Domino’s pizza manager blames technology that isn’t broken

Technology fails us every day. Whether it is the cryptic error message our software programs present us or the web page we visit every day that suddenly won't load, something is always bound to go wrong.

But what happens when something goes wrong that's not the fault of the technology? Such was the case with me tonight when I ordered a Domino's pizza online.

Before I go on, I feel it necessary to tell you that I have ordered dozens of Domino's pizzas online. And I've never once had a problem.

On to the story

Tonight, I placed my usual Friday-night pizza order that my family enjoys during our weekly movie night. Everything went smooth and my kids and I had our usual fun time watching the Domino's pizza tracker keep us informed of every stage of our pizza order from preparation to delivery.

At 5:56 pm, the pizza tracker dutily informed us that Charles had left the store to deliver our pizza. Everything was on schedule. Or so I thought.

20 minutes later I started to get a bad feeling. Why wasn't our pizza here yet? It shouldn't take 25 minutes to drive from the store to our house. I rationalized that the driver might have several stops to make since it was a Friday night and they might be extra busy.

But then another 10 minutes went by. And it started to get ugly.

Tried to resolve the problem with the local store

I called the number for the local store that made my pizza (the number was right on my screen) and asked about my order. The woman answering the phone asked me what I ordered and then promptly told me they never received my order.

I asked how that could be possible since the pizza tracker on my screen said Charles was out delivering my pizza at this very moment. Without batting an eye, she asked me if I would like to place a new order. Thinking I was already hungry enough to eat a horse, I declined.

I decided to wait it out 10 more minutes before giving up. Still nothing so I executed Plan B and put a frozen pizza in the oven.

Remembering that I had supplied my credit card with the original online order, I called the store back and asked to speak to the manager. When the manager got on the phone, I once again explained my situation and asked if he was sure there wasn't something wrong with my order. Seeming rather put off by my question, he quickly retorted that they never received my order and that online orders had nothing to do with his store. He then recommended I call corporate to see if they knew what the problem was.

Are you kidding me?

Realizing I was in a losing situation, I simply asked about my credit card charge. The manager said that he has to manually run the credit card charges for online orders at the end of the night (news to me) and that if he saw my charge, he would just tear up the slip and not process the charge.

I didn't know who to blame

At this point I didn't know whether I was more mad at the online ordering process or the staff at my local Domino's store. Luckily, the answer became crystal clear in a matter of minutes, when my doorbell rang.

Guess who was standing at the door with my pizza order? Yup... Charles.

When I asked Charles why he was showing up at my door 1 hour and 15 minutes after I ordered, he put his head down and said, "I'm really sorry. I got lost trying to find your place and then I ran out of gas."

When I told the kid I wasn't going to pay for the pizza, something incredible happened. The teenage delivery boy on my front door step empowered himself and told me that I might as well keep the pizza anyway and that he would explain to the manager what happened when he got back to the store.

Roses to Charles, thorns to the staff back at the store

First things first. Big time kudos to the teenage delivery boy who was nothing but honest and took total blame for what happened. As I listened to him explain what happened I actually felt sorry for him. And then to see him make the decision on his own to just give me the pizza blew me away. I had already been preparing for the typical "Well, it's not my fault, you still have to pay for what you ordered" response.

I wish I could say the same for the staff at the local store WHO COMPLETELY LIED TO ME.

There was nothing wrong with the online order. It was received at their store. And their own employee named Charles did leave the store at 5:56 pm to deliver the pizza. Charles just got lost and ran out of gas. The online ordering technology wasn't broken. The manager's ethics were.

The manager of the store and Domino's corporate may never read this but they will surely feel some ill effects from my telling of this story. As I posted the event of this story on Twitter and Facebook as it played out, I had more than one person thank me and tell me they would be sure never to order from Domino's.

Will I order from Domino's again? Perhaps. But I'll make sure the order doesn't come from the same store, which by the way happens to be store #2544 at 1211 N Madison Ave in Greenwood, Indiana.