.
I like to call this the ‘forgotten zone’ at the McDonald’s near my house if they tell you to pull forward you might as well go somewhere else. Out of sight out of mind. I once waited 18 minutes, finally went inside to talk to the manager and sure enough they had forgotten about me.
Now if they ask me to pull forward I just ask for a refund and go somewhere else.
That sounds like the best thing to do. Why give them your money at all if they’re going to do this? I haven’t come across this yet, but if it happens I’ll just do what you do.
Mostly I park and go in because when I go through the drive-thru they mess up my order and I don’t have time to check it before I leave, what with cars behind me. At Taco Bell they do it every time. I never ever do drive-thru there anymore.
I saw a McDonalds nearby that has a parking space in front of the store with a legitimate sign that says “Reserved for drive-thru customers”. Seriously. This place has a spot reserved for people to wait.
I’ve seen this too. It makes sense for orders that would legitimately take a long time (huge orders or special orders).
This is common practice as many items do take longer. In busy times if the fry station has gotten behind or with certain items like chicken strips that aren’t as common and are *gasp* made to order. So they ask you to park in those spaces.
Obviously these arent supposed to be used in the manner depicted in the article.
A couple of the newer ones near me have this. We were directed to it once when my friend requested unsalted fries. I think for special orders or large orders, it’s a good solution because it avoids some of the congestion.
We have three of those at our McDonald’s. Most of the time, they aren’t full with even one person.
“I tried to let her know I hadn’t paid yet‘
If you hadn’t paid, why didn’t you simply drive away? If they get enough drive aways, they’ll stop this BS.
She wasn’t the one who wanted the food, it was her brother.
OP here.
I personally didn’t care much about driving away, but my brother wanted the food. Trust me, I wouldn’t have gone here if he hadn’t wanted it & I though I’d be nice and just do it.
BK in Dallas does this same tactic even when no cars are behind me. I’m not sure how this “cheats” their timer system but next time I am going to ask why I need to pull up when there are no cars behind me and then promptly refuse.
By asking you to pull ahead they are cheating the timer. They have sensors installed at various points in the drive thru lanes so that when a vehicle passes over a certain spot (right before you get to the window), the time resets from the previous customer and the time starts ticking up. When the vehicle crosses the sensor at the end of the drive thru lane, the timer stops and the time for the transaction is recorded. As far as the timer system is concerned, you paid for and received your order in 52 seconds, even though you sat patiently in the parking lot for 5 minutes. Your 5 minute wait is never recorded.
My theory is that the management probably gets some type of bonus for drive thru times. I don’t think that many minimum-wage high school students would conspire to trick the timers, esp if there is no compensation for them. It would have to be organized by the higher-ups, who probably have a monetary stake in the clock times.
The store I worked at had a window timer instead of a line timer, so instead of tracking total time between order and pickup, it only tracked how long the car was parked in front of the pickp window. Target times for lunch was around 25 seconds, and a store best of around 18 (it’s been awhile and I don’t remember the numbers exactly, but I do remember we were doing EXTREMELY well on that 18 second day). Evening time was 45 seconds IIRC, but was rarely met (low staff, and people not in a hurry to pull ahead).
25 seconds is hard to hit. You can lose up to 10 by the person being slow when pulling up or away, and in this time frame you need greet, ask if they want condiments, hand out the drink, and hand over the order. This is hard to do even in the given time, and if pretty much anything goes wrong it’s blown.
I always go in…they rip you off at the drive-through. 9 out of 10 times when I used to use the drive-through, my order was wrong or I was severely shorted on fries.
I’m digging the “pull over? no it’s a cardigan but thanks for asking” tag.
I think the OP should tell anyone in the car with them that this BK is not an option. Tell whoever is in the car with you that the only options are a different restaurant or a different BK location. Also contact corporate because Riroon13 is right and the local management has to be the reason this is occurring.
Sounds like the simplest thing to do is just refuse to pull aside. How can anyone expect the service to get better if the people working there are tricking the timer? Politely say no. They can’t make you move and the longer they sit there arguing with you the longer the timer goes.
Enjoy the free “secret sauce” from the ticked off worker…
… enjoy the free visit from the Board of Health.
OP here.
I have thought about just refusing to pull over, but i’m worried they might do something to the food.
OP here.
Some of you have said it is acceptable for the fast food place to ask you to pull over to the side if you have some specialty/big/complicated order. I could understand that, as the fast food place probably doesn’t want to have all the customers behind you wait as they get your order ready. However, this particular BK has you pull over even if you want 1 burger without any modifications. Surely they should be able to give you a simple sandwich before the timer goes off.
Also, I try to avoid this particular BK as I hate going through the extra wait and hassle when there’s a McDonald’s across the street that gives great service and has a fast drive thru. However, since it is down the street from me, sometimes my family will want to go there to get a bite to eat. Honestly, this is the only reason I even visit this location.
