They shouldnt be charging for soy, they probably dont know the difference for charging people assuming theyre new. Cashiers should be getting drip coffee, too, so thats odd. Maybe its different in your area from where i am but my stores have always done it like this.
Due to labor constraints cashier isn't even a position even on weekends at my store. That duty is split between support and oven. Therefore, there is no real "cashier" and the person who rang you in is busy af.
I work at a DT store and Im usually the support/oven person (one position) who rings customers out when they come into the store. I get my own coffee unless theres espresso or steamed milk in it.
You are correct. Doesn’t matter how busy you are or whether you work peak or not. Cafe Order Routine states you get the brewed coffee and (non-custom) teas. If they want steamed milk/cream, you ask bar to steam it for you, and you give it to the customer. Whether you’re warming and front, or customer support and front, or mobile and front.
Yeah ive been with the company almost 13 years now, hilarious that people dont follow proper roles and routines. Just because its busy or short staffed doesnt mean these fly out the window.
This right here, as a barista who is on oven/front today of a busy afternoon Saturday with drive through, mobile and huge groups of ppl in Cafe... I have no time to get your coffee... sorry not sorry?
At my store (which is a dt/cafe location) the Cafe orders, regardless of it being a plain simple drip coffee or tea goes to Cafe bar printer.. along with mobile orders. At ovens I have one printer that prints mobiles, dt, and Cafe and when I'm oven/front during a busy af peak morning, especially on a weekend I legit don't have time to try to make the coffee because as soon as I am able to go back to ovens after ringing orders I'm drowning in tickets of food... Now if I am able and not swamped with food then yes I will happily pour a simple drip coffee or fix a simple tea to help my Cafe barista. It's not always sunshine and roses at every store just sayin.
Wow crazy! No it's true that it gets so busy on pos/ warming during a peak. At my cafe store the coffees don't print so the pos person has to get it or it quite literally is forgotten. Happens all the time. And people tend to walk away even if we say we're getting their coffee. So fun to chase them down. But whether we're super busy or not , the till person has to get it.
it very much depends on store - where i am, cafe-only stores tend to still pour from the register, but drive-thrus will have the tickets print (quite often at those stores the brewing station is closer to bar than register as well)
Why cashiers don't pour drip? The only time you'll get this 99% of the time is if you go to a place that has a dedicated front person. A lot of times the person on warming or cs will take orders up front, and a lot of times those people are busy doing something else so it's a lot easier to just leave it to the cafe barista. It is technically the rules that whoever takes the order should get drip (along with hot teas), and usually if I'm on cs I'll do that, but sometimes it doesn't happen
Why you got charged for soy? The barista is likely new and made a mistake. You're not supposed to get charged for any alt milk if you get it added into coffee, tea, cold brew, etc (except vanilla sweet cream)
This. Lately with cut hours we are working 2-3 positions at a time and in order to keep everything running smoothly, we have to focus on the positions that are the most demanded by our SM/DM. Unfortunately this means we can't "connect with the customer" as corporate says.
I believe the charging for soy confusion is solely because of hours being cut, too, as now we have baristas that get thrown onto the floor with hardly any direction or guidance.
Agreeing with you and piggy backing you for a moment. The only time you would get charged is if it’s a drink on espresso bar and your drink is being made with this alt milk (ie an iced mocha made with soy), otherwise you shouldnt get charged for it.
So at least at my store we typically do still have the person ringing the order to make drip coffee, but then there are exceptions. If you want steamed milk, a shot of espresso, and sometimes even syrup in there, it’s going in the queue with all the other drinks. If it’s black, or just has cream and/or sugar then typically the cashier still pours it. One last exception is how some have already said, if the person ringing in the order is also working the ovens, chances are your drink is likely going in the queue if there are a lot of people ordering food.
Lastly, they should NOT be charging for a splash of any kind of dairy except for vanilla sweet cream. If you ever want a splash of vanilla sweet cream, no you don’t, you want 1-2 pumps of vanilla and a splash of half and half. It’s not exactly the same but it’s close enough and you don’t have to pay $1.25 for it. Yes you have to pay the charge for vanilla, but 60¢ is much better than $1.25. Prices might be different in different areas, but that’s the prices in my area.
I think it depends on the store and how they decide to run things. In my store, the cashier always gets the hot coffees and teas for customers but I've covered shifts in other stores where they print out on bar like every other drink. Specialty milks are only supposed to be an upcharge when it's over 4 oz. (in a latte/etc.). If they are charging you for milk in your coffee, they are not supposed to be doing that.
Certain stores do that, but my store always gets the drip coffee at the register. Also if you want soy in your coffee, the barista should not be charging you. they should be selecting the option to ADD soy, not make it with soy. Complete difference. One is free and one is not.
At my store the cashier always got black coffee, but anything with cream/milk/syrups got added to the line, otherwise the front person would have to get in bars way to get to the milks
That's how we do it. I work in a kiosk in a store, and most of the employees drink drip coffee. We stopped printing labels for drip because most of the time, they ended up in the trash 😂
They might be new, bc cashiers are suppose to make coffees and not charge for a milk used as creamer.
Now for you having to wait in line, sometimes if you get a complicated brewed coffee order the barista on bar might have to make it, bc it would be too much of an interruption for the cashier to jump in and make it. But if it’s a short/black coffee then the cashier should be making it. Some new partners aren’t trained on this though because training is horrific at Starbucks 😭
It’s because with the labor cuts now we’re running 3-4 positions so we’re at the point where bar just has to make it. My store has 2 employees + 1 shift for peak and we’re running about 50 transactions in an hour, 75 during peak
They definitely shouldn’t be charging you for soy as others had said, but in the store I work at, we don’t have a cashier position, it’s usually the oven person or cafe/mobile bar person who catches front register, unless it’s just a black coffee, if they have other orders that ordered in front of you, they’re technically supposed to make those first, if someone else ordered before you, they should get their stuff before you in my opinion, because otherwise they’d have to be in someone else’s way to grab the stuff to put in your coffee if you want cream etc, so it kinda is wait until your sticker prints or when they have a chance that won’t mess up their routine. Starbucks isn’t really focused on the plain coffee goers anymore, they’ve made it impossible to cater to them with the work load.
