A few months ago, Subway introduced a special $5 price for all their footlong subs (except of course those premium subs that are really just a gimmick anyway). I am here to tell you that upon experience of this offer, it simply is not worth the hassle my friends.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve been to some decent subways and the experience has been fine. My local Subway, at the Caltrain station, has been my regular lunch stop at work approximately 3 times per week since this offer began.

I blame this mostly on the staff. They’re all foreign workers, which I have absolutely no problem with. I do, however, expect that if you work at an establishment where the customer is going to give you specific parameters for creating their valued lunchtime meal, you should at least be able to understand English. Honestly, some of the people’s level of English comprehension is worse than those voice recognition telephone switchboards (”did you say ‘Technical Support’?”). Their training must be painful, assuming that is that they actually receive training.

Subway staff have 5 preset questions, and anything that can’t be answered in one of these 5 questions causes a lot of confusion. Plus, even if you answer the question, don’t expect them to remember your answer.

“Footlong Tuna on Honey Oat bread please”, I say.
“You want cheese?”, the response.
“Swiss, please”, I reply
“What type of bread”, the heavily accented girl asks.
“Um, Honey Oat…” I reply, annoyed somewhat that this is the second time I’ve answered this in 10 seconds.
“Toasted?”, she asks in truncated question format.
“No, not toasted”. This is actually where they get you - if you ask for it toasted, you get slapped with a hot food tax.
“What type of cheese?”

It’s a vicious circle.

By the time I’ve reached the end of the production line, I’ve got my sandwich, with lettuce because they guy has already assumed that I want it, and when I tell I don’t want it, he questions my judgement in sandwich fillers.

“You said lettuce, right?”
“No lettuce, I said!” comes my reply. Still he proceeds to wrap it up. Moron.

Ok, so it’s $5 dollars but the amount of work involved is enormous. I used to go to Subway almost every day and the guy there knew me, and what I wanted so it was quick and painless. Fortunately for him, he thinks independently and has found a real job. Sorry to offend any ’sandwich artists’.

Weekends are a different matter entirely. That’s trainee time.

2 people in front of me in the line. It takes 20 minutes to get my sub made. It’s still wrong, and he charges me the tax for a toasted sub. I point out his mistake, he doesn’t understand. Typical.

I checked out Quizno’s once, who are Subway’s main rivals. They take too long though, and are much more expensive. I hate Subway more though.

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