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On Jan. 9, Chooby Pizza, a pizzeria near Farrer Park MRT station, shared on Instagram and Facebook an interaction between it and a customer.
The pizzeria posted screenshots of a complaint left by the customer, as well as the customer's negative review on Facebook.
As background to the situation, the caption of the post explained how on Jan. 6, one of Chooby Pizza's staff faced verbal abuse from the customer.
As seen in post, the customer sent a detailed message to Chooby Pizza via Instagram, expressing their "bad experience" with the restaurant.
The customer explained that they had a reservation for 8pm as that was the last slot offered on Chooby Pizza's website.
However, the customer explained that they had a baby to put to bed and could only go to the restaurant at 8:30pm or 8:45pm.
Received eatery's phone call
The customer proceeded to recount that at 8:30pm, an employee of Chooby Pizza called the customer to inform them that the restaurant's last order was being processed, and the table had by that time been kept for them for 30 minutes.
The customer was not happy.
The customer said: "I have been [in Singapore for six years], it is the first time I had such an awful experience. If you guys don't want to work beyond 8:30pm, I suggest that you do something else [other] than restaurant [business] and go work in an office."
The customer called the whole experience "an absolute disgrace" and a "big disappointment".
"I hope you will not charge me for no show while you were the ones rejecting us," the customer said.
S$30 deposit
According to Chooby Pizza's website, a S$30 deposit is required for each confirmed reservation, and the deposit will later be offset from the total bill.
The website also stated that the last order for food is at 8:30pm.
The timing is highlighted in bold.
Restaurant's response
According to receipts of the interaction, Chooby Pizza responded to the customer's message on Instagram.
The eatery pointed out that the customer was already more than 30 minutes late for their reservation.
The customer also failed to inform the restaurant beforehand about being late.
"As a courtesy, our staff contacted you to check if we could help by taking your order before we closed the kitchen for the night," the message by the eatery read.
The restaurant pointed out that the customer appeared to be "incredibly offended" by the phone call and lashed out at the employee.
The restaurant said: "Our staff too have babies and their families waiting for them at home. It is our responsibility to ensure that they finish their day timely to return home."
Restaurant further responded
However, instead of ending the interaction there, another reply from Chooby Pizza took it a step further.
"If your foreign norms and expectations do not align with those here, it is only respectful to adapt and realign them here," the restaurant continued.
The message concluded with Chooby Pizza reaffirming that they do not tolerate any form of abuse towards their staff and will not provide the customer with the refund requested.
Use of word 'foreign' triggering
The "foreign norms and expectations" phrase appeared to trigger the customer.
The customer called Chooby Pizza out for that comment.
"Thanks for your racist comment I will let everybody know how bad you people are in this shop and I hope you'll close shop soon," the customer replied.
"1 more minute and you tell me to go back to my country."
The customer added: "People like you are the shame of Singapore."
Bad review
After the whole interaction on Instagram, the customer went on Facebook and left a bad review for Chooby Pizza.
"Horrible experience yesterday, they [close the] kitchen at 8:30pm. On top of that, they [were] rude and made racist comments to me. Run away."
The negative review can no longer be found on Facebook as it appears to have been deleted.
In response to the customer, Chooby Pizza said in the caption of its Instagram post: "We will always call out such behaviour and urge our colleagues in the industry to do the same. The aim is not to shame but in hope that we can have the basic respect we all deserve."
Entitled behaviour
Many commenters agreed that the attitude of the customer was rude and entitled, and many showed their support for Chooby Pizza.
Screenshot from Instagram
Screenshot from Instagram
Screenshot from Instagram
Some even went to Chooby Pizza's Facebook page and left positive reviews despite never patronising the shop before, all in support of how the restaurant handled the customer.
However, one commenter called to question the use of the word "foreign".
The comment pointed out that while the word "foreign" is not racist, it can be seen as xenophobic.
Screenshot from Instagram
Screenshot from Instagram
This led to a handful of comments on Chooby Pizza's Facebook that said the customer should go back to their own country.
Screenshot from Facebook
Screenshot from Facebook
Screenshot from Facebook
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