Domino's Debacle (or Spit Shakes)

It is hard in this age to appropriately express one's ire towards vendors whom we feel have mistreated us. Outside of frivolous litigation, the strongest display of dissatisfaction is to simply no longer patronize the establishment or vendor in question and advise all your friends to do likewise. For example, after several years of unsatisfactory visits to various Friendly's restaurants, a good friend of mine and i decided to remedy the situation by swearing to never set foot in one again.

So we spat in our hands and shook on it. That was about three years ago and neither one of us have set foot in a Friendly's since.

Now i have another business to add to the List of Shunned Stores. Domino's (frakking) Pizza.

I've actually always had a bit of a soft spot for Domino's. Despite the sub-par flavor and disappointing diameter of their pies, when i was growing up, they were the only pizza place in town that could cater to my brother's life-threatening milk allergy. This is probably part of what made my last experience with them so traumatizing: it tasted like betrayal.

My brother, father, and a few of our friends were helping my dad's mom (Nana) move into a new mature-living community. After filling a 16-foot U-Haul to the door with furniture and boxes, seven men and a little old lady were tired and hungry and wanted some pizza. A few of us were actually hunkered down in the truck waiting for a sudden cloudburst to slow down when my cell rang. My father was calling from inside the apartment, asking me to call Domino's and get us some lunch. Fine, i think, not my favorite activity, but what the hell.

Red Flag #1: All Domino's orders are now handled at a central location: they're corporate headquarters in Mid-West Town, Middle of Nowhere, USA. The woman took my order (two large pizzas and a medium, no cheese pizza), and asked the address for delivery. I gave it to her and was told the bill came to $38-something and to expect it in a half hour. Aright! all seems well. Twenty minutes later, however, the woman calls back saying that the two closest branches did not offer delivery (Red Flag #2). Ok, no problem, just connect me to the branch in my hometown - no more than 15 minutes from where we were - and i'll give them the address. This she does and i repeat the address to the woman at the actual store in which the pizzas will be made. She gives me another ETA and i hang up, satisfied.

Then my phone rings. Once again, it is a woman from Domino's telling me that (Red Flag #3) they cannot deliver our lunch, this time because our location is outside of their delivery area. Now, i am distinctly anti-conflict by nature, but the likelihood of me being dissuaded is inversely proportional to the amount of difficulty presented me. At this point, i WILL have my pizza, so i tell the woman that i will come pick the pizza up myself, only, would you please add sausage to half of the plain pie, because my Nana will cry otherwise. She agrees and i hop in the car and head out.

A couple of items retrieved from Nana's old place, i arrive at the Domino's expecting to pay the mentally-figured sum of approximately $38 ($38 - delivery fee of about $2, plus about $2 for the sausage). Red Flag #4, the woman, who is alone in the store, pleasantly informs me that i owe $42-something.

"I'm sorry, was the sausage $4?" I asked?

"No..." She responded, slightly confused. I asked her if she took off the delivery fee. She responded in the affirmative, and i told politely explained to her my difficulty in justifying this bill to the one i was expecting. Either realizing she was caught in cheating me or simply (and accurately) deciding that it was wise to get me out of the store as fast as possible, she managed to mysteriously knock $5 off my bill and i finally forked over two $20s for my hard-fought pizza.

It is as she is handing me my change that she tells me that, "had you gotten the third pizza as a large, they would have been $5 each".

"I really didn't need to hear that right now," i said, jaw clenched.

And that is why i am never going to give Domino's any of my money ever again.