Tag: tammymayhewblog

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Innocently I posted an image on my hilariously honest customer service group on facebook@suitea$$service and my author page on facebook@tammymayhewauthor. Naively I was trying to lighten the mood and remind people to just BE NICE! Wow never thought I would get the political backlash that I did.

The image is of a simple laminated sign that basically says: yes customers have the right to refuse to wear a mask while reminding the public that private businesses have the right to require one to enter their business. It then goes on to say that no matter what we each have the right to decide for ourselves and live with the consequences. The most important message and purpose of the sign was when it asked for folks to please not yell at the employees regarding the need to mask or not. It reminded them it was not the employee’s decision. My favorite part of the sign was where it states that if you yell at them, are rude to them or mistreat them for enforcing the policy they did not create then you are not being patriotic, rather you are just being an asshole.

I absolutely and unequivocally love the true point of the sign. After all it is the repeated theme in my book My Suite A$$. The theme being “If you can’t be nice, at least don’t be a dick”. The purpose of the sign was not to further the debate over mandating masks. WOW, mind blown! All of this is NOT that complicated, the true purpose of the sign was to just BE NICE!

Look we don’t have to agree on things. We can choose to wear a mask or not. We can choose to patronize a business or not. We can choose any side of a political issue. These are our rights.

What you can do (besides yelling or cursing at the poor person serving you).

  1. You want to make a difference or change a mind?
    Talk to the owner
    Write a strongly worded letter to corporate
    Shop somewhere else (Exercise your rights)
    Attend a government meeting (let your voice be heard)

I fail to see how anyone’s angry or foul mouthed rant directed towards a cashier, clerk, wait staff, service team, sales person or security guard accomplishes anything constructive.

To the contrary it serves to just further the disrespect, the intolerance, the acceptance of bad behavior, and it might just get your childish outburst posted on you tube or social media. Personally that is not how I want to become famous. BEING NICE, seems like such a small thing, and it takes such little effort, but it has a BIG impact. I had to remind folks on almost every site I shared it with that it was not a political statement, rather a lesson in how to treat people. So please, please, please remember these hard and fast rules when faced with this conundrum:

1. BE NICE

2. BE NICE

3. BE NICE

Would love to read your thoughts on this blog at www.tammymayhew.com (non political) or experiences with this.

Customer Service Stupidity, Theirs or Ours?

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I vote theirs. First let me shout out to all my fellow service warriors for all you do. Go to my blog post “They” to know how much I appreciate your jobs’ rewards and frustrations. It never ceased to amaze me how stupid some customers thought we Service Warriors were. That is what one could only assume for the requests and demands that we received on a regular basis in all genres of customer service, from some of our well healed, valued customers. These errant questions lead to the all to familiar awkward smile and brief silence while we garnered the energy and strategy necessary to diffuse and redirect our deceiving demanding guest.

  • Using their friends credit card for a purchase and have no ID.
    • Who travels without any form of ID.
  • Telling me the unleashed dog that just shit on my carpet is a well-trained service animal.
    • Throws a fit when we charge them the pet fee and hand them a rag and cleaning fluid.
  • The old man who thinks I will comply when he requests that only a female team member deliver his room service.
    • This just happened for the umpteenth time last week and when our male delivery team member knocked on the door the man was only wearing loose pajama pants held up by his hand. We all know what would have happened next.
  • Assuring us that because they paid for a room, they can treat our team any way they want.
    • You paid for a room not my integrity and self-respect.
  • That they have travelled all over the world and never had an incidental hold on their credit card.
    • By whole world you mean towns small enough that the only thing to do there is leave?
  • That they eat out all the time and have never had a gratuity automatically added to a party of 8 or more.
    • Nice to know you treat your family to drive thru on a regular basis.
  • That we should not require a valid credit card at check in, because they are going to pay cash in the morning.
    • Oh hell no. Enough said.
  • That they have never paid more than $49.00 for a room ever.
    • Thank you for finally travelling since 1978 and I can direct you to a place that will fit your economic profile if you prefer.
  • Can’t we just finish paying for our wedding two months after?
    • As per the stories in my hilarious book, My Suite A$$!, available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble, you could be divorced by then.
  • Why are you asking for my ID, I turned 21 last year. (Acting insulted)
    • Well if you actually looked old enough to shave on a regular basis I wouldn’t, but you don’t.

My hospitable nature had its’ limits even though examples and levels of customer ignorance did not. For some tips on how to survive these ones, click here. Share with me below or on my facebook page @tammymayhewauthor, some of the requests from guests that you have had that just made you question, Really? or at the very least your sanity or career choice.

“Enduring” to the end?

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That is the question that hit me when I opened facebook today. A friend said she had to put together a talk for church about “Enduring to the End”. She was having a hard time putting it together and asked the ever-wise audience of social media for help. The answers were cookie cutter at best. Folks quoting scripture, stating it was our duty to endure all things. In doing so we would be a testament to our faith, and it was then that we fulfilled our goal of living a worthy or noble life. Dutifully enlightening and mostly full of crap.

