Social Media Case

            I recently became aware of something that happened a few years ago. To briefly summarize the situation I am describing, a waitress was fired from an Applebee’s restaurant in Missouri after posting a picture of a receipt from one of her customers on the internet. The customer was a pastor who ate at Applebee’s with seven of her friends and noticed on her receipt that a tip of 18% was suggested. This customer wrote “I give God 10%, why would YOU get 18?” and didn’t give any tip. It is an interesting situation. Officially, the waitress was fired because she violated the privacy rights of the Applebee’s customer by posting a picture of her receipt and the personal information thereon to the internet.

            I was out of the country when this incident occurred and I was not connected to the internet during my time abroad so I heard nothing about what happened. Now that I am researching it; however, I am noticing that it was quite the Internet sensation. People ran to the defense of both the customer and the waitress who had been fired. Applebee’s made an official post to their Facebook page to inform their customers of the reasons for the actions taken. In this post it was stated that a policy of the company had been broken that regarded the photographing and posting of said photographs without the permission of Applebee’s was prohibited. 

            Michael Wolf, a contributing writer at Forbes, wrote an article regarding his opinion of what happened entitled “Why Applebee’s Was Right.” This article was written with a very obvious touch of humor saying that waiters and waitresses often talk about and enjoy the comments made by customers because they share the common experience of being “stiffed” and they learn to take a joke in that profession. Wolf goes on to say that the waitress crossed the line from posting an innocent joke to violating the rights of the customer when the customer’s signature was included in the picture. According to Wolf, a signature is a private part of a person’s identity and shouldn’t be posted on the Internet. 

            Personally, I have a hard time deciding how I believe this situation should have been handled. As I was reading this case and the reactions of people on social media about what happened, I was struck by the comments of many people who had the opinion that Applebee’s had fired Chelsea Welch because they valued customers more than they valued workers. I understand that a business has the priority of making a profit and that in a food service industry a returning customer is the best way to make those profits. That being said, without servers to care for them, people won’t come to restaurants at all, no matter how well their personal information is kept secret, safe, and private. I believe that Applebee’s had every right to fire their employee after this incident but I also believe that it was a severe penalty for the circumstances. 

            Having worked in the food service industry myself I am somewhat familiar with what Chelsea Wright might have experienced. Training for jobs in this industry is usually not very extensive and almost never is it completely inclusive of all the privacies of the company. For the most part, when someone is being trained to work in a food serving position, the priority of the training process is focused on familiarizing the employee with the practices and duties that he/she will be using every day and how to make those as effective and lucrative as possible. I think that Chelsea Wright was probably told about the policy regarding posting pictures of the Applebee’s customers but that she had never been told that this policy also included the receipts of these customers.

            In my opinion, there were very few “winners” in this situation. I think that this encounter on social media and the Internet left all three parties involved in a situation where they would rather not be. The customer, Alois Bell, is now seen as the pastor who used “the God card” to get out of giving a tip to a waitress who had just served her and her seven friends and subsequently got that waitress fired. Applebee’s posted an official, professional, and politically correct reason for its action that was totally validated by the company’s policies and people looked at it like it had fired a customer on whim and a technicality. Chelsea Wright started an internet movement and, at one point, had a Facebook group of over 4,000 members called "HIRE BACK Chelsea" trying to get her rehired at Applebee’s but she didn’t get hired back and stayed unemployed. She also now has a very prominent mark on her internet presence that says she is an employee who violates company policy and leaks customer information. In a world where companies are more often than not vetting their potential hires on the Internet, this might cause her problems in the future. I learned from the experience of these three groups that social media are very intricate and sensitive and that we all must be very careful with how we are represented on these sites.

            It seems like trying to decide who was right and who was wrong in a situation that happened years ago is an exercise in futility. In my opinion, I think that Alois Bell made a statement in poor taste that was blown out of proportion on a very large scale by the careless action of waitress. It is unfortunate for all parties involved that it grew to have such widespread attention, but that seems to be the nature of the Internet.

            I hope that I, and anyone who reads this, can learn to understand the power that the Internet has to connect people in good ways and in bad ways. It is important that we all learn to use the Internet properly and appropriately. I also think that it is important for organizations to learn this lesson in order to properly educate their employees of proper behaviors and the possible disciplinary and legal consequences of inappropriate internet activities.  
Thanks for reading! 
Scott Call

Sources:

1.     http://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelwolf/2013/02/02/why-applebees-was-right/

2.    https://www.facebook.com/applebees/posts/10151390415294334

3.    http://gawker.com/5980816/applebees-responds-to-fired-server-scandal-claims-waitress-disregarded-a-company-policy-that-gets-disregarded-all-the-time?discussion_truncation=15&utm_expid=66866090-56.xSggy8zmSwG3vMsivr7rOg.4&utm_campaign=socialflow_gawker_twitter&utm_source=gawker_twitter&utm_medium=socialflow&utm_referrer=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.forbes.com%2Fsites%2Fmichaelwolf%2F2013%2F02%2F02%2Fwhy-applebees-was-right%2F See the comments of Clementine Rountree, be aware before reading that there is a large amount of profanity and obscene language in the comments posted on this article.