LifeBlows

and I'm feeling pretty bummed out. What happened was that last week on Friday, the health inspector came to the restaurant that I work at. He was less than impressed by the cleanliness of the place. He gave us a week to get our act together and is supposed to show up tomorrow as soon as we open to do a follow up inspection. Well the last time he came, I was part of a three person crew who closed up the restaurant the night before his visit and we didn't do a good job. This contributed to our less than stellar review. I am not part of the crew that is closing tonight so yesterday I decided to be proactive. I knew how hard it would be to have everything spick and span in the alloted time tonight so I decided to clean the stainless steel appliances.
They apparently had not been cleaned for some time, so there was stubborn build up. I tried cleaning with a cloth, nada. Tried one of those sponges with a scouring pad attached, nada. So finally I had the bright idea to use steel wool. Yes, I can see now how that was a bad idea. But whatever. Anyway, we have our garbage bins stacked by one side of the defrosting fridge and its just gross. No one ever cleans it. I attacked that side with vigor. I wanted to help out the rest of the team and impress my boss with my proactive hard work. She was impressed, until that side of the fridge dried, and it looked like it had been attacked by, well... an angry drunk. They were planning to sell the fridges that they had and buy three door ones, but she says no one will want that fridge now that its all scratched. What I did, took off at least $1000 in value. She didn't scream at me. She didn't act angry towards me the whole day. She's actually been pretty cool about it. My boss is the kind of person though who will vent about one employee to the other employees and I'm just not looking forward to that. I owned up, apologized. I wanted to offer to pay for it, but I don't have the money. I worked really hard yesterday. I tried to remember all the stuff she complains about when other people close and avoid those mistakes. She was impressed when she saw me cleaning the fridges yesterday, and she didn't complain about any of the work that I had done during the close nor has she said anything to my face about it. I feel so stupid. I guess it could have been worse. She could have fired me. After all I did damage her equipment. What should I do?

DayTrader

What's that old liine, "No good deed goes unpunished." lol

I don't know too many pieces of rest. eqip that DON'T have some sort of cleaning scratches. I wonder if your boss isn't just being a bummer and hopping on a pity-pot. I can't say.

Either way.... it's over. You screwed up, obviously. Try to maybe slow down and think a little more ahead from now on. You've apologized.......that's good too.

FWIW, stainless steel IS scratched. I've used fine-grit sandpaper and water to "re-scratch" stainless that had a scratch in it..... it works great.

BackToSquareOne

Your post made me think of my cousin (an attorney), who visited her mother about a month ago. Anyhow, she parked under some trees and got bird droppings all over her new BMW. She thought it would be a good idea to get a bucket of water and brillo pad to get it off. Got the bird droppings off but also did a job on the finish.

Here's some ideas for the stainless : Removing scratches from stainless steel appliances

Nevertheless

I don't see how cleaning stainless steel with steel wool could ruin it. I think about anything done by steel wool could be taken out by 600 grit sandpaper, like Daytrader says. Or a buffing wheel like body shops use. Or Scotchbrite. I kind of wonder if the crap you were trying to clean off isn't what scratched it.
And if they were actually trying to sell it,why didn't it get cleaned for the said "sale" in the first place. I wouldn't sweat it. It needed to be cleaned,and you did what you thought was right. I have a feeling it can be fixed fairly easily.
And it probably looks better than having gross crap on it.
Fred

MetalChick

Your boss seems to be exaggerating. Sounds like she really made you feel like a jackass, which you are not. You will probably forget about this whole thing in a couple of days. I would try not to stress it. People are always scratching their stainless appliances and there seems to be many ways to fix it cheaply. Plus, since when did a restaurant kitchen care about scratches? I worked at one a couple years back and everything had some scratches, Jeeze. I think we need to be careful with our self worth when recovering. Yes , we should own our mistakes; you did, but it doesn't take much to make us feel overly worried or unduly down on ourselves.

Take care

CarolD

The restaurants and hotels and bars I worked in all had insurance
to cover many things includeing appliances/equitpment.
I imagine yours has the same...

You did apologize that is enough.

LifeBlows

Thanks a lot guys. This makes me feel soooo much better. I cannot tell you. Its days like these that make me wish I cried easily because I was just really upset. All day at work I really wanted to take someone aside and say this is how I feel but people gossip so much there and that information always seems to find its way back to the boss. I did take 5 to call the AA hotline to ask but that didn't really help. So I had to sit on this for a whole 8 hours until I could come home and post here which was stressful too. I'm so glad I didn't drink. I didn't have cravings or feel triggered to drink its just that alcohol is the one thing I knew that would make these feelings go away right now, for the moment if you catch my drift. I didn't binge eat, drink or spend which is what I felt like doing.
Thanks so much. Again, I feel a thousand, no million times better.