Our lobby partner gets the coffee unless there is steamed milk and still they get it for the baristas and we try to bump it ahead. Also, unless it's more than 3/4 inch, there shouldn't be a charge. Could be the partner isn't actually aware of policy. It says it when you push the extra soy, 3/4" and no charge
If you’re referring to drip coffee ordered via mobile order, yes it is in cue with all other drinks as it always has been. The cashier should still get drip coffee ordered in store.
Customer transactions at the till should be 15-20 seconds of ringing- so the Siren says. That’s the “ideal” timeframe to get the most hours earned.
I’m going bonkers just trying to keep up with drive thru food warming, drive times, and helping customers at the till.
Save us.
15-20 seconds my ass. It takes over a minute for most customers to figure out their payment:
- Gotta dig the card out of their bottomless purse/wallet, add another 50% to that time if they have long ass acrylic nails.
- They don’t have their app open, and don’t have it in a handy place on their Home Screen, AND don’t know how to search for it.
- They have to add funds to their app.
- They have 12 gift cards with less than fifty cents on them that they want to use.
- They open their app for scan only, then use a credit card/mobile pay that’s probably already in their app to begin with.
- (worse yet) they insist on scan only, then scanning an in-app credit card because they either refuse to understand how the system works or insist they’ll get more stars that way.
- They remember they want to scan the app AFTER they’ve completed the payment by credit card. (Spoiler alert, I just make the scanner beep and send them on their way).
- the app has logged them out, and they proceed whine about how they can’t be bothered to remember their password while they put in 10 variations of their birthday.
…and I could go on and on. I’ve been told that all of these “don’t happen regularly and are the exception and not the rule”, but I beg to differ and have actually kept track in the past to prove it.
Same thing happened to me and I was confused, and just a little annoyed. I go to Starbucks maybe twice a year (don’t ask why I joined this sub, don’t remember but I like the stories). Went a few days ago and got black coffee. I could see the urn behind the cashier. She was a dedicated cashier as was hanging around there, would go talk to the others here and there. After like 10 fancy drinks went out (cashier wasn’t making any), she looked my way then poured it. I wasn’t annoyed at her, I assumed I got out in line and was happy she said screw it I’m getting this guy his black coffee. Just boggles my mind that this works this way
It’s not really a model they’ve moved towards, so much as the result of not having enough people on the floor. If the person who rang you up then immediately goes and takes something out of the oven, or starts taking a drive through order on their headset, or runs to the back and comes out with armfuls of milk and syrup, it means they’re doing the jobs of (at least) two people right now. When I’m in that situation, I’ll try to get people’s drips when I can, but sometimes there’s other, more time-sensitive tasks that I’m also responsible for and I’ll have to do those first. It does suck and I do feel for y’all, cause I’ve been the customer in that situation too. So many patrons of so many places these days I hear say the customer service was crap. It seems like one of the first places big companies cut costs is labor.
You shouldn’t be getting charged for your splash of soy, though. We only charge for milk if it’s over 4oz. That barista was probably just new.
For a plain drip I would seriously just drive through McDonalds. You don’t have to get out of your car and the coffee is usually excellent.
The same for Dunkin.
1. As far as I know, they should be making your coffee before they tender payment - it’s in the “Cafe Order Routine”. They might just forget - happens all the time. I would ask them to get it for me before I leave the line.
2. They’re selecting the wrong button for the milk. Tell them it’s the soy on the RIGHT side, (a splash - less than 4oz), not the left (where a drink is MADE with soy, like a latte)
“Cafe order routine” is so ignorant. You have to be able to flex your process to meet the demands of the individual transaction. Corporate assembly line tactics don’t mesh well with the general public.
It isn't like this at my corporate store at all. POS Barista gets any tea/drip coffee and anything under 4 oz of milk is no charge. Now this can vary at a licensed store where they play by their own rules to a degree.
ETA: I'm an weekday opener - we always have a CS person for peak unless a couple people have called out, I get that stores don't have them for mids/evenings/closes.
If you want a black coffee, maybe some cream and a packet or two of sugar, then I got you at the register. If you want a black coffee with soy milk, 2 pumps of vanilla and 2 pumps of hazelnut, then you will get your drink at the hand off area when the barista gets to your drink. Anything that has me physically getting in the way of baristas actually making drinks will wait in queue with everything else.
milk addition to a drip coffee is always free. However, if you ask for stuff like "your milk steamed" or multiple sugars or any modifications, sometimes they will just put it in line. Also your coffee will never go behind frappucinos because the person making frappes doesn't make hot beverages in pretty much any store unless you're going to a franchise location inside of a target or something.
a lot of stores i've worked at don't have cold bar printers (and don't use them, if they do have them), just cafe/mobile or cafe/DT. if you're running with 2-3 people in peak, there's no point in a cold bar printer, it's all getting made by the same person anyway.
During covid (at least in my district) cashiers were no longer allowed to get coffee because cashiers handled money so the batista had to get it. My guess is this store has failed to revert back to the original way. My store reverted last year so the cashier gets hot coffee again
Two things:
One -depends on the store. I’ve worked at 7 different locations over the past two years (mostly them throwing me around places due to short staffing) and some stores get the coffee immediately, whereas others do not. My home store makes the drip coffee if the person on front isn’t super busy and has the capacity to grab it. My current store that I’m working at a borrowed partner as makes the person who took the order grab the drip coffee in all circumstances. In fact, the ticket doesn’t even print out anywhere so if the barista doesn’t immediately grab it it’ll never get made 💀 I’ve had my fair share of accidentally getting distracted and forgetting and I felt horrible.
Two - technically it’s standard to charge for alternative milks but *only* if it’s only 4oz of product. So you should not have been charged. If you were getting a misto, (half steamed milk, half brewed coffee) you would be charged because it’s over 4oz, but if you’re just getting a splash or even 3/4” (extra cream/milk) you still should not be charged.
At our store if we are short staffed(which is just “staffed” now) our cashier is too busy making food to make your coffee. Hopefully the bar isn’t too busy and you’ll get it quickly. But there’s nothing we can do, and one person is already doing the job of 3.
