Her date embarrassed their waitress over a simple mistake. She didn’t argue — just stood up and left

Red flags in relationships should never be ignored, and when this woman on Reddit noticed her boyfriend's rude behavior, she did the right thing by calling it off. Sharing the story on Reddit, the woman’s post from December 1 has attracted varied reactions from online users. The woman and her boyfriend had gone to an expensive restaurant for dinner, but he pulled a rude move and ended up creating a negative impression on her.

In a now-deleted Reddit post, a woman asked users if she did the right thing by dumping her boyfriend over his attitude toward a restaurant staff member. The 20-year-old woman had been with her 22-year-old boyfriend for a while, and the two college students wanted to visit somewhere expensive for the first time. However, what happened at the restaurant took her aback. As per People, she explained, "The waiter came and poured glasses of water for us, and when he was pouring my boyfriend's, some spilled on the table. It wasn't very much, and none of it got on my boyfriend." But her boyfriend immediately yelled at the waiter and demanded to speak to the manager. He told the manager that the waiter had spilled water on him and insisted he was entitled to something free for the inconvenience, despite it being untrue.

Unable to calm the situation, the manager and the waiter apologized repeatedly for the small mishap and offered a free dessert, but the woman said that "the rest of the night was so awkward." After their dinner, the woman decided to call off their relationship because she knew he had lied and, more importantly, because of the way he mistreated the staff unnecessarily. "He apologized to me and said he knew he shouldn't have lied, but he thought it was a way he could afford the dinner for us. I told him it was actually less about the lying and more that he'd yell and talk down to someone just to get something for himself," she wrote.

A 2023 study from the Journal of Business Research examined customer incivility and found that rude customer behavior directly harms service employees and creates further negative consequences. Using bibliometric analysis, the study noted that such behavior causes direct damage to employees. Businesses champion the ideology of "service with a smile," however, researchers note that "in the service interaction process... the way that both customers and employees behave and interact" leads to the outcome, and not one or the other alone. While the man may have done it to get a free meal, the waiter may have faced the consequences, which could also negatively affect his job security.

Soon after the post gained traction, people reacted to the woman's reaction. u/Due_Association_5128 wrote, "NOR. Cringe. Great job for dumping him." u/MosleyB commented, "You got a glimpse of the future, so you did what was necessary. Keep doing you, and something will find you." u/Perkis_Goodman wrote, "NOR. The way someone treats their service is indicative of the type of person they are. That's a complete deal breaker for me."

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