'Prank' on the Pizza Delivery Guy

[ACamp1900]

It's like we're brothers...even if you're still a dirty Imperial

Delivered for Papa Johns too in college. I'd like to say I delivered to a woman who didn't want pizza, but wanted my pepperoni...never happened though. I was pretty oblivious in my late teens/early 20s though. I remember a number of overweight slobs I worked with bragging about the customers that made offers to them, I was never lucky enough despite the fact I did alright with girls outside of work. I did have the misfortune of delivering pizza to an apartment once...and it was a bit awkward. There were just two guys there, no shirts, and they were clearly watching porn with the TV facing the door. They acted like everything was completely normal, that was probably the weirdest thing that happened.

I did hear stories of guys getting robbed at gunpoint, never had that happen to me. I did deliver to a couple houses that had giant fucking dogs roaming around outside. I'm talking dogs that were big enough that I would reach over to grab the pizzas from the passenger seat, turn to my window on the left and be looking eye to eye with a monstrous beast that probably ate pizza guys for breakfast.

There were some days/nights where I made decent money, but you do get stiffed an awful lot. You could have a really bad night, and then the next it could be really good and make up for the losses. Some cities generally tip better than others, and it seems customers that order from better franchises (Like La Rosa's) will tip better than customers that order from Domino's all the time. It's nice bringing in a little extra coin each day instead of just a bi-weekly check, but people don't realize how rough it can be on a car. It's a lot of miles, all stop and go, and it's city driving.


I've got one semi-funny story that I remember. At one point I would deliver pizzas on some nights and manage the day shift on other days. One day I got a call from some dude that was asking for a free pizza. I looked through the records for the last few days, but I didn't see that anyone had ordered a pizza using his phone number recently. I immediately knew where he was located though because I was a driver...government housing. Anyway, the reason this guy felt he should get a free pizza is because of an incident that happened the night before. Apparently someone prank called an order and had it delivered to this man's house. When the driver got there, the man told him that he didn't order it...and the man claimed our delivery driver actually asked his kids to go door to door to his neighbors and asked if anyone of them had ordered the pizza. So, he wanted a free pizza in compensation....Now, I knew the driver that works nights. He's a 60 year old Korean man, nicest guy you'd ever meet, knew him for a number of years while I worked there in college and there's no way he would have asked these kids to go door to door late at night like that. So, struggling to hold back the laughter, I told the gentleman I apologized, but there was nothing I could do. He quickly got irate, and asked repeatedly if I was calling him a liar. I lied and told him I would speak to the driver about the situation, but I couldn't give the man a free pizza. He then went back to the "Calling him a liar" statement, threatened to call my boss and have me fired from my pizza job (Which did cause me to laugh, since my boss at the time was my girlfriend's sister...and it was a fuckin' pizza job), and "I'll be sorry." At that point I started laughing and hung up the phone, and it was several minutes before I could stop laughing. There's nothing better than shutting down some idiot that's trying to scam for free pizza.

I delivered in San Bernardino CA... That should explain the levels of crazy i experienced while on the job... The town was the murder capital of the country just ten or so years before I got the job...

I too laughed when anyone threatened to call my boss... He was a college buddy and they needed drivers far worse than I needed the job... It was very secure. Hell my 'boss' would even delete a couple orders a night from my order list when I was cashing out... For those who don't know, you'd hold onto all the receipts and cash through your shift, then at the end of the night your manager would pull your order list say, ' you owe me x amount' and whatever was left over was your tips... Obviously, the full price of those deleted orders went right to my tip amounts..... Very nice.

 

[ACamp1900]

I stopped getting pizza delivered when they started charging me 2-4 dollars extra for a "delivery fee". If I order a pizza for 10 bucks + 2 dollar fee + tip + tax its going to be at least a 16 dollar pizza, more if I tip more than 2 bucks. No thanks.

They started doing that bc gas prices were killing the drivers who often got no tip... The delivery fees go straight to the drivers to cover gas.

 

[Huntr]

Okay, I delivered for Papa Johns in college:

Once had a guy flip the pizza over in the box right in front of me and ask for a free replacement... Even called my manager and said I did it.

Once had a guy pull a gun on me and ask if i had his pizza... Thing was it WAS his pizza, dude was 'joking around' and even paid for the pie. That's was this guys world, where drawing a gun and threatening someone is an everyday 'joke'...

Delivered to women in bra/ panties who weren't interested in pizza... Sadly they often didn't look great in said wardrobe... Women would call in straight asking for a pizza guy every now and then...

Delivered to Janet Jackson (backstage concert) and got a hundred dollar tip once...

Delivered to a well known swingers club a few times, was never invited in...

Average tip was no tip...

Very 'interesting' job... But some of the people. And ALWAYS tip your delivery guy, lazy motha fuckas!

I delivered pizzas for a small local joint back when I was in high school. No bad uniforms or anything, it was a family owned operation in a small, midwestern college town. I experienced similar stupid stuff. And lemme tell ya about no tips. For the most part, college kids are dumb shits about that kind of thing. Savin the tip to buy more weed and beer.

 

[Irish YJ]

I installed Directv and Dish for a while both as a sub and in house. Even as an in house tech anything over 18 inches your were getting charged $37.50 every 30 minutes minimum of an hour.
Payable directly to me and I didn't accept checks. You'd be surprised how often people either said go through the exterior wall or did it themselves when they heard that even in the half a million dollar homes.

I'm sure some customers do not want the expense. Was not the case in my situation. The guy was either lazy, or was trying to get to the next install. His skill set in what he did do was lacking.