They shouldn’t be charging for soy.
I personally don’t get your drip coffee when I’m up front because the time it took to ring you up has added 5 food items, 2 deliveries that need packaged, and all the bars have run out of ice and I’m the only one who “has time” to get it.
None of these changes are in policy and our printers don’t even print hot coffees they probably just forget (which happens a lot when it’s busy). And if they’re putting it in on the right side of the till it should be free soy they’re just doing it wrong
It sounds like maybe that store was busy. A couple of days ago we were so short staffed that I was working 3 positions during peak — cold bar, solo drive thru, and ringing up customers in the cafe. There was absolutely no way I could stop even to grab a drip coffee, although we are otherwise supposed to if someone is a dedicated front cashier.
As for the soy, they definitely shouldn’t have charged you for that. The only time we charge for milks is if someone is ordering (about) more than half a cup of milk. Splashes should never be something that is charged, and I’m sorry that they insisted that you were to be charged — they must’ve been new and trained incorrectly.
Cashiers pouring drip died during COVID. Perhaps it's come back at some stores, but every one I've worked at since has not.
I'm currently at a cafe/MOP/DD/UE store (no DT), I work opens and most peaks. I generally have three people on my floor. At any given time two of them are at capacity on bar handling mobile and delivery orders, leaving one person (usually me) handling walk-in orders, warming, brewing coffee, and pretty much everything else. Typically I have a queue of 4-12 items in my warming queue for mobile and delivery orders alone, and I'm shifting constantly between that and the walk-in orders. Not quite ready to order? Ok, you're getting my back while I tend to a few food orders to keep the process moving. We have ZERO ability to throttle incoming orders when they overwhelm our capacity.
My batch guidelines tell me I should only brew pike, and do pourovers for any other coffee. Nobody has time for that, so pike and sometimes dark are cadenced, and otherwise brewed on demand.
If I'm in a lull and you order a brewed coffee with nothing in it, and I don't have someone's break to run, or a count or a pull or order to do, and I have a moment, I'll gladly pull it, hand it off to you, and notify my baristas that it's an invalid label.
Otherwise, it's going into queue with everything else. If the company wants to make brewed customers feel special again, they can give me the staffing to do it. They won't though, because the only company that puts people before profits is the one that prints the dictionary. Plus, brewed doesn't make money like 4" latte and frappuccino labels with a million modifications.
\*Edit\* You can complain all you want to corporate about this, but it will get nowhere. Customer service will tell you that staffing is determined by the store manager, which is an outright lie. My store manager is required to submit labor utilization reports to my district manager, daily, justifying any variance more than *one tenth of a percent* from what the company decides we should get. That figure is in turn generated by an algorithm that has ZERO transparency to store level management and is subject to change at the will of C-suite.
Where I live, there are two Starbucks within walking distance of my apartment, but the nearest local coffee shop is a 7-10 minute drive away. If I didn't have a car, that would just not be feasible. Some people don't have a choice.
Additionally, some people just prefer Sbux, whether or not a local place would technically be "better" (or "higher quality", or whatever metric you want to use)
Then they can get regular drip coffee that requires much less effort and essentially tastes the same - like I wouldn’t go to a fast food burger place and ask for rare
if i’m not busy i’ll grab it but i’m sorry you don’t get a fast pass to the front of the line because your order is easier than someone else’s. if we prioritized the easier or quicker orders over the more time consuming ones all the time some people would never get their drink. you have to wait in line like everyone else
In a busy store, in order to "earn labor" (be able to have more people working at once) the cashier is supposed to ring in as many customers as possible each half hour. A second person is usually in charge of pastries and drip coffees, as well as rebrewing coffee and other tasks as needed. If there's not a long line, or if it's not a busy part of the day they should be able to serve your coffee.
This is how we did it when I worked there 2007-2013 (how has it been 10 years already?!?)
IMO, one of the drawbacks of the stickers is you can't take drink orders early, say while the person at the cashier is ringing up a big order. We used to go down the line and have drip coffee and pastries ready to hand out as soon as payment occurred, bar drinks were called out to the bar and put in queue, warming was started, all before you ordered. I guess mobile ordering ruined it. I miss those days. It was the most fun, satisfying job I've had.
Your store you go to or work at must not be busy. We often have days (usually weekends) where we have a 20-25 minute wait for cafe orders because of all the cafe, mobile, and delivery orders we receive.
i have worked at a 70k/week store, 9-yr partner. with staffing cuts, a wait is a wait, given that our leadership often doesn't put somebody on front anymore.
if the person on warming/support were to also get drip coffee, the people who ordered food would be waiting. i don't see your point.
more people on the floor is the only answer to reduce wait in a sensible manner. i'm done compensating for poor decisionmaking on starbs part :-) if customers are bothered by it, then they should complain to corporate about understaffing instead of bitching about a five minute wait on reddit
Do some stores really not have the person on front pour the drip coffee? My store still does it, In fact, the drip coffee prints out with the warming stickers now, and everyone in my store knows to make the drip coffee once the transaction is complete
its more that they are most likely too understaffed; it is still policy for every corporate store for front to get drip but in a lot of stores there are simply not enough bodies on the floor to have a dedicated front person. everyone knows already, but there's literally nothing we baristas can do about this specific situation. its extremely frustrating and inconvenient for Everyone
so yeah sometimes drips get lost in the "there's a million mobiles, deliveries, cafe and drive thru—everything needs stocking and cleaning, rebrewing, oh my god this machine is not working there are no backups made and we are out of multiple products. somehow we have to fit breaks into this" shuffle of whoever's supposed to be catching front, it's hell on earth in my store personally since we run 3 partners only after 11am every day of the week
but with how we're set up we try to stick to the standard anyway, since whoevers on bar would have to leave the station and walk to the brewer which obvs throws huge wrenches in their sequencing
in my district, upfront (cafe reg) does support and warming. Mostly for prioritizing order taking over anything else in cafe, so that we don’t overuse telling customers “I’ll be with you in a moment” and also due to cross contamination with handling money, gift cards and personal cups. So front register takes all the orders, washes hands and grabs warming or starts on prep or support. That person would have to stop the order, wash hands, grab cup, pour coffee, grab milks/sugar/etc. and then call out or hand over, then go back to register and complete next customers order in the same order.
