NASHVILLE, Tenn. — A company that owns and operates more than 1,000 Burger King and Popeyes restaurants across the country apologized Wednesday after a truck driver who walked up to one of their drive-thrus to place an order was turned away.
Chris Sensing says the incident happened Tuesday at a Burger King in Donelson, Tennessee.
Sensing is a truck driver who cannot use the drive-thru because of the height of his semi. With dining rooms shut down across the state due to COVID-19, Sensing walked up to the drive-thru window to place an order.
Sensing recorded a video of the interaction that happened next, posting it to Facebook .
The employee at the drive-thru window turned Sensing away, saying they were only allowed to take orders from people in vehicles at the drive-thru, not those who walk up to the window.
"Sir, we have to follow the rules that we're told, I'm just following the rules," the Burger King employee said.
At another point in the video, the employee tells Sensing that they are not allowed to take his order "because you're a liability."
"It did kind of offend me because all I wanted was something to eat," Sensing said Wednesday.
Wednesday afternoon, Carrols Restaurant Group, the company that operates the Burger King in question, apologized for turnign Sensing away. In an email, a regional director for the restaurant group said the company's policy of not allowing walk-ups at the drive-thru had been changed at the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis, but, "unfortunately the Manager involved did not receive the communication however this has been corrected."
But Sensing says with so many fast food chains and even more franchise owners across the state, this kind of communication problem is probably not limited to just one restaurant.
"This is happening in multiple states, it's happening in Tennessee a lot, they're falling through the cracks," Sensing said.
McDonald's announced earlier this week that it had instituted a new policy regarding truckers that allows them to order food for curbside delivery.
This story was originally published by Jason Lamb on WTVF in Nashville.