& they’ve had this practice going on for years. I used to visit this BK on a semi regular basis, but stopped because it’s not worth the hassle. I know a lot of people say that it’s not that big of a deal, but other fast food places in the area do not do this and they manage their timers just fine, so why can’t this BK do it? Also, the point of the drive thru is to (most of the time) get your meal more quickly while staying in your car. Having to wait on the side for them to bring out your order kind of defeats the purpose. Why offer a drive thru if you’re not going to use it correctly?
Sooo…you’re going to complain to corporate, right? Or else this nonsense will still be going on the next time your relatives drag you there.
Yeah, I was planning on it. I looked up the phone number yesterday and they only take calls from 9 – 5 eastern time I think & I’m on the west coast, so I wasn’t able to call yet. &this only happened yesterday so I think its still pretty recent.
Actually many of our Burger Kings are franchised. Talk to the franchise owner (not the idiot manager of that store) and you may get a faster response. They don’t want Burger King to berate them a year or more after you write the letter to corporate.
How do I automagically know the store manager is a complete idiot? Its the manager’s responsibility to get his store’s times down and he is obviously too incompetent to get his crew organized to get it done without cheating on the timer every single time. Stupid is as stupid does.
The proper response to this is “No, thanks”. And then if they insist, get a refund, like the last commenter suggested. Make it very much not worth their while.
I had no idea. The only BK I visit has 2 parking spots, with signage, specifically for getting people out of the drive through line. I never thought much about it because they’ve always been fairly prompt and friendly. I always just wrote it off as method for promoting efficiency.
The last time I went there, I was the only only person in the drive through and they asked me to pull around to the waiting area. I thought it was really weird and a whole lot of extra work to walk my food out to rather than just pass it through the window.
I’ve only had this happen when chicken is ordered, and they have to make a fresh batch of whatever. It is annoying, but unless that’s an excuse I don’t see what is wrong with it, if it’s for something like that. It’s one thing to cheat a timer, but if food is going to take 5 or 10 minutes because of a cooking timer, there’s no point in making other people wait–as long as they hand over the drinks first.
Odd… places that actually cook your food like, Fat Burger and In and Out – never ever do this… I think I’ve only had this particular issue with BK in general.
But on the flip side – it’s probably in some store quarterly that threatens their jobs of they don’t meet time expectations, like talk time in call centers…. I really can’t blame them at this point.
At the taco bell by my house, there was one in this box by the window. The workers would put their hand covering the sensor after about a minute to reset the beam. It made me wonder what the point of the timer was.
this is common practice in my area. all burger kings ask you to pull up, regardless if ur the only person asking for food or not. its rather annoying especially when they screwup the order and you have to get out because the person that brings out the order never waits for you to check it and they always screw something up. the screw ups can be from something simple like straws or utiensils to forgetting a whole burger. also even if you ask for a drink other then a soda (and no food) they still ask for you to pull up. its rather annoying and i have stop going to bk unless the craving is to strong or someone else is picking up.
Ironically, this happened to me at McDonalds this morning. I was getting my breakfast (before a long out of town trip), and the drive thru attendant asked me to pull ahead to get my food (I already paid for my food, and there was no line). I asked if there was something wrong with my food, to which she stated “No, but it is policy in the morning to have all customers pull ahead to get their food.” I politely told her that I would not pull ahead, as I have done so before and I have waited a long amount of time to recieve my food. The young attendent rolled her eyes and closed the door. About a minute later, an older man came to the window, gave me my money back and asked me to longer patronize this location.
I said fine, went to Burger King, got my food in less than a minute, did one of those “Twilight” game pieces and won a free whopper!!!
The quick and easy response? “No, that’s okay – I can wait here”
*shuts off engine*
While I can understand the practice for someone ordering for more than 5 people through the drive through, I can’t condone it for every car.
I say, first notify the manager. If s/he doesn’t seem receptive or doesn’t actually change things, notify the franchisee and Burger King corporate. I bet that’ll knock some sense into them.
I stopped patronizing the Burger King down the street because of the timer system.
I got sick and tired of screwed up orders and pretty much having food sacks shoved in my face, all so that they can shave 5 seconds of their time.
Get the orders right, and stop being rude, even if it takes a couple seconds longer.
It is pretty simple guys, REFUSE to move. Just because someone ask you politely doesn’t mean you have to comply. I get this all the time, and I simply say. “I’m sorry but I’ll just wait here.” I’ve gotten some really weird looks, a couple of “what’s?”, “excuse me”, “sir if you’ll just pull…”. You have a choice, you don’t have to do what people ask of you.
Also, this usually results in getting my food right away =)
Also, I always check my order. No matter how long it takes. I paid, I’m not leaving without my food.