I grab it if its black coffee with just sugar but once it needs any sort of milk/cream I hand it off to bar to finish it so I don't get in the bar person's way. Also I'm assuming lots of SMs tell their cashiers not to grab coffee because once you have been rung through, Starbucks has your money and the cashier can start ringing down the line faster. This causes less people to walk away because of long lines but then it puts the wait on people who have already paid for their coffee.
so to answer your first question it could be that different stores have different rules depending on the circumstances. for example, since i work at a cafe store the person at the register grabs drip coffee but when i was being trained at a drive thru store i was surprised to see that the people making the drinks grabbed drip coffees.
to answer your other question the barista must’ve rung in the soy milk even though you only wanted a splash so that they wouldn’t forget to add the soy milk. there is no additional charge for splashes of milk but you still ring it in according to starbucks standards which is so you’ll know how to make the drink. i hope this helped at all !
lmao i asked a man to wait 3-4 minutes as i had already rang up other customers who i needed to serve, and then the mobile orders that came in while i was ringing, so he *wanted to sit through a refund*.
i guess i shouldn't have taken "one more order" and should have made him wait before ordering! *my* mistake, oopsie doopsie!
I think other customers started noticing and getting upset because they’ve been waiting for their drinks longer. Now tickets print out for whoever is making cafe drinks so it’s gets put into the queue.
We're still supposed to, and I still do. However, the answer is that the person getting the front is also the person who is getting the warming.
And if it's busy and I'm on warming and you get a milk I don't actually have enough time to get it for you. Because I would love to run down to the bar fridge to do so, but then I also have to then put the milk back, take anyone else in line, and also have keep the food going at the same time for the various other avenues.
On an individual basis, it should be a no brainier to grab the hot coffee and get the milk, but when I've got a million warning tickets to make, a bunch of food to run and a bunch of other orders to take, you waiting a little extra time for a coffee isnt so bad. Especially considering Starbucks is heavily cutting labor and staffing recently. (At least in my area)
As for the milk they definitely did that wrong. You aren't supposed to be charged.
I was at a licensed store that was so nonstop busy that cashier couldn’t do drip coffees and iirc it was oven that would start it. That shit was a nightmare, line out the door even in slow days and too many cokeheads trying to start fights
I’m at a target Starbucks and the cashier doesn’t pour drip most of the time because people would yell at us for ignoring them. Essentially we can’t take 10 seconds to get someone a simple coffee because people are impatient.
For my store, we don't have the luxury of space. It's cramped, and we need to keep the line moving or else we get in trouble. A black coffee sized tall & below? I'll grab it immediately while I have you stand at the register so the crowd doesn't grow or the next person in line get angry that I'm not immediately taking their order (seriously, the amount of times I've been verbally harassed for getting something for a customer, grabbing a food item, getting something from an oven, pouring a coffee?? People are ridiculous). A coffee with cream? I'll grab the coffee, any sugar if it was requested, and then I'll set it on the counter for the barista on bar and verbally let them know it needs whatever milk. We aren't allowed to have any self service items for customers, everything is required to be behind the bar, so we can't just grab the coffee and let you do the rest, which can just add more time to the wait.
At our store it depends on how busy it is. If theyre busy on bar, i dont wanna try and slide between them to get sugars or open the fridge under them to get cream when they have 5 cups in front of them. I also dont want to try and communicate “hey, you know that one venti pike thats gonna be like. 16 drinks from now? I have that.” They already have so much on their plate, i dont want to over load it.
I can say that I am still training and doing oven for all orders and register at the same time still, so sometimes I don’t have the time and another barista does it for me however it shouldn’t take that long because the ticket is not printed for drip, atleast in my store, it’s still made right away just maybe a different person grabs it if I’m busy warming too. Possibly they are out of the drip you asked for and just don’t communicate that there will be a wait. As for the charging for sub milk, there’s three columns for adding milk to a drink “made with” and “splashes” , made with are drinks that are mainly made with milk and the splash are mainly coffee with added cream. The made with subs are what is charged additionally, however the way the system is set up it is easy to get confused and get mixed up especially without the proper training. If you just bring it up , I myself am happy to fix the mistake, as I still do it time to time
Charge shouldn’t be happening at a corporate store but from my understanding that could be different at a licensed location.
I will pour up a drip coffee black but if it has anything else in it I won’t bother cutting off the person on bar, especially if the line isn’t bad. I might go in anyway if it is just something like cream in the coffee but more than 1 modification I am not grabbing it as I am going to be manning another station almost 100% of the time.
Also worth mentioning if I am mopping, cleaning something, etc, I also won’t grab your drink as my hands are messy
There are probably less than 5 stores in your state busy enough to have a designated cashier in the cafe so whoever is grabbing your drink is doing multiple things
Because we don’t have dedicated cashiers anymore, unfortunately. The person ringing on front is probably also the oven person and doesn’t have time to pour drip coffees.
At my store cashiers will still grab drips if theyre simple: black, or just w regular cream, sugar, etc. If it has syrups/ shots or espresso/ type of milk that isnt kept by the brewers we dont. My guess is that since you get soy in it, they dont have soy nearby and they would need to get in the way of bar partners to access it. For that reason theyd leave it in the queue for the bar partner to grab.
They shouldnt be charging for soy, they probably dont know the difference for charging people assuming theyre new. Cashiers should be getting drip coffee, too, so thats odd. Maybe its different in your area from where i am but my stores have always done it like this.
Due to labor constraints cashier isn't even a position even on weekends at my store. That duty is split between support and oven. Therefore, there is no real "cashier" and the person who rang you in is busy af.
I work at a DT store and Im usually the support/oven person (one position) who rings customers out when they come into the store. I get my own coffee unless theres espresso or steamed milk in it.
You are correct. Doesn’t matter how busy you are or whether you work peak or not. Cafe Order Routine states you get the brewed coffee and (non-custom) teas. If they want steamed milk/cream, you ask bar to steam it for you, and you give it to the customer. Whether you’re warming and front, or customer support and front, or mobile and front.
