On Hold at McDonald's

McDonald's put me on hold.

What's supposed to be a new dining experience at the global hamburger empire's McDonald's 3'n1 concept restaurant turned out to be more of the same experience you expect today when using the telephone: A long wait to talk to a real person. The pleasantly decorated restaurants with quite affordable and good-tasting food have red telephones at each table which you use to order your food from a picture-filled menu that rivals coffee-table books in size.

Encountering such novelty, one eagerly presses the yellow connect button expecting the fast service you get at a regular McDonald's counter. What you really get, though, is, "Thank you for choosing McDonald's 3'n1. Please hold."

Five minutes proceeded to elapse. Grrr. Luckily for the two test restaurants, both in Lincoln, Nebraska, a tatooed guy named Zed saved the evening with a bit of service that recalls the bygone days when employees were empowered to employ common sense, make independent decisions, and actually act to please the customer and perhaps ensure said customer's return. Zed, bless his ink-covered neck (both sides, below the ears), gave us our dinner free after a series of miscues that left us parched without beverages and mystified by the restaurant's billing system.

Here's how it went down: After the long wait on hold, we got a genuine apology from the anonymous operator (where in the store is she?) and proceeded to order the meatloaf platter and the country-fried steak platter for ourselves, and the Chocolate Tower (or some such) for our almost-13-year-old cousin. (She inexplicably had already eaten dinner by the time we finally got an 8 p.m. breather from Saturday chores. Ah, to be a kid again and spend all that free time wishing we were older.) Finishing our order with a request for three "State Fair" lemonades, we got an "okay," CLICK to end that conversation. No total. Hmmm, we thought, but soon had our attention diverted by that almost-13 bundle of energy who just couldn't stop talking, mostly about how best to prank the restaurant by pressing the yellow ordering button at multiple tables.

An impossibly gooey brownie topped with chocolate ice cream, rich whipped cream and chocolate sauce arrived first, to the delight of the almost-13-year-old who'd just eaten two hours ago and to the dismay of the two adults who hadn't seen food since 11:30 a.m. The Chocolate Tower's foundations were almost completely eroded when the platters arrived. Keeping the country-fried steak company were two sides of mashed potatoes, not the one side of potatoes and one of buttered rolls we ordered. The meatloaf, in frighteningly uniform 1/4-inch-thick slices, had the "buttered garden vegetables" and mashed potatoes by its side as requested. Zed looked confused when we asked for utensils; to his credit, they arrived quickly.
The missing-in-action forks and knives should have prompted a quick mental leap toward a "the drinks are never coming" theory, but eight hours of working in the sun with no fuel but Vanilla Coke tends to addle the brain. Especially when steaming tasty food presents itself. Other problems aside, all the food was really quite good for the price -- $5.99 for the meatloaf, $5.99 for the country-fried steak and $4.29 for the Chocolate Tower, if memory serves. The mashed potatoes, though obviously instant, were a buttery garlicky lovely dream to eat. It's good they messed up the order.

The drinks never did arrive of their own accord. We had to again call the operator, who this time did not put us on hold. The "State Fair Lemonade" didn't show up; rather, Zed did, with three empty cups. He looked confused again when we asked for lemonade, but produced it quickly once he figured out we had ordered the specialty lemonade, but were now so thirsty we'd settle for the fountain variety.
Dinner finally drew to a close, the efforts of the resident order-messing gremlin notwithstanding. We rose to pay at the cashier and Zed, who seemed to do just about everything in the restaurant, again looked confused. Hadn't we gotten a bill? No, could you just look it up? Okay. We had a seat and he brought a bill, which did not contain the items we'd ordered. What did you have? "Well, it should be free," we said in a polite and restrained fashion. "But we had the meat loaf, country-fried steak and the Chocolate Tower."

Here's where the rational behavior so rare these days in businesses large and small came in. "You know, you're right," Zed said. "Go ahead. I'll take care of it." So we left feeling fat and happy, and we'll probably return. Zed, they should clone you and put you in all the 3'n1s.