Starbucks customer complains finding dead mouse in coffee

Dead rats have a way of haunting dining establishments. First, it was fried chicken fast food KFC that was the subject of a complaint by a 25-year-old California man that a piece of chicken served to him on June 10, 2015, was a fried rat.

On Thursday, it is the turn of Starbucks in Mandaluyong City in the Philippines when a female customer, named Jessa, ordered food and coffee. She did not finish the coffee, so Jessa brought the cup on her way home. However, Jessa claims she felt something inside the drink when she stirred it with the straw, reports Trendingnewsportal.

Jessa says she found a lifeless mouse inside the cup which she brought to a nearby police station to complain. Reports say that the Starbucks outlet in Addition Hills, visited the next day by the city’s sanitation office, did not allow the inspectors inside the kitchen. The 3-minute, 14-second video posted in YouTube has become viral with more than 50,000 hits in one day.

In a statement, Starbucks Philippines said, “We want everyone who visits our stores to enjoy their visit, and we take such claims very seriously. Ensuring all of our products meet Starbucks high quality assurance standards is a top priority, and we are actively investigating this customer’s concern.”

To back up the coffee chain’s claim, Marco Carlo Calibara, a former barista of Starbucks, in a Facebook post, says it is impossible for a rat to sneak inside a coffee cup. In a lengthy explanation, Calibara points out that all Starbucks use high-powered blenders which would have resulted in anything inside the blender chopped to pieces and would have made the coffee red with blood and look like an order of Red Velvet Frappuccino.

He adds that even if the rat was placed inside the coffee after the blend was poured, it would be visible to the customer because the mouse would attempt to swim out. Calibara also debunked Jessa’s claim that the manager of the Starbucks did not apologise, saying that the chain has specific service recovery steps for issues like what happened to her.

The ex-Starbucks employee notes that Jessa discovered the rat outside the store premises. Calibara challenges Jessa to go for a medical test to check if she developed Gastroenteritis or other ailments because of the coffee, but she must be accompanied by a Starbucks staff.