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I ruined someone's Christmas dinner

edited December 2007 in General
I work as a grocery clerk and was given an 8 hours shift on Christmas eve. After an incredibly miserable day and with 30 minutes lefts before our store closes (and the end of my shift), one of the employee asked me to grab a shopping cart and pull it to the bakery. One of the bakers passed me around 7 bags of bread. After that, I asked him if I were to threw these out and he nodded his head. So, I chucked it out and had it crushed. 15 minutes later, the employee barges through the employee lounge and asked me what I did with the bread. I told her I chucked them out and she screamed at me before barging out the door again. Obviously, by this point I was sort of fed up with everything so I left.

As it turns out, those bread I chucked out belonged to her and she had it held for by the baker so she could pick it up at the end of the shift. Our bakery usually throws tons of left over bread before the store closes, so naturally that's my assumption. Also, no one told me what I was suppose to do, and since our store was very busy, I thought was lending a hand and help them catch up.

Chances are, she probably made a huge scene and told the managers. I was wondering how I can deal with this? I'm going back to work tomorrow, and chances are, she's going to murder me. She's a mother of 3 kids too, so I feel really bad.

Comments

  • edited December 2007
    God who cares, its bread. She should get over it.

    If there's a problem, just stand up for yourself. You were told to throw it out....you specifically asked if you were to throw it out and the baker nodded his head. What else should you have done?

    If that bread was set aside for her, then there should have been a specific note on it or something that said: DO NOT THROW OUT

    Its not your fault. If she yells at you, yell at her back. Is she just another employee or a supervisor? Either way, it wouldnt matter to me, Ive yelled at supervisor's before when they have yelled at me, but its up to you. Dont put up with any shit from her.

    :)
  • edited December 2007
    Obviously it's just a misunderstanding, but if you want to apologize, get her a gift card for the grocery store so she can buy as much bread and groceries as she wants for Christmas time
  • edited December 2007
    Don't apologize for throwing out the bread like you did something wrong, apologize for the misunderstanding and make your good intentions known. Apologize for unwittingly causing her grief, but make it very clear that you had asked the baker if they were to be thrown out and you were instructed to do so.
    Do all that in a very professional way. Make your apologies heartfelt/believable but don't acknowledge what you did was wrong.
  • edited December 2007
    Kevin M.;20201 said:
    Obviously it's just a misunderstanding, but if you want to apologize, get her a gift card for the grocery store so she can buy as much bread and groceries as she wants for Christmas time
    I would not do that as then he'd be apologizing for a fault that he feels responsible for. Even if thats not the intention, that is how it'll be construed.
  • edited December 2007
    Ummm, I dont quite understand, why should he apologise for anything at all?? He didnt do anything wrong.

    If anything, SHE should be apologising to HIM. If it were me, i would request that and tell her that she had no right to yell at me and should learn how to treat people properly.
  • edited December 2007
    baby e;20210 said:
    Ummm, I dont quite understand, why should he apologise for anything at all?? He didnt do anything wrong.

    If anything, SHE should be apologising to HIM. If it were me, i would request that and tell her that she had no right to yell at me and should learn how to treat people properly.
    Yes, but in all likelihood, shes has seniority/is higher up. If nothing else, we don't want to lose a good reference in the future.
    Theres nothing wrong for apologizing for the grief she had to endure, its just being considerate ;)

    Thats how I would approach it at least.
  • edited December 2007
    Well, I personally would not cuz i dont think he's in the wrong at all. Things don't have to get messy, but if she yelled at him like that, its just not right, and not considerate on her part.

    But of course, i am the type of person that stands up for myself no matter who it is.
  • edited December 2007
    Thanks for all the great advice. I thought about it for awhile, and thought maybe the baker couldn't hear me. Being an introvert, I'm really quite and often repeats things when talking to people.

    I'm probably going to approach this through DaNoobie's advice and try to be rational with her. I might resort to yelling if she becomes irrational and making a fuss out of it.

    Also, I have more seniority over her. I've been working for 3 years and she just recently got hired. Not sure if that's an advantage or not.
  • edited December 2007
    Well, you still come off immature and asshole-ish by making this a shouting contest ye know
    I dunno, up to you. I'm sure you'll make the best decision for yourself :)
  • edited December 2007
    ^I dont think its about shouting or yelling really....its more of just standing up for yourself.

    She seems (from what you told us) to be the type of person who would yell, as she already did at you. I was just saying that if she does yell at you that there shouldnt be a problem with you yelling back at her....a taste of her own medicine so to speak. She needs to learn that you cant just yell at someone like that.

    Anyways, good luck to you. Since you have seniority, I doubt you'll have a problem. She prolly won't say anything to you at all about it.
  • edited December 2007
    Actually it seems something that any normal person would do should they find out that part of their xmas dinner was thrown out which had been paid for and being xmas eve they had no place else to get food for their dinner.

    As for AgentBob, you didn't do anything wrong. I wouldn't even care about this situation nor bring it up again. You did what you were told and that's not something you should be blamed for. Should she bring it up again, or anyone else, just explain what happened. That's it, that's all. It's as simple as that.

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