In Fort Pierce, Florida, 27 year old Latreasa Goodman phoned 911 a total of three times after being informed that McDonald's was out of chicken McNuggets after placing and paying for her 10-piece order.
She was later quoted as saying to police:This is an emergency, If I would have known they didn't have McNuggets, I wouldn't have given my money, and now she wants to give me a McDouble, but I don't want one.She attempted to get a full refund, but was informed that all sales were final by the cashier, who according to her 911 call was also the manager. You can listen to the recordings of the first and second 911 calls here and here. She is now facing a misuse of 911 charge.
Are you done laughing yet? Perhaps you are too flabbergasted to laugh?
Is this the extent of North American consumer culture, that it now becomes an emergency worthy of police involvement when we don't receive precisely what we've ordered? It's not as if she was being refused her food, she was simply being offered an alternative, larger portion of food for the same price due to the lack of chicken McNuggets. This is something that happens in various restaurants across the world everyday. For those of you unfamiliar, as I was, the McDouble is the new name for a Double Cheeseburger.
Oh, but that isn't chicken. That's mystery beef. So order a McChicken? No thanks, I'll just call the police instead.
There was a time when I would respond to this type of story with "This could only happen in the United States," but sadly I would be no more surprised to hear of this happening in a McDonald's in my city. The sense of self-entitlement that exists amongst so many people these days, across all generations, never ceases to amaze and disgust me. How any person could look at this situation and view it as an "emergency" is entirely mind-boggling to me. We don't even need to ask ourselves whether she gave thought to the fact that she would be pulling police officers off of their regular patrol in order to tend to her "crisis", either taking them away from real emergencies or from being able to prevent criminal activity, which is in fact their job. We know she gave no thought other than to her own situation and needs. Three 911 calls tells us that.
McDonald's had this to say about the incident:
Satisfying each and every customer that visits our restaurants is very important to us.Holy Sweet and Sour Sauce Batman! Not only is she now going to get her refund, but she's also going to get a complimentary meal to correct the mix-up that caused her mental anguish. That's just fantastic. Back in the day, McDonald's would have heard this story and likely just laughed. Now they have to "cover their ass" to prevent a possible civil suit.
Regarding this isolated incident, we apologize for the inconvenience caused.
In the event that we are unable to fill an order, a customer should be offered the choice of a full refund or alternative menu items. We regret that in this instance, that wasn't the case.
We want to correct our mistake. We will be sending the customer her refund, along with an Arch card for a complimentary meal on us.
We never want to disappoint a McNuggets fan or any McDonald's customer.
Customer satisfaction is our top priority.
Carlos Solorzano
McDonald's Operations Manager Florida Region
My favourite part of all of this is that if she had just given a little more thought to the situation, and directly called the police station rather than 911, she would have still gotten the police involvement she felt was so necessary AND her refund without the misuse of 911 charge.
Isolated incident right? WRONG! In Boynton Beach, Florida, roughly a month earlier Jean Fortune placed a 911 call when the Burger King he had just placed his order with informed him that they did not serve lemonade, with additional complaints that his food was taking too long to cook and that the employee was rude to him. He hadn't paid for anything. Not surprisingly, he was also charged with misuse of 911. You can listen to his 911 call here. This one is great, because unlike Latreasa's calls the 911 operator tells Jean like it is:
The Police are not for customer service complaints. They are not here to respond to your beck and call.
We can only hope that these charges teach Latreasa and Jean the proper function and purpose of 911, and that others will learn from these stories.
People are so consumed with their own rights to live as autonomous individuals that they forget that it's necessary to respect the autonomy of others to maintain order - you cannot do what you will as you will, your actions must be curbed to respect the rights of others. There are no rights without limitations. The sooner people all over the world - of all ages, races, and cultures - learn that, the better.
Does anyone else want McNuggets right now?
**McNugget photo from google image search. Burger King drink image from Flickr by "di+mars".