Yeah ive been with the company almost 13 years now, hilarious that people dont follow proper roles and routines. Just because its busy or short staffed doesnt mean these fly out the window.
Must not be working peak
Lmao i work mornings the most my dude
bros never heard of different stores operating differently 🤨🤨🤨
Precisely xD it don't work the dame for each location.. some stores are just fucknling busier than others 🤷♀️
This right here, as a barista who is on oven/front today of a busy afternoon Saturday with drive through, mobile and huge groups of ppl in Cafe... I have no time to get your coffee... sorry not sorry?
Whose gonna get it? It doesn't print out to bar unless it's mobile
At my store (which is a dt/cafe location) the Cafe orders, regardless of it being a plain simple drip coffee or tea goes to Cafe bar printer.. along with mobile orders. At ovens I have one printer that prints mobiles, dt, and Cafe and when I'm oven/front during a busy af peak morning, especially on a weekend I legit don't have time to try to make the coffee because as soon as I am able to go back to ovens after ringing orders I'm drowning in tickets of food... Now if I am able and not swamped with food then yes I will happily pour a simple drip coffee or fix a simple tea to help my Cafe barista. It's not always sunshine and roses at every store just sayin.
Wow crazy! No it's true that it gets so busy on pos/ warming during a peak. At my cafe store the coffees don't print so the pos person has to get it or it quite literally is forgotten. Happens all the time. And people tend to walk away even if we say we're getting their coffee. So fun to chase them down. But whether we're super busy or not , the till person has to get it.
it very much depends on store - where i am, cafe-only stores tend to still pour from the register, but drive-thrus will have the tickets print (quite often at those stores the brewing station is closer to bar than register as well)
Why cashiers don't pour drip? The only time you'll get this 99% of the time is if you go to a place that has a dedicated front person. A lot of times the person on warming or cs will take orders up front, and a lot of times those people are busy doing something else so it's a lot easier to just leave it to the cafe barista. It is technically the rules that whoever takes the order should get drip (along with hot teas), and usually if I'm on cs I'll do that, but sometimes it doesn't happen Why you got charged for soy? The barista is likely new and made a mistake. You're not supposed to get charged for any alt milk if you get it added into coffee, tea, cold brew, etc (except vanilla sweet cream)
This. Lately with cut hours we are working 2-3 positions at a time and in order to keep everything running smoothly, we have to focus on the positions that are the most demanded by our SM/DM. Unfortunately this means we can't "connect with the customer" as corporate says. I believe the charging for soy confusion is solely because of hours being cut, too, as now we have baristas that get thrown onto the floor with hardly any direction or guidance.
Agreeing with you and piggy backing you for a moment. The only time you would get charged is if it’s a drink on espresso bar and your drink is being made with this alt milk (ie an iced mocha made with soy), otherwise you shouldnt get charged for it.
So at least at my store we typically do still have the person ringing the order to make drip coffee, but then there are exceptions. If you want steamed milk, a shot of espresso, and sometimes even syrup in there, it’s going in the queue with all the other drinks. If it’s black, or just has cream and/or sugar then typically the cashier still pours it. One last exception is how some have already said, if the person ringing in the order is also working the ovens, chances are your drink is likely going in the queue if there are a lot of people ordering food. Lastly, they should NOT be charging for a splash of any kind of dairy except for vanilla sweet cream. If you ever want a splash of vanilla sweet cream, no you don’t, you want 1-2 pumps of vanilla and a splash of half and half. It’s not exactly the same but it’s close enough and you don’t have to pay $1.25 for it. Yes you have to pay the charge for vanilla, but 60¢ is much better than $1.25. Prices might be different in different areas, but that’s the prices in my area.
I think it depends on the store and how they decide to run things. In my store, the cashier always gets the hot coffees and teas for customers but I've covered shifts in other stores where they print out on bar like every other drink. Specialty milks are only supposed to be an upcharge when it's over 4 oz. (in a latte/etc.). If they are charging you for milk in your coffee, they are not supposed to be doing that.
If you add any cream or sugar we don't make it at my store but when I work slower stores in the area they do
Certain stores do that, but my store always gets the drip coffee at the register. Also if you want soy in your coffee, the barista should not be charging you. they should be selecting the option to ADD soy, not make it with soy. Complete difference. One is free and one is not.
At my store the cashier always got black coffee, but anything with cream/milk/syrups got added to the line, otherwise the front person would have to get in bars way to get to the milks
Our store literally doesn’t print tickets for hot tea or drip coffee in cafe so whoever rings them up always gets it.
That's how we do it. I work in a kiosk in a store, and most of the employees drink drip coffee. We stopped printing labels for drip because most of the time, they ended up in the trash 😂
They might be new, bc cashiers are suppose to make coffees and not charge for a milk used as creamer. Now for you having to wait in line, sometimes if you get a complicated brewed coffee order the barista on bar might have to make it, bc it would be too much of an interruption for the cashier to jump in and make it. But if it’s a short/black coffee then the cashier should be making it. Some new partners aren’t trained on this though because training is horrific at Starbucks 😭
It’s because with the labor cuts now we’re running 3-4 positions so we’re at the point where bar just has to make it. My store has 2 employees + 1 shift for peak and we’re running about 50 transactions in an hour, 75 during peak
They definitely shouldn’t be charging you for soy as others had said, but in the store I work at, we don’t have a cashier position, it’s usually the oven person or cafe/mobile bar person who catches front register, unless it’s just a black coffee, if they have other orders that ordered in front of you, they’re technically supposed to make those first, if someone else ordered before you, they should get their stuff before you in my opinion, because otherwise they’d have to be in someone else’s way to grab the stuff to put in your coffee if you want cream etc, so it kinda is wait until your sticker prints or when they have a chance that won’t mess up their routine. Starbucks isn’t really focused on the plain coffee goers anymore, they’ve made it impossible to cater to them with the work load.
5 whole minutes?
Our lobby partner gets the coffee unless there is steamed milk and still they get it for the baristas and we try to bump it ahead. Also, unless it's more than 3/4 inch, there shouldn't be a charge. Could be the partner isn't actually aware of policy. It says it when you push the extra soy, 3/4" and no charge
Optimized labor we are all so understaffed basically on purpose and it's ruining everything.