Me, while looking at her request wrote a response. A response of, “Isn’t that exactly what is happening here on not such a giant life event scale? There is something you wish to accomplish as mundane as you think it may be. You are struggling, you are asking for help and you will finish it, seeing it through to the end. Enduring, and your question is what again?”

I left out the rest, the part that was running around in my overthinking brain as I read the ever-martyring responses of lives lived through their sacrifice only to end in a righteous death. Why the hell do you want to just endure? Life is to be lived, enjoyed, loved through, cried over, and laughed through.  Why does anyone even want you to write that piece? Endure what? My guess was accepting to do that talk when you really didn’t want to, or as I like to put it, you were voluntold what to do, and you did it.

How many of us never think of saying no? I know I didn’t. Tammy Mayhew wasn’t raised to say no and so many of you weren’t either.  I was raised in a family business. The world of service and hospitality, conditioned me to please other people at the expense of myself. Somehow other people’s needs, and feelings were above my own. I was conditioned to endure my own discomfort while pleasing everyone around me. For the most part the customer service world reinforces that ideology day after day after day.    

One official definition of the word endure is, “To continue to exist or experience a hardship over a long period of time”. Life was not intended to be “endured” it was meant to be lived. It is a frightening epiphany when you realize that instead of living your life, you endured it. Simply being, with just enough bits and pieces of love, joy, and happiness to sustain you. Living this way, or let me rephrase that, existing this way does not fortify the soul, it starves it.

Grab the pieces, all the pieces. The good, the bad, the joy, the chaos and the sorrow, and claim it as your own. Look ahead and reflect inward at what feeds YOUR soul. I did. Follow what you find, and bring all that you carry with you, use it build and shore up your path. I did. It is a daunting and scary proposition.

I don’t’ know what I was more afraid of; stepping outside my responsibly enduring comfort zone, letting the world see ME, or ME looking at myself and asking and answering those questions of my own heart. I did it and I have no regrets. It may have taken longer than I would have liked, but I did it and so can you. Unburden with me what you endure in your life? Share with me here or on my facebook author page@tammymayhew,author what feeds your soul? Inspire me with your dreams and beautiful chaos?

Thank you!

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Just felt the need to thank all those hard working men and women out there tirelessly helping all of us get through this. It is kind of overwhelming when you think of these folks working so all of us can have what we need, still get educated, stay well and safe. Thank you doesn’t seem like enough so I will offer my prayers for each and every one of them as well. Did I forget anyone? Let me know below and if I did thank you to them as well. Bless you all and stay safe and healthy.

Things I Will Not Do

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Things I Will Not Do for any customer. Long, long ago I once naively said I would do anything for a customer as long as they paid me for it, and the request was legal and moral. After forty jaded year in customer service, I could choke on those words. I learned that while those boundaries mattered to me, they didn’t always matter to my customers. You ever have that customer who wanted you to do something for them that you wouldn’t do for anyone else on the planet? I don’t know why I’m actually asking that question, because of course you have.

Here is a sample of the things I would or will not do for any customer. (Lord knows this list is not all-inclusive.) 

  • I will not give you your room service order if you answer the door naked. (I will laugh when I see the size of what you think is my tip.)
  • I will not lift your naked wet husband out of the bathtub. (This will not end well, as neither myself nor my team has been trained in convalescent care. We may both end up in the tub. I will call an ambulance to assist.)
  • I will not give you access to my security camera footage to spy on your girlfriend at the bar. (Not only will I not do that, you run the risk of me telling said girlfriend what you asked me to do.)
  • I will not let you go see a room unaccompanied.  (My hotel room is not your assured-to-be-clean public restroom.)
  • I will not babysit your children in the lobby. (If you are not interested in watching your little angels, what makes you think I am? I will promptly and always send them back to your room.)
  • I will not suffer your bad mood. (Your poor planning or life choices are not my problem—I just may make your bad day worse.)
  • I will not allow you and five of your closest friends to play a drunken game of full contact football in my hallway. (I will use my very best Catholic mom guilt-laden speech to scold and embarrass six grown-ass men.)
  • I will not refund part of your night’s stay after you have spent an hour in your room with your girlfriend.  (I will provide turn down service and leave those little mints on your pillow, so be a prince and pay for and stay the whole night.)
  • I will not let you taste everything on the menu for free until you find something you like. (I will charge you for all that you order, as, “I don’t like that” is not a valid reason to not pay for your meal. If you want a taste of everything, go to an ice cream shop.)
  • I will not allow you or your kids to bang on the fifteen-thousand-dollar baby grand piano in the lobby. (I do not wear noise cancelling earbuds to work. I will tell your untalented oblivious-to-painfully-annoying-sounds ass(es) to stop.)
  • I will not clean up after your furry family member when they shit on my lobby floor. (And don’t try and tell me that he is a service dog. I will gladly provide you with paper towels, cleaning rags, disinfectant spray and a smile.)
  • I will not marginalize my team, myself or my integrity to make you feel better. (I will value them and myself as much as I value your business.)

What crazy customer requests have you received and refused to do? I’d love to read them below or visit me at my facebook page @tammymayhew,author.