I'm in the industry (on the commercial side) so very familiar with the model, and all the platforms (FieldNation, OnForce, World Market) these guys work off of (if not a badged employee). I also know that employee turnover is astronomical in the residential space. In my experience as a customer, and managing the commercial side, I can say there are simply a lot bad and inexperienced guys out there. Lot's of good folks too, but the contractor residential space is simply the worst.

 

[ulukinatme]

I stopped getting pizza delivered when they started charging me 2-4 dollars extra for a "delivery fee". If I order a pizza for 10 bucks + 2 dollar fee + tip + tax its going to be at least a 16 dollar pizza, more if I tip more than 2 bucks. No thanks.

You've obviously never delivered pizza. Ask yourself this: what would be fair to tip a waitress that comes out to your table 3, maybe 4 times during the course of a meal? They may take your initial order, bring the appetizers, maybe bring the dinner unless someone else does that, and refill your drinks once or twice. For a $50 meal for two you'd pay them $10 for those 3-4 trips if they did well, and it doesn't cost them anything to walk to your table.

A delivery driver takes a $20 in food out to your door. It typically takes the driver 5-20 minutes to get to your location, depending on distance, traffic, etc. In that time frame they're burning gas (During my time it was $3+/gallon) the whole way and in some cases braving inclement weather. There's also the fact there isn't a quicker way to destroy a car than pizza delivery. You're going to be doing oil changes at least twice as often as the normal daily driver, you're replacing breaks every 1-2 years as well as tires. The miles are hard. Yeah, you'll often make more hourly than the waitress, but it's typically minimum wage or less still. If that driver is getting stiffed on a number of orders, he's effectively destroying his car for a minimum wage paycheck.

They started doing that bc gas prices were killing the drivers who often got no tip... The delivery fees go straight to the drivers to cover gas.

This. When I worked they instituted a dollar delivery fee shortly after I started, although the drivers didn't even get that at first. Some drivers don't make very much at the end of the day, it all depends on who stiffed them or how busy the shift was. Occasionally you could do very well, but I can tell you that I often walked out breaking even some day shifts if it was slow and the gas prices were high. I could have gone elsewhere, sure, but the job was fun and it was a way to see my girlfriend at the time during my busy college schedule.

 

[ACamp1900]

I was lucky to work in a pretty large urban center, so even after gas, on a bad tip night, I'd still walk home with ~20 bucks in my pocket. Good night was about 60 or so...maybe once a month Id go home with close to 100... This was in 2000, 2001... But in fairness that was with help from my buddy manager...

 

[ulukinatme]

I was lucky to work in a pretty large urban center, so even after gas, on a bad tip night, I'd still walk home with ~20 bucks in my pocket. Good night was about 60 or so...maybe once a month i go home with close to 100... This was in 2000, 2001... But in fairness that was with help from my buddy manager...

I delivered between two Midwestern towns, our store was kind of in the middle of both. One was a very young community, used to be farm land 15 years prior, but in '05 it was all new developments with people that thought they were upper crust. They tipped like crap. The other community was much older, middle class and below, and they tipped better. $20/night was probably my average take home a night too, although we didn't comp any orders...at least not in full. Occasionally a manager might cut a few bucks off an order if the customer was particularly rude or if we were asked to take a remake out because one of our high school insiders screwed a pizza up.

The only night I was guaranteed to make bank was Halloween. It was always crazy because parents were too busy to make dinner before Trick or Treat. I would dress up with a kilt on, a flat Irish cap with fake red hair coming out the back, and my Hot Rod Rowdy Piper t-shirt. I usually had bagpipe music blaring from my car too. I'd break $100 on Halloween, those nights were awesome. There was one other time I did really well. I helped deliver for another Papa Johns in a very rural neighboring town. Despite not knowing the routes and map, I pulled in $80 that one night simply because everyone in that locale tipped $3-5 almost every order with only one stiff I think. It was amazing, I was jealous of those delivery drivers after that night.

 

[ACamp1900]

I delivered between two Midwestern towns, our store was kind of in the middle of both. One was a very young community, used to be farm land 15 years prior, but in '05 it was all new developments with people that thought they were upper crust. They tipped like crap. The other community was much older, middle class and below, and they tipped better. $20/night was probably my average take home a night too, although we didn't comp any orders...at least not in full. Occasionally a manager might cut a few bucks off an order if the customer was particularly rude or if we were asked to take a remake out because one of our high school insiders screwed a pizza up.

The only night I was guaranteed to make bank was Halloween. It was always crazy because parents were too busy to make dinner before Trick or Treat. I would dress up with a kilt on, a flat Irish cap with fake red hair coming out the back, and my Hot Rod Rowdy Piper t-shirt. I usually had bagpipe music blaring from my car too. I'd break $100 on Halloween, those nights were awesome. There was one other time I did really well. I helped deliver for another Papa Johns in a very rural neighboring town. Despite not knowing the routes and map, I pulled in $80 that one night simply because everyone in that locale tipped $3-5 almost every order with only one stiff I think. It was amazing, I was jealous of those delivery drivers after that night.

Every once in a while I would cover a shift from a neighboring city, Highland CA... Real shitty, ghetto area for the most part, but the hills at the edge of Highland are where the San Manuel Indians ( of matching casino fame) reside... Baller. If you were lucky enough to deliver just two orders there, the rest of the night didn't matter...

 

[pkt77242]

Every once in a while I would cover a shift from a neighboring city, Highland CA... Real shitty, ghetto area for the most part, but the hills at the edge of Highland are where the San Manuel Indians ( of matching casino fame) reside... Baller. If you were lucky enough to deliver just two orders there, the rest of the night didn't matter...

Haha, I have been to Highland California. Some of the new areas are slightly nicer, but the older areas are shitty.

Maybe now that Gas prices are falling they will get rid of the delivery fee (or maybe just lower it). A man can wish, can't he.