MacGyverisms

Apparently, I did the right thing, which was actually the wrong thing. Make sense to you? Yeah, me either.

Last week we had a visit from Head Office. They pop around every six months or so. This was one of the smaller visits, and while we prepared for it, the bloke who came around didn't even go out the back to see us cook or clean, just sat down in the dining area with Inga and had a chat.

Before I explain what happened, I should tell you how the system works: We have what is known as 'Split Function Service'. This means that one person serves, and the other person is the 'expeditor' or 'runner', meaning we get the food and fries, and prepare the drinks. On busy days, we might have two people serving, one person on drinks, and one person running.
You serve the customer, then get them to stand to the side behind their receipt (there are clear markings stating this) while you serve the next person. Once you have served the second person, the order for the first person should be ready.

An SOC is basically a review of how the store runs and how well we follow procedure. If we fail, we lose the SOC until the next review.

On this particular day, Suzie was serving and I was running. All was going well, until itgot busy. There was only one person serving, and Suzie couldn't handle 10 or more customers on her own, so I did what I believed what the right thing, and immediately jumped on a register to start serving.

While I was serving, some bloke apparently had to wait 'too long' for his hotcakes, and he complained they were cold when he finally got them - which is impossible, as they go into a warmer, which keeps them lovely and hot until we place them on the tray.

Chez told me about this the other day. She said I did the right thing in serving, but the guy from Head Office and Inga had looked at the cameras to see how long this guy had to wait, and they reckoned it was too long. So I was told that even if it is busy, and there is one person serving, I am not allowed to serve ANY customers until I am told to. Fine by me - but when I don't serve customers, Relpha comes out and yells at me because I am not serving!
So basically, we are expected to show initiative, while at the same time not showing any initiative! (*)(*)(*)(*)ed if we do and (*)(*)(*)(*)ed if we don't!

I am completely lost as what to do. Get yelled at for serving, get yelled at for not serving...the old boss left because she couldn't stand how complicated things had become. Maybe its about time I walked out.