I do wish that wouldn’t piss them off so much. Oh well.
Seen this before with McDonalds, at a location that had a plaque for the fastest drive-thru time. They have a weight that starts the clock, so they tell you “wait behind the line”, then move you through to the other side, to end the clock quickly.
It is a total scam, and if you see this, make a call to corporate – they are cheating in their metrics, wasting customers time (not to speak of safety), and looking good to corporate while doing it.
My wife actually called in and reported this, and the plaque was mysteriously removed.
While I understand the OP’s gripe, I am not seeing where they wrote or contacted Burger King before sending this here. They even have the store number!
Hi, I’m the OP. I actually called BK today. The reason I didn’t call yesterday (when the incident happened) was because their consumer relations lines are only open 9 – 5 EST. I’m on the west coast, so they were already closed for the day by the time I was able to look up the number and everything. Considering that this happened yesterday and I called within 24 hours of the visit, I don’t think that’s too bad, is it?
Seen this before, and it is a scam on the clock, to either win a contest between stores, or to meet their average serving time requirements.
At Carls Jr (Hardees to the east coast), they did the same thing, and had everyone stacked in their parking lot, having food hand-delivered. My wife actually refused to move, knowing about this trick (they actually had painted a yellow line where the weight trigger was, and had patrons wait before the line, then cross it, time them one minute, then have them park somewhere else). The manager came out and yelled at her, and when my wife picked up her cell phone, informed the manager that she is in the process of calling the district office, they quickly gave her the food at no charge and asked her to leave.
Moral: Catch burger king doing this, and you have a chance for a free meal!
I live in a college town in Delaware and they do the same thing at my Burger King. Numerous times I’m asked to pull forward and park, but there’s no one at all in the line behind me. I’m sure it takes a longer time for the person to come around the employee exit and come all the way to the front to give me my order, longer than me waiting at the window, and it’s annoying to have to do this. I just stopped going there because it frustrated me so much.
I used to work at another fast food place when I was a teenager and such practices of tricking the timers were really frowned upon by the corporate office. Perhaps I should call them sometime to make them aware that they’re losing business due to their timing manipulation.
My local McD’s has an automated voice that asks me if I want a particular item. Before I can ever respond, another automated voice asks me if it can take my order. I’ll place my order and then a live person comes on and asks me again if they could take my order. Has anyone else experienced this? It’s awfully annoying.
When I worked at Arby’s we had one of these timers, during rush periods we would usually have all orders out and ready well under the required 120 seconds, with some days exception due to short workers, untimely delays, etc. But these were the rare occasions. Now a days the time is always over and slow, and the rare is when the speed is ok.
I have talked to some people I know who still worked there and there seems to be a consensus between employees is that the management decisions and bad customers is what causes it. I think it is just an attitude problem with the employees. We rarely had bad customers and when we did just got rid of them and ignored them. Today it seems when there is a bad customer, the employees gets attitudes and every customer then is a “bad” customer.
More and more recently, unfortunately, at multiple fast food outlets (not just McD’s). I don’t know who thought this was a good idea, or why it was even necessary to begin with. When I worked in fast food in drive through, it wasn’t terribly hard to either take the order immediately, or provide a polite “Welcome, please hold for just a moment” if I was in the middle of serving another customer.
At least with McD’s, most have altered the automated greeting to clearly indicate that it’s automated, something like “Someone will assist you shortly.” It’s more annoying at the local Hardee’s, which has an automated message like “Hi, my name is Melissa, I’ll be your order taker today…” then as soon as you start ordering, you get interrupted by a male voice, almost assuredly NOT someone by the name of Melissa, telling you to hold.
I don’t get two automated voices but yeah, I’ve gotten the automated greeting, spiel on the “highlighted” item, the “please order when ready” and then gotten asked to hold by the actual employee.
At least with being told to hold you know they’re not ready. I hate when I give my order and then it’s just silence because whoever is on drive-thru decided not to bother to respond to you.
“No thanks, I’ll just wait here” and pray my food doesn’t get spit in.
How about when the drive through order-taker barely speaks English? They screw up your order so badly every time you go there that you finally just stop going to that restaurant. Then they don’t have to worry about timers at all!
We have that problem in Dallas BIG TIME. At the local Jack in the Box you’re better off ordering a “numero siete con Sprite/Coca Cola/etc…si, con queso…no, no quiero los ‘curly fries’, gracias…si, quiero salsa de tomate y servilletas…etc.”
Sad that it’s come to that.
Yeah. It’s a weird, customer-unfriendly practice that is clearly designed to game the corporate monitoring.
The drive-thru can often be slower during peak times since there’s only 1 line. Just go inside.
The Wendy’s by me asks you to pull forward and then roll back when they wave. Ridiculous. After they did it to me twice I don’t go anymore.