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Dining Disaster-What would you do? (Extremely long)
After a really long weekend helping a friend setup and run an MMA event here (didn't even get home until 3 a.m. the morning following the event), hubby and I decided that we and the kids should just go out to dinner last night (Mother's Day and I didn't feel up to getting groceries just to cook). I had a hankering for a particular dish that I had enjoyed that is only served (that I know of) at this one place here in town. It's a relatively new place to us having only been open under 9 months. The reviews from several others have been 'ok to so-so'. We'd eaten there 2 times prior and the first time was ok, the second was great.
So, here's last night's accounting of what happened:
7:00pm-Arrive and tell the hostess there are 4 persons and that we request non-smoking seating area. Her response is, "Well, where do you want to sit?" Our response is, "