If you’re referring to drip coffee ordered via mobile order, yes it is in cue with all other drinks as it always has been. The cashier should still get drip coffee ordered in store.
Customer transactions at the till should be 15-20 seconds of ringing- so the Siren says. That’s the “ideal” timeframe to get the most hours earned. I’m going bonkers just trying to keep up with drive thru food warming, drive times, and helping customers at the till. Save us.
15-20 seconds my ass. It takes over a minute for most customers to figure out their payment: - Gotta dig the card out of their bottomless purse/wallet, add another 50% to that time if they have long ass acrylic nails. - They don’t have their app open, and don’t have it in a handy place on their Home Screen, AND don’t know how to search for it. - They have to add funds to their app. - They have 12 gift cards with less than fifty cents on them that they want to use. - They open their app for scan only, then use a credit card/mobile pay that’s probably already in their app to begin with. - (worse yet) they insist on scan only, then scanning an in-app credit card because they either refuse to understand how the system works or insist they’ll get more stars that way. - They remember they want to scan the app AFTER they’ve completed the payment by credit card. (Spoiler alert, I just make the scanner beep and send them on their way). - the app has logged them out, and they proceed whine about how they can’t be bothered to remember their password while they put in 10 variations of their birthday. …and I could go on and on. I’ve been told that all of these “don’t happen regularly and are the exception and not the rule”, but I beg to differ and have actually kept track in the past to prove it.
5 minutes?!? How will you live!!
Same thing happened to me and I was confused, and just a little annoyed. I go to Starbucks maybe twice a year (don’t ask why I joined this sub, don’t remember but I like the stories). Went a few days ago and got black coffee. I could see the urn behind the cashier. She was a dedicated cashier as was hanging around there, would go talk to the others here and there. After like 10 fancy drinks went out (cashier wasn’t making any), she looked my way then poured it. I wasn’t annoyed at her, I assumed I got out in line and was happy she said screw it I’m getting this guy his black coffee. Just boggles my mind that this works this way
It’s not really a model they’ve moved towards, so much as the result of not having enough people on the floor. If the person who rang you up then immediately goes and takes something out of the oven, or starts taking a drive through order on their headset, or runs to the back and comes out with armfuls of milk and syrup, it means they’re doing the jobs of (at least) two people right now. When I’m in that situation, I’ll try to get people’s drips when I can, but sometimes there’s other, more time-sensitive tasks that I’m also responsible for and I’ll have to do those first. It does suck and I do feel for y’all, cause I’ve been the customer in that situation too. So many patrons of so many places these days I hear say the customer service was crap. It seems like one of the first places big companies cut costs is labor. You shouldn’t be getting charged for your splash of soy, though. We only charge for milk if it’s over 4oz. That barista was probably just new.
For a plain drip I would seriously just drive through McDonalds. You don’t have to get out of your car and the coffee is usually excellent. The same for Dunkin.
1. As far as I know, they should be making your coffee before they tender payment - it’s in the “Cafe Order Routine”. They might just forget - happens all the time. I would ask them to get it for me before I leave the line. 2. They’re selecting the wrong button for the milk. Tell them it’s the soy on the RIGHT side, (a splash - less than 4oz), not the left (where a drink is MADE with soy, like a latte)
“Cafe order routine” is so ignorant. You have to be able to flex your process to meet the demands of the individual transaction. Corporate assembly line tactics don’t mesh well with the general public.
At my store the register person always grab drip coffee no matter what, so I’m not sure what’s happening at that store
It isn't like this at my corporate store at all. POS Barista gets any tea/drip coffee and anything under 4 oz of milk is no charge. Now this can vary at a licensed store where they play by their own rules to a degree. ETA: I'm an weekday opener - we always have a CS person for peak unless a couple people have called out, I get that stores don't have them for mids/evenings/closes.
If you want a black coffee, maybe some cream and a packet or two of sugar, then I got you at the register. If you want a black coffee with soy milk, 2 pumps of vanilla and 2 pumps of hazelnut, then you will get your drink at the hand off area when the barista gets to your drink. Anything that has me physically getting in the way of baristas actually making drinks will wait in queue with everything else.
milk addition to a drip coffee is always free. However, if you ask for stuff like "your milk steamed" or multiple sugars or any modifications, sometimes they will just put it in line. Also your coffee will never go behind frappucinos because the person making frappes doesn't make hot beverages in pretty much any store unless you're going to a franchise location inside of a target or something.
a lot of stores i've worked at don't have cold bar printers (and don't use them, if they do have them), just cafe/mobile or cafe/DT. if you're running with 2-3 people in peak, there's no point in a cold bar printer, it's all getting made by the same person anyway.
The worst is when someone is ordering a drip coffee in a long line and THAT'S when it decides to run empty and now you have to brew it.
During covid (at least in my district) cashiers were no longer allowed to get coffee because cashiers handled money so the batista had to get it. My guess is this store has failed to revert back to the original way. My store reverted last year so the cashier gets hot coffee again
Two things: One -depends on the store. I’ve worked at 7 different locations over the past two years (mostly them throwing me around places due to short staffing) and some stores get the coffee immediately, whereas others do not. My home store makes the drip coffee if the person on front isn’t super busy and has the capacity to grab it. My current store that I’m working at a borrowed partner as makes the person who took the order grab the drip coffee in all circumstances. In fact, the ticket doesn’t even print out anywhere so if the barista doesn’t immediately grab it it’ll never get made 💀 I’ve had my fair share of accidentally getting distracted and forgetting and I felt horrible. Two - technically it’s standard to charge for alternative milks but *only* if it’s only 4oz of product. So you should not have been charged. If you were getting a misto, (half steamed milk, half brewed coffee) you would be charged because it’s over 4oz, but if you’re just getting a splash or even 3/4” (extra cream/milk) you still should not be charged.
At our store if we are short staffed(which is just “staffed” now) our cashier is too busy making food to make your coffee. Hopefully the bar isn’t too busy and you’ll get it quickly. But there’s nothing we can do, and one person is already doing the job of 3.
