Aussies have been left baffled after a retail deli worker copped backlash for using one of the nation’s favourite phrases.
The woman, who has been on the job more than five years, was recently left ‘puzzled’ when a customer asked her not to call him ‘mate’.
Her father recounted the moment his daughter was accused of being ‘unprofessional’ while working at a fruit and vegetable store.
His daughter immediately apologised thinking that she had offended the customer, who her father believes was also n, which confused the pair even more.
She now ‘won’t use any titles’ out of fear of offending someone, which is stark change from the ‘polite and courteous’ girl she had once been, he added.
Sharing the story on social media, he asked other shoppers: ‘When did the word ‘mate’ become unprofessional?’
Many people who responded to the post were shocked that the customer took offence to the ‘friendly’ and ‘warm’ phrase.
‘I think old mate needs to chill out,’ one person commented.
Other commenters took a similar tone.
‘Woah what an over-reaction,’ another wrote.
‘I use mate all the time, I’m female in my mid-30s. If someone said ‘hey mate how can I help?’ I wouldn’t even blink.
‘And I’d say ‘thanks mate’ too! Anyone finding this odd, that’s on them. What a strange thing to pull someone up for!’
‘I’m delighted if I’m ever addressed as ‘mate’ by a retail worker,’ a third confessed.
‘I instantly warm to them.’
‘It’s casual, but not unprofessional or rude. n culture is a casual culture,’ a fourth added.
Other retail workers who experienced a similar situations also weighed in.
‘I had a customer say ‘I’m not your f***ing mate’ to me when I simply asked: ‘Would you like to add some patio clips to your order mate?’,’ one woman wrote.
The woman added that she was 22-years-old at the time and the customer was ‘a tradie maybe in his late 40s’.
‘[I] had worked there for one year and 99 per cent of the traditional customers called me mate or liked that I called them mate and had friendly banter,’ she added.
However, some commenters sympathised with the original complaint that ‘mate’ was too casual for the workplace.
‘Yeah ‘mate’ is informal and doesn’t reflect the retail relationship very well,’ one wrote.
‘I would consider being called ‘mate’ unprofessional personally, but [I] wouldn’t think beyond the moment about it,’ another said.
A third camp of thinkers conceded that while ‘mate’ is unprofessional, the phrase was appropriate given the setting.
”Mate’ has not at any time ever been considered ‘professional language’,’ one commented.
‘Having said that, she’s in a deli, not a corporate lawyer’s office!’
‘It’s a deli. If the workers don’t call customers ‘love’, ‘sweetie’, ‘mate’, ‘darl’, or the like, they violate a longstanding tradition,’ a second said.
‘It’s not like you’re meeting the royal family on a lawn with cucumber sandwiches and the PM in tow or trying to impress a magistrate.’