We had dinner at Burger King one night, and three of us only ordered a set meal each. The bill came up to RM48++. I didn’t think much of it at first, thinking that Burger King isn’t really a cheap fast food restaurant. Then my eyes fell on the three huge paper cups of soft drinks. I asked the Burger King staff what size the drink was and she said they were all large.
I then asked her “You gave us all large meal sets without asking us first?” and her reply was simply “Yeah”. I told her we only wanted the medium sets and not large. So I made her change the order and re-bill us for the meal. It was significantly reduced by some RM13.
Had I not realised that Burger King silently forces all its customers to buy large meal sets that cost more than the medium set prices that they put up on their menu boards, I would have been cheated! For a large meal set that you pay more for, you are not really getting any more food, as the size of the burger remains the same no matter what size meal you order.
The only extras you get are the fries and a larger cup for drinks. Remember that the drinks are refillable and free flow no matter what size meal you order too, so you are essentially only paying the extras for the little bit of extra fries! And I believe we don’t really need the extra fries so that we don’t expand the waistline and resort to diet pills to trim down later on.
I personally feel this is not the right way for Burger King to increase its revenue and profits. You can’t just give your customers a large meal by default when the menu board’s default prices are for medium sets. Even if you would like your customers to buy your large meal sets, have the courtesy to ask the customers first instead of quietly charging them. This is as good as cheating, you know.
I’m not a cheapskate who can’t afford a large Burger King meal set. But it’s a matter of principles in doing the right thing that made me force the Burger King staff to change all our orders. I would do it all again anywhere and anytime I come across dishonest sellers of any kind.
The next time you are buying a Burger King meal, take note and see if are you given a large meal when you did not ask for it. You don’t need to pay more for something you don’t need.
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
I usually order the small/medium set because the drinks are refillable and I don’t really like their fries.
I am a fan of Burger King (love their mushroom swiss
) and so far I have not had such problems. I think it is because I always mention ‘medium’ when I place my order. But I guess you are right, we just have to be extra careful all the time when patronising these fast food outlets.
Rambling Mind & Amy, so it looks like when we order, we MUST say mention medium or else we’ll have to pay more huh. I hope others who are blur like me will learn something from this and save a couple of bucks too.
Hello. I’m actually a general manager at a Burger King restaurant and came upon your article when searching for a shopping website. I would like to assure you that what you experienced is not standard protocol!! I am in the midwest and we ASK EVERY customer whether they want small, medium or large. We DO NOT upsize without asking first and AFTER granted permission from the customer. As a matter of fact, we have just renamed our sizes. What used to be called a small (like fries or drinks) is now called a ‘value size’ in our market. This happened 6 months ago and when a customer orders a small size a la carte menu item we still ALWAYS clarify if they are wanting the ‘value size’ for a $1 or the small for $1.xx to make sure the customer is receiving what they truly want (which is actually DOWN selling in most instances – a business ‘no-no’ but a customer satisfaction ‘yes-yes’)
I appreciate articles educating the public but feel by generalizing and assuming this is standard practice instead of maybe an improperly trained team member or an isolated incident in your local area AND REPORTING it as a brandwide standard is uneducated and really doing your readers a disservice. Maybe a little investigative work or research to see if that 1 incidence is indeed common practice before posting would have been better served.
I DO feel badly about your dissatisfaction at your local Burger King but I just wanted to input this is NOT standard practice brand wise. If I knew your address, I would love to mail you a few free meal cards to make your experience a positive one.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
Nan
Hi Nan. Thanks for taking the time to read and respond to this post. Well I’m sure this isn’t supposed to be a standard practise, because we as consumers will not expect it.
I don’t think pointing this incident out is a disservice to readers because all it takes is one incident that is not in accordance to your company’s practise that will reflect the inefficiency of training your staff to render consistent services.
In any case, you can also read another blogger’s dissatisfaction about her experience here at this site: Burger King’s Choc Fudge Sundae – Thumbs down!. I was present with this blogger during this incident, so I was a direct witness to this too.
you’ve got an american mid-west manager- hanging out at a local malaysian website….
ya, he should bring it up with the local malaysian franchise… just how bad the training of our customer service staff is…