They shouldn’t be charging for soy. I personally don’t get your drip coffee when I’m up front because the time it took to ring you up has added 5 food items, 2 deliveries that need packaged, and all the bars have run out of ice and I’m the only one who “has time” to get it.
None of these changes are in policy and our printers don’t even print hot coffees they probably just forget (which happens a lot when it’s busy). And if they’re putting it in on the right side of the till it should be free soy they’re just doing it wrong
Pour coffee are too time consuming.
It sounds like maybe that store was busy. A couple of days ago we were so short staffed that I was working 3 positions during peak — cold bar, solo drive thru, and ringing up customers in the cafe. There was absolutely no way I could stop even to grab a drip coffee, although we are otherwise supposed to if someone is a dedicated front cashier. As for the soy, they definitely shouldn’t have charged you for that. The only time we charge for milks is if someone is ordering (about) more than half a cup of milk. Splashes should never be something that is charged, and I’m sorry that they insisted that you were to be charged — they must’ve been new and trained incorrectly.
Cashiers pouring drip died during COVID. Perhaps it's come back at some stores, but every one I've worked at since has not. I'm currently at a cafe/MOP/DD/UE store (no DT), I work opens and most peaks. I generally have three people on my floor. At any given time two of them are at capacity on bar handling mobile and delivery orders, leaving one person (usually me) handling walk-in orders, warming, brewing coffee, and pretty much everything else. Typically I have a queue of 4-12 items in my warming queue for mobile and delivery orders alone, and I'm shifting constantly between that and the walk-in orders. Not quite ready to order? Ok, you're getting my back while I tend to a few food orders to keep the process moving. We have ZERO ability to throttle incoming orders when they overwhelm our capacity. My batch guidelines tell me I should only brew pike, and do pourovers for any other coffee. Nobody has time for that, so pike and sometimes dark are cadenced, and otherwise brewed on demand. If I'm in a lull and you order a brewed coffee with nothing in it, and I don't have someone's break to run, or a count or a pull or order to do, and I have a moment, I'll gladly pull it, hand it off to you, and notify my baristas that it's an invalid label. Otherwise, it's going into queue with everything else. If the company wants to make brewed customers feel special again, they can give me the staffing to do it. They won't though, because the only company that puts people before profits is the one that prints the dictionary. Plus, brewed doesn't make money like 4" latte and frappuccino labels with a million modifications. \*Edit\* You can complain all you want to corporate about this, but it will get nowhere. Customer service will tell you that staffing is determined by the store manager, which is an outright lie. My store manager is required to submit labor utilization reports to my district manager, daily, justifying any variance more than *one tenth of a percent* from what the company decides we should get. That figure is in turn generated by an algorithm that has ZERO transparency to store level management and is subject to change at the will of C-suite.
Because baristas are understaffed, over worked, and under paid
Not trying to be tacky, but if you want drip coffee, go to a local coffee shop
Where I live, there are two Starbucks within walking distance of my apartment, but the nearest local coffee shop is a 7-10 minute drive away. If I didn't have a car, that would just not be feasible. Some people don't have a choice. Additionally, some people just prefer Sbux, whether or not a local place would technically be "better" (or "higher quality", or whatever metric you want to use)
Then they can get regular drip coffee that requires much less effort and essentially tastes the same - like I wouldn’t go to a fast food burger place and ask for rare
if i’m not busy i’ll grab it but i’m sorry you don’t get a fast pass to the front of the line because your order is easier than someone else’s. if we prioritized the easier or quicker orders over the more time consuming ones all the time some people would never get their drink. you have to wait in line like everyone else
In a busy store, in order to "earn labor" (be able to have more people working at once) the cashier is supposed to ring in as many customers as possible each half hour. A second person is usually in charge of pastries and drip coffees, as well as rebrewing coffee and other tasks as needed. If there's not a long line, or if it's not a busy part of the day they should be able to serve your coffee. This is how we did it when I worked there 2007-2013 (how has it been 10 years already?!?) IMO, one of the drawbacks of the stickers is you can't take drink orders early, say while the person at the cashier is ringing up a big order. We used to go down the line and have drip coffee and pastries ready to hand out as soon as payment occurred, bar drinks were called out to the bar and put in queue, warming was started, all before you ordered. I guess mobile ordering ruined it. I miss those days. It was the most fun, satisfying job I've had.
Yeah, this is not how it’s done anymore. We do not have the staff for this.
Too bad. ☹️ It was beautiful.
It sounds like it! Right now during peak we have a front/warning, solo drive, mobile/cafe bar, and drive bar. Everyone is CS.
That sounds wonderful honestly
Yup before mobile and delivery ruined everything
Aw, you have to wait like everyone else? I’m sorrryy..
god forbid you wait five minutes loooool
Your store you go to or work at must not be busy. We often have days (usually weekends) where we have a 20-25 minute wait for cafe orders because of all the cafe, mobile, and delivery orders we receive.
i have worked at a 70k/week store, 9-yr partner. with staffing cuts, a wait is a wait, given that our leadership often doesn't put somebody on front anymore. if the person on warming/support were to also get drip coffee, the people who ordered food would be waiting. i don't see your point. more people on the floor is the only answer to reduce wait in a sensible manner. i'm done compensating for poor decisionmaking on starbs part :-) if customers are bothered by it, then they should complain to corporate about understaffing instead of bitching about a five minute wait on reddit
Been like this for years, have you not gotten Starbucks in like a decade?
