I have literally had nightmares about dishes. This is why.
I just graduated high school, and needed to make some money for college. I didn’t think a summer job would be this bad. I applied at IHOP to be a bus person. Oddly enough, it seems that there aren’t any bussers. They have what they call “combo” which is where you (supposedly) work half the day washing dishes and half the day working. Now I wouldn’t have been pissed if they had said up front that this was the situtation, but they never did, and plus they had a sign out front that said they were hiring dishwashers and bussers, implying they were two seperate jobs. On my first day, I watched a video about how to bus a table. Then I watched another video (ironically, it was longer) about harrasment. The very next thing I was doing was learning how to wash dishes. WTF. But that’s really just a minor issue. My manipulative coworkers were more than happy to let me wash dishes all day and not bus any tables, but if they were in the back, they made SURE that we switched on time.
I was there for a grand total of a little over two months, and during that time, I witnessed a 100% turnover rate, including the night shift. No joke. This job is that bad.
This place is chronically understaffed, and it’s obvious because I never once saw them take down their “NOW HIRING” sign. Considering that, the main boss’s expectations are absolutely unrealistic. During a normal weekday, we had one person bussing the front (about 50 tables) and keeping everything stocked, like glasses, milk, etc., and one person would wash the dishes. During the peak hours, about 9:00-2:00, the dishwasher gets an average of about 1 bus tub every five minutes. The main boss, Joe, expects the dishwasher to break down the bus tub, stack the dirty dishes, spray and scrub them, rack them up, spray them again, put them in the dishwasher, stack them up when they’re done, and bring them to they’re respective places. And then of course there is silverware that must be washed and sorted, and later there is an onslaught of pots and pans. Now bussing tables never really gave me any problems. But the dishes are a different story.
There was only ONE person I knew that could actually wash the dishes correctly and quickly enough to not get bogged down. Aside from him, the dishwasher, whether it was me or someone else, would either get bogged down or wouldn’t actually get them clean. For example, they would take dishes that had been washed with food on them and therefore were still dirty when they came out AND WIPE THEM OFF WITH A TOWEL! Unbelievable. But even they got bogged down. So guess what happens? Even though the busser is busy enough with the front, he has to spend half of his time in the back sorting silverware and transporting dishes and the rest just making sure that the front is well supplied. This of course means that nobody is bussing the tables, so now the WAITRESSES ARE DOING THE JOB I WAS HIRED TO DO.
But it gets worse than just dirty dishes, because with the batter containers, pots, pans, and buckets, half of the workers would just spray them off and put them back on the shelf, still with spots of grease, batter, residue, and MOP WATER. AND THESE BUCKETS WITH MOP WATER, GREASE, AND RESIDUE STILL IN THEM ARE THE SAME BUCKETS WE USE TO PUT ICE IN. So don’t go to IHOP unless you want to drink chlorine.
But to be honest, I don’t blame them for being horribly dirty. All of us were making overtime, and with no lunch break, no bathroom breaks if we were busy which was almost constantly, and bitchy coworkers, I’m not surprised that they just wanted to go home. I know I did.
NEVER WASH DISHES AT IHOP. YOU’LL BE SORRY.