Phones

We have a weekly phone contest for "upselling", in other words, asking the customer to add a side order (wings, breadsticks, Pepsi, desserts) to their order.  You have to take 15 orders and I usually don't work enough hours to get that many orders.  Winner gets a $10 gas card.


I noticed today I was 4/4 on upselling (the computer shows the top upsellers of the day) so I made a concerted effort to get to the phones for the rest of my shift.  I had the boss check and towards the end of the night I had 14 orders and was in the lead (among qualified employees).


But by that time we were no longer busy and the manager asked me to cash out my deliveries and clock out.  I was hoping the phone would ring again but it did not.  So right before I clocked out, I took my own order, a cookie and breadsticks.  That gave me the 15 minimum and put me (barely) in the lead.


Then the phone rang again.  I took the order but unfortunately all they wanted was a pizza!  Now I was out of the lead.  There are 4 more days in the week but since I don't work, my chances are pretty slim that everyone's upsell will fall below mine.  Oh well.


Totals for the night were 6.47 hours, 13 deliveries, 59 miles, and $45 in tips.

Better Safe Than Robbed!

As I've posted here before, the night before Thanksgiving is one of my favorite nights to deliver pizza.  Many kids are home from college, getting back together for the first time since summer.  And many mom's are busy preparing Thursday's big meal and are looking for an easy way to feed the family on Wednesday night.


The night started off super, with 3 five-dollar tips and a seven-dollar tip in my first 4 deliveries.  Then things plummeted.  Manager Nick had properly staffed (or maybe even over-staffed) the drivers and I ended the night with 8 hours, 13 runs, $36 in tips, and 66 miles.  (The stores computer expected me to drive 61 miles).  So my last 9 runs netted me a total of $14 in tips.  Pretty crummy.


But the story of the night was crime.  About a week ago a driver from a rival pizza shop was robbed in our town, and Tuesday a driver from our chain, about 5-10 miles away, was robbed on a delivery.  So of course we were all alert and on our toes.


A little after 11 I had a potential double, but one of the orders was to a new customer.  Our protocol after dark is to only accept delivery orders to new customers that are pre-paid by credit card.


This order had been placed online and was NOT prepaid.  I tried several times to call the customer to work out the payment, but there was no answer.  So I left the order in the shop and the manager eventually cancelled it.  Apparently the customer called around 12:30 wondering where their pizza was.


Moral of the story ... I don't want robbed, and if you really want your pizza, answer your phone!