McNormal's COPYRIGHTED IN 1988, ONLINE March 19, 2001.
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McNormal's
Another Last Food Restaurant
Book One: THE GAME
Fiction by: Roscoe Smith

Prepare for: >>> Book Two: Managerial Mind Games
This page became quite long.

  • DRUGS in the soda system. Book One describes the distribution of drugs through the soda system in a twenty-four hour fast food restaurant. One story I heard about 'drugs in the soda system' alleged that drugs were a sedative placed in the soda system with permission from a 'higher authority'. The objective of serving people a sedative without their knowledge was to make them sleepy so they would go home and get off the streets.

  • THEFT During my time working in Fast Food, I investigated and uncovered an extraordinary amout of theft.

  • The most common theft is when the Cashier under rings the customer's order or places more in the bag than they ring up. Say the customer orders two items, the Cashier rings up one item and gives the customer two. Or for their friends, the Cashier rings up a small drink then gives a large.

  • One theft ring was quite clever. At the end of the day, before the cash system was closed and before the final readings were taken, a person would change the 'food costs' numbers within the computer system's main memory bank. Then, they would close the computer and correct the food cost numbers afterwards. Example: Say a food item cost $2.00 each and all day the computer calculates the profits based on that cost. Say they sell 50 of that food item and gross $500.00. Figuring the food item at 20% cost, that's a projected profit of $400.00. If a person changed the food cost from $2.00 to $2.25, the gross sales would still be $500.00 and the quantity sold would still be 50, but the profit margin would be less because the costs were altered. The profit goes down from $400.00 to $387.50 and the food costs raise to 22.4%. There's 2.4% of sales that's being extorted and there's almost no way to catch it. 2.4% of $1,200,000. annual sales? $28,800. free and clear.
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  • The author also worked in a 'Manager's Training Store' where the manager trainees were trained to steal. Quite bizarre. They were taking orders in Drive-Thru and erasing ordered items from the customer's order before the customer arrived at the Pick-up window. Say the Customer ordered a Sandwich, Fries and a Drink.'Thank-you, your total is $5.00. Please procede to the Pick-up window.' Before the hungry customer arrived at the Pick-up window, the Cashier would erase the $2.00 Sandwich from the order and from the computer's memory. The computer didn't know the customer was actually receiving the Sandwich, and the Cashier was charging for the Sandwich and slipping $2.00 into their pocket. The author caught Cashiers charging for food and stealing a portion from the amount paid.

    When the 'Trainers' were confronted about the theft, the 'Trainers' told the author two conflicting lines. At first 'they' said,( 1 ) 'Good you caught us. That was a test to see if you could uncover theft.' Fine, the thieves were caught, the test was over. Wait, the theft continued. The 'Trainers' were talked with again. 'What's going on? You said the thieves and the stealing would stop.' The 'Trainers' plainly responded, ( 2 ) 'We steal because the owner pays us so poorly, the only way we can pay our rent and other bills is to steal from him.' The thieves were promoted, the author received death threats.
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  • Running with an open drawer is another way to steal from the owner and the customers. A dishonest Cashier can learn the prices and become familiar with the regular order combinations so they can run with an open drawer and keep the proceeds. I keep using the example, Sandwich, Fries and a Drink, $5.00. That's an easy price combination to remember. I used to have to say,"Hey, close your drawer after each order!" The dishonest Cashiers always argued that they could go faster if they didn't close the drawer.

    At a twenty-four hour store where I worked, at Midnight, the Cashiers needed to take orders on menu pads while the Midnight reports were printing out. ( PAGE 45 ) Needless to say, this is an opportunity to place one or more menu pad orders in the garbage and leave them for later to take that money out of the register. There were several people stealing this way. Example: Say they took ten orders for ten sandwiches, ten fries, and ten drinks, total, $50.00. After midnight, they could ring up six of the orders for $30.00 then they mark four sandwiches on the waste sheet, they dilute the soda mixture and reduce the amount of fries they were serving in the bags. They pocketed an easy $20.00.

  • I caught a Manager stealing: The Manager would take an ending reading from a cash drawer and then take one or more orders in the same drawer, this made the drawer they were using over in receipts. (Which they pocketed.) They would then close out the drawer again and dispose of the reading. Or they would just leave the shortage for the next Cashier to answer for.

  • Stealing right out of the store safe. Say the safe had $1,000.00 in coin and bills at all times. Every shift change we count the rolled coin and the envelop of bills, $1,000.00. For a week there was six racks of quarters with $100.00 in each rack, easy to count. The Manager on the shift before me removed a roll of quarters from the bottom rack and turned the quarters that remained on an angle so it appeared there were ten rolls. I counted six racks, $600.00. At the end of my shift, what a surprise, "There's a roll of quarters missing. Where is it? You signed for it when your shift started. You stole the roll of quarters, pay us $10.00."
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  • I caught a 'Manager Trainee' stealing. They totaled the customer's order and told the customer what their bill was. Then, very quickly, they would press the 'ITEM RETURN' key, one of the item keys and the 'AMOUNT TENDER' key . What this action did was erase one item from the order before the customer noticed. The receipt screen showed '00.00 due' , and the Cashier needed to figure out the cash in their head. The thief then removed the money from the register in the amount of the item return. When I reported the theft to my Supervisor, I was told,"Then why didn't you cashout their drawer and fire them." I replied,"Yeah, sure. You scheduled me with one employee on grill and one employee on cash and I had to check in the truck. What am I supposed to do? Close the store during lunch hour and lose four hundred in sales to catch a two dollar theft?" "Well? I don't know." "Well, I know. Demote the thief. Keep them away from cash." The thief was promoted.