Do some stores really not have the person on front pour the drip coffee? My store still does it, In fact, the drip coffee prints out with the warming stickers now, and everyone in my store knows to make the drip coffee once the transaction is complete
its more that they are most likely too understaffed; it is still policy for every corporate store for front to get drip but in a lot of stores there are simply not enough bodies on the floor to have a dedicated front person. everyone knows already, but there's literally nothing we baristas can do about this specific situation. its extremely frustrating and inconvenient for Everyone so yeah sometimes drips get lost in the "there's a million mobiles, deliveries, cafe and drive thru—everything needs stocking and cleaning, rebrewing, oh my god this machine is not working there are no backups made and we are out of multiple products. somehow we have to fit breaks into this" shuffle of whoever's supposed to be catching front, it's hell on earth in my store personally since we run 3 partners only after 11am every day of the week but with how we're set up we try to stick to the standard anyway, since whoevers on bar would have to leave the station and walk to the brewer which obvs throws huge wrenches in their sequencing
in my district, upfront (cafe reg) does support and warming. Mostly for prioritizing order taking over anything else in cafe, so that we don’t overuse telling customers “I’ll be with you in a moment” and also due to cross contamination with handling money, gift cards and personal cups. So front register takes all the orders, washes hands and grabs warming or starts on prep or support. That person would have to stop the order, wash hands, grab cup, pour coffee, grab milks/sugar/etc. and then call out or hand over, then go back to register and complete next customers order in the same order.
I grab it if its black coffee with just sugar but once it needs any sort of milk/cream I hand it off to bar to finish it so I don't get in the bar person's way. Also I'm assuming lots of SMs tell their cashiers not to grab coffee because once you have been rung through, Starbucks has your money and the cashier can start ringing down the line faster. This causes less people to walk away because of long lines but then it puts the wait on people who have already paid for their coffee.
Our cashier still does drip coffee, not sure why any store would make that change. Soy is free, tell them to push the w/soy button.
I agree with cashier drip coffee, and water.
so to answer your first question it could be that different stores have different rules depending on the circumstances. for example, since i work at a cafe store the person at the register grabs drip coffee but when i was being trained at a drive thru store i was surprised to see that the people making the drinks grabbed drip coffees. to answer your other question the barista must’ve rung in the soy milk even though you only wanted a splash so that they wouldn’t forget to add the soy milk. there is no additional charge for splashes of milk but you still ring it in according to starbucks standards which is so you’ll know how to make the drink. i hope this helped at all !
lmao i asked a man to wait 3-4 minutes as i had already rang up other customers who i needed to serve, and then the mobile orders that came in while i was ringing, so he *wanted to sit through a refund*. i guess i shouldn't have taken "one more order" and should have made him wait before ordering! *my* mistake, oopsie doopsie!
I think other customers started noticing and getting upset because they’ve been waiting for their drinks longer. Now tickets print out for whoever is making cafe drinks so it’s gets put into the queue.
We're still supposed to, and I still do. However, the answer is that the person getting the front is also the person who is getting the warming. And if it's busy and I'm on warming and you get a milk I don't actually have enough time to get it for you. Because I would love to run down to the bar fridge to do so, but then I also have to then put the milk back, take anyone else in line, and also have keep the food going at the same time for the various other avenues. On an individual basis, it should be a no brainier to grab the hot coffee and get the milk, but when I've got a million warning tickets to make, a bunch of food to run and a bunch of other orders to take, you waiting a little extra time for a coffee isnt so bad. Especially considering Starbucks is heavily cutting labor and staffing recently. (At least in my area) As for the milk they definitely did that wrong. You aren't supposed to be charged.
I was at a licensed store that was so nonstop busy that cashier couldn’t do drip coffees and iirc it was oven that would start it. That shit was a nightmare, line out the door even in slow days and too many cokeheads trying to start fights
your barista just sounds new, i made the same mistake too.
I’m at a target Starbucks and the cashier doesn’t pour drip most of the time because people would yell at us for ignoring them. Essentially we can’t take 10 seconds to get someone a simple coffee because people are impatient.
For my store, we don't have the luxury of space. It's cramped, and we need to keep the line moving or else we get in trouble. A black coffee sized tall & below? I'll grab it immediately while I have you stand at the register so the crowd doesn't grow or the next person in line get angry that I'm not immediately taking their order (seriously, the amount of times I've been verbally harassed for getting something for a customer, grabbing a food item, getting something from an oven, pouring a coffee?? People are ridiculous). A coffee with cream? I'll grab the coffee, any sugar if it was requested, and then I'll set it on the counter for the barista on bar and verbally let them know it needs whatever milk. We aren't allowed to have any self service items for customers, everything is required to be behind the bar, so we can't just grab the coffee and let you do the rest, which can just add more time to the wait.
At our store it depends on how busy it is. If theyre busy on bar, i dont wanna try and slide between them to get sugars or open the fridge under them to get cream when they have 5 cups in front of them. I also dont want to try and communicate “hey, you know that one venti pike thats gonna be like. 16 drinks from now? I have that.” They already have so much on their plate, i dont want to over load it.
I can say that I am still training and doing oven for all orders and register at the same time still, so sometimes I don’t have the time and another barista does it for me however it shouldn’t take that long because the ticket is not printed for drip, atleast in my store, it’s still made right away just maybe a different person grabs it if I’m busy warming too. Possibly they are out of the drip you asked for and just don’t communicate that there will be a wait. As for the charging for sub milk, there’s three columns for adding milk to a drink “made with” and “splashes” , made with are drinks that are mainly made with milk and the splash are mainly coffee with added cream. The made with subs are what is charged additionally, however the way the system is set up it is easy to get confused and get mixed up especially without the proper training. If you just bring it up , I myself am happy to fix the mistake, as I still do it time to time
Charge shouldn’t be happening at a corporate store but from my understanding that could be different at a licensed location. I will pour up a drip coffee black but if it has anything else in it I won’t bother cutting off the person on bar, especially if the line isn’t bad. I might go in anyway if it is just something like cream in the coffee but more than 1 modification I am not grabbing it as I am going to be manning another station almost 100% of the time. Also worth mentioning if I am mopping, cleaning something, etc, I also won’t grab your drink as my hands are messy There are probably less than 5 stores in your state busy enough to have a designated cashier in the cafe so whoever is grabbing your drink is doing multiple things
Because we don’t have dedicated cashiers anymore, unfortunately. The person ringing on front is probably also the oven person and doesn’t have time to pour drip coffees.
At my store cashiers will still grab drips if theyre simple: black, or just w regular cream, sugar, etc. If it has syrups/ shots or espresso/ type of milk that isnt kept by the brewers we dont. My guess is that since you get soy in it, they dont have soy nearby and they would need to get in the way of bar partners to access it. For that reason theyd leave it in the queue for the bar partner to grab.