Legal question....about McDonald's restaurant?

[D A]

I am an employee at McDonald's restaurant, and I have quite an interesting story that I need to ask Y!Answers about the legality of one of our customer's threats.

We have a guy that comes in every once in a while, and he orders a double cheeseburger without pickles. He claims that he is deathly allergic to pickles and if he bites into one, he could potentially die.

So today, he orders his normal double cheeseburger without pickles. He gets his order, comes back, and tells me that he needs to go throw up in the bathroom because he took a bite into his sandwich, and it turns out that it had pickles on it.

These mistakes happen every so often, sometimes when we're busy, we make mistakes, like any normal humans would.

He claims we were trying to "poison" him and that he wanted to name of the person who made the sandwich. And was telling us that he would file a lawsuit if we ever did this again.

You would think that if he was "deathly allergic" to pickles that this guy would, you know, check his sandwich before taking a huge bite out of it. But nope, he'd rather come back to the counter and harass the McDonald's employees.

I know that of course we're in the wrong for making his sandwich incorrectly, and he has every right to be upset about that fact. But the idea that we were trying to "poison" him and "attempt murder" (he said that) upon him just sort of makes me chuckle.

So for all of the lawyers or people that are familiar with the law.....here is my question:

Does this man have any sort of claim or legal action that he could take against the McDonald's employees or corporation that would justify his claims? Could he really press charges against us and claim we attempted to murder him?

And as a McDonald's employee...do I have any right to refuse him service, for fear of being prosecuted if for any reason his sandwich is accidentally made wrong?
Songbird JPA - could you please elaborate?
Everyone please report Tallen and Songbyrd, they're a waste of oxygen.

 

[Lexie]

I don't think you, as the employee, can make that call, but your manager certainly could. Of course, then the dimwit would sue the store for discriminating against people with pickle allergies (which I've never heard of in my life, and suspect there is no such thing--at least not one that will kill you).

No, if he called the police complaining you were trying to murder him ("it was Ronald, at McDonald's, with a pickle", for all you Clue fans), he would be all over YouTube in a matter of days.

I wouldn't want to deal with this nut (oops, another allergy). I think you should discuss with your manager how to handle him.

 

[joupedamom]

I'm not a lawyer, but have worked in the food industry as a Manager for many years. First off... yes, it is your mistake. Maybe not you personally, but you know how things go when you're busy. You take the order, someone else reads it, someone else makes it, someone else grabs it and hands it to the customer. Somewhere along the line, someone made a mistake. It happens.

As far as suing you personally, no. He cannot do that. He may be able to sue the corporation, but I'm not so sure how far he could take that one. I certainly hope your Manager spoke with him and was able to handle the situation properly.

I don't believe you should put yourself in a position to refuse service to anybody. People get a little too worked up over simple things sometimes, and the management is trained and prepared to deal with those situations. If you feel uncomfortable about serving this man, tell your Manager, and let them deal with it in the way that they feel is appropriate.