Are Your Policies Working AGAINST you?

Recently I was with my wife and her 87 year old mother at a small diner in Toledo, OH. We coming to the end of our meal and commenting on the meal. My wife's mother commented on how her toast was not toasted enough. The server came by and passed the bill to us. I commented on the toast that my wife's mother had. The waitress looked at the plate and said that since more the half was consumed, she couldn't do anything about it. I asked why is that, she said it was the policy. 

The policy, what policy? It was not written in the menu!  After having flashbacks about a toast exchange at a diner between Peter Fonda and a waitress in Easy Rider, I returned to the diner.

We have been there to this place multiple times, this was the first time I have heard of such a policy. How does one ascertain what constitutes over 50% consumption. She didn't take the fragments and do a post mortem. 

Heck, she wasn't even asking to remake the toast, just commenting! So rather than saying, "Sorry to hear that, is there anything I can do to make you feel better?" to her, the server just said, "It is our policy." 

Incensed about the matter of fact lack of empathy, we then asked the server's supervisor, to which her reply was, "It is management's policy." So for two slices of bread, perhaps be valued at $0.10 (not counting labor and processing) the wait staff had effectively alienated a customer. 

Perhaps if they would have said something like, "I understand, I am sorry you found the toast to not meet your expectations. Is there anything I can do to make you feel better about this?" This would have shifted off the decision to the customer to which the customer might say, "No" or "Yes", preserving the friendly relationship. 

In my experience above we would have ordered a couple slices of pie which would have brought the bill to $30. With Good service a 20% tip is warranted ($6.00); with Great service 30% or greater ($9.00 +). However in this case due to the blaming of the policy, the tip was less than 10% ($2.00). 

Assuming good service a service fee of $6.00 was warranted we would paid $6.00 service fee. After being confronted by the policy (value of the bread $0.10), it dropped the service fee from $6.00 to $2.00, a loss of $4.00. When the looking at the cost of the bread ($0.10) and the delta between what they would have received from what they did receive, they took a $4 dollar hit over a $0.10 piece of toast. 

The problem as I see it is that the policy provided the server, the one on the front line, no flexibility to make customer service decisions impacting the quality of the experience of the guest. At this establishment it was my way of the highway, or the veritable Soup Nazi, "No soup for you!" Perhaps one day they will grant to the server the discretion to make positive customer services changes. 

And so here is MY policy.  Whenever service is superior, I will reward that service with a premium service fee of 30% or greater over the pretax total; where service is good but not exceptional, I will award it with 20% service fee over the pretax total; however, where service is substandard (or there is a stupid policy), I will award it with less than 20% of pretax total.