  • QUALITY ASSURANCE - I told the District Manager,"That chicken is old, it has tomaine poison, we can't serve it." The District Manager told me,"Wash it off, cook it and serve it. They'll never know what hit them." I told the Manager "We can't do that, they'll figure it out. We'll lose more in the long run if we sell it than if we throw it out and lose the food cost." The District manager folded his arms and demanded that I order the Employees to prepare the poison chicken for service. The Employees begged me not to force them to prepare and serve the poison food. I said,"Don't worry, just make it and see what happens." The District Manager waited twenty minutes until the poison food was in the service bin then he said, "There, now I can leave." He walked out the door, we waited until he left the parking lot and we threw the poison chicken in the garbage. I threw away $189.00 of spoiled chicken and put $189.00 in a cash register at the end my shift as a 'CASH OVERAGE'. 'THEY' responded by having a car driven into me,"As a warning."

    At another job, the refrigerator was 42 degrees. The thermostat was broken or the refrigerator was in need of replacement. The food in the refrigerator was spoiling on a daily basis. I told my Supervisor about the problem. The supervisor stopped in the store, he looked at the calibrated thermometer reading of 42 degrees. He said,"Oh, I see what the problem is." He took the calibrated thermometer and reset the dial so the 42 degree thermometer read 36 degrees. "There, now your refrigerator is cold enough." The supervisor demoted me on the spot and told me if I returned to that store I would be charged with trespassing. I put aside some savings and laid my store keys on the counter.
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  • ASSAULT - At the same job where the author disposed of the spoiled chicken. He was transferred to a store where a female employee 'popped' the author in the mouth and split the author's lip. She was not disciplined properly because of the four witnesses, noone saw it happen. ( Remember, this story is all fiction. ) "He's 'an incompetant troublemaker', don't believe anything he says. He's trying to pull an Officer Bob. That's all." When the author was accused of trying to pull an Officer Bob, he didn't even know who or what an Officer Bob was... Book two will include an explanation of what an 'Officer Bob' is.

  • DISCRIMINATION - Blatant discrimination was rampant at the McNormal's where the author trained. The author was assigned to learn 'station duties'. The author was working a cash register when a 'trainer' came to the 'front line' and told the author,"Let me take the next customer, I'll teach you something." There were no customers in the store, I asked,"What customer?" The trainer pointed to the parking lot,"See that white limosine?" "The one with six doors?" "Yeah." "How can I miss it?" The trainer directed me to stand aside. I was told,"That limosine belongs to an international sports figure who lives up the road. He always sends his driver here cause he likes our 'Chickin McLickin' sandwich and our 'McWhale' fish sandwich." I replied, "Wow, he eats here? You ought to put him in a TV commercial." The trainer looked at me like I was crazy.

    The trainer continued,"Okay, this is what we do." The trainer turned and stepped to the food bin. The trainer pulled three McWhales and three Chickin McLickin sandwiches out of the bin and dropped them in the garbage under the service counter. I told the trainer,"Hey, those were just prepared a few minutes ago." I asked, "What are you gonna do make fresh ones for him?" The trainer looked at me like I was crazy. The trainer said, "Are you keeping notes?" I said,"Yep, don't worry." The trainer didn't realize that I really was 'keeping notes'.

    We watched the driver exit the limosine and enter the front door. He walked to the front counter and looked in the service bin. The driver asked,"No McWhales or McLickins ready?" The trainer said,"No, sorry." The driver asked, "How long for six McLickens?" I thought,"Wow, he must have some appetite." The trainer told the driver, "We're out of Chickin McLickin this week." The driver was obviously upset,"Out of Chickin McLickin? You was out of Chickin McLickin last week too. What's go'in on?" The trainer stated,"I don't know, the plant must be on strike or something." The driver looked at me,"Is that right?" I started to say,"AH-h-h." The trainer interupted,"He doesn't know anything, he just started." The driver agreed,"Yeah, you wasn't here last week, was you?" I agreed,"Nope." The driver said,"Well, give me six McWhales then." The trainer said,"We're out of McWhales too." The driver became frantic,"No McLickin or McWhales for two weeks in a row?" The trainer told the driver,"Yeah, sorry." The driver inquired,"What gives?" The trainer told the driver, "I don't know, I think they're made in the same plant." The driver looked at me and waved his hand at me, "Nah, you don't know nothing. Guess I have to go to that fried chicken place again. I hate fried chicken." The trainer told the driver, "You should call first to make sure we have McLickin and McWhales in. Then we can make it for you and have it ready when you get here." The driver responded,"Yeah, I guess I'll have to do that next time."

    The driver left the store and the trainer went to the production area to prepare three Chickin McLickin and three McWhale sandwiches. The graphic explanation of why the driver was discriminated against cannot be documented on this page. This ( fictional ) description of the occurance is explanation enough.

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So, That's the reality; In most Last Food Restaurants, 2% can be stolen and that amount is very hard to trace. But take heed; Greedy thieves get caught. And be forewarned; Whistle-blowers get wasted by 'The Organization'. The author became labeled as 'an incompetent troublemaker'.

Thank-you, have a nice day?

DANIEL Z. SEYLER ©