We work at McDonald's and these are 6 habits we really wished you’d stop doing

If you think you’re helping the staff by putting your tray away, you are mistaken. How many are you guilty of? 

Get your order straight befoe you enter the drive-thru line. Image: Supplied

A quick bite to eat at McDonald’s is usually because you want a fuss-free feed that will keep everyone happy.

But according to some employees at the popular fast-food eatery, our quirks when ordering, making our way through the drive-thru, or cleaning up after ourselves can sometimes kill their McVibe.

Just two months after @maccasworkeraddict took to TikTok to share that she ignores any impatient customer yelling "Hello?" the instant they arrive at the drive-thru speaker, other former Maccas employees have come out with a longer list of what irritates them the most about diners - and some of them might surprise even the most thoughtful person. 

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Maccas workers are sharing their most annoying requests and habits from diners. Image: Supplied

1. Don't throw your pickles around if you don't want them!

They get it, you don't always like the pickles added to your burger, but the workers get absolutely fed up when teens get silly with the infamous condiment. 

One worker, who spent two years serving at a NSW Maccas, told Kidspot, the pickle hate was hands down the worst thing about working at the fast food joint.

"They would throw pickles at the wall or on the table if they didn't want them and then we'd have to clean up the mess," the former employee, who preferred to remain unnamed, shared.

"Just put them with your rubbish or order without it."

2. Don't stack the trays for us

Thankfully, responsible diners walk among the pickle-throwers. But according to the workers, they can also be problematic. 

If you're one of those who tidies up the table by putting all of the rubbish in the tray to "help" the employees, you need to stop doing that. 

“It’s great that customers want to help keep the dining area clean, but stacking trays with leftover food and trash can make it harder for employees to clean up,” Norah Clark, who worked at Maccas for four years told Reader’s Digest.

And that includes putting the trays away near the bin too. 

“It’s better to leave the trays and let the staff handle the clean-up, as they have a system in place for efficiently disposing of waste and sanitising the trays,” Norah adds. 

Ray Morrone, who also worked for McDonald’s for two years, agreed.

“Guests would thoughtfully throw their trash in a garbage bin, but often recyclable material would be mixed with food scraps. I would dig through half-eaten Big Macs and warm milkshakes to find anything recyclable," he shared. 

RELATED: I work at Maccas, I’ll ignore you if you do this

Maccas workers apparently have a system in place when cleaning out trays. Image: Supplied

3. Going AWOL after you've ordered

We've all done it before - ordering the food and then scooting off to the bathroom or supervising the children in the play area while you wait for your order. But for the workers calling out your order number, this is a very irritating habit from customers because more often than not, they don't actually hear the number called the first time, leaving the food to sit on the bench taking up space for future orders and confusing staff. 

“There was always some confusion as to where the guest should wait for their food after paying,” Ray says. “But most guests would simply wait patiently for their order number to be called out.”

4. Making a McJoke

Emily, who worked at McDonald's for a year in her late teens, tells Kidspot she has lost count of how many times she encountered someone who thought they were "funny" by making a joke with "Mc" somewhere added in there. 

"I'll get a Big Mac with some McFries and some McNuggets with sweet and sour McSauce and a large McCoke thanks...

"I would always be like, yes, yes, I've heard it before. So what do you actually want? It was never funny," she says. 

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5. Taking your time at the drive-thru

How many times have you driven up to the drive-thru speaker ready to start ordering only for the kids to change their minds at the last minute? For me, it's almost every time. And for those queuing up behind me, it's incredibly frustrating. 

The workers get it when kids are indecisive, but what they can't stand is when the adult in the car asks a million questions about what burger to have, or if a meal can come with other items, or why that discontinued burger is no longer available, or best of all why the soft serve machine is broken AGAIN?!

If you see the line getting longer, skip the chit-chat and get the order right BEFORE the worker asks for it. 

Gregory, who worked at Maccas for 36 years, says it's the impatient people waiting to order that makes this one of the most unbearable habits. 

“People are less caring nowadays than they used to be,” he says. “They are less patient.”

Get your order straight befoe you enter the drive-thru line. Image: Supplied

RELATED: Macca’s fan’s air fryer hack for chicken nuggets

6. Finding something mysteriously wrong with your order... AFTER you've eaten it

Emily says another sneaky thing people would do is take advantage of McDonald's policy of preparing a brand new order if something is wrong with the one they received. 

"I don't know if it's still a thing, but we were always made to make a brand new burger if it was cold or something was wrong with it," she recalled. 

"Almost every shift, I'd get some teen come up and say they found a hair in the burger... after they'd already eaten majority of it. They knew what they were doing. And so did we!"

Originally published as We work at McDonald's and these are 6 habits we really wished you’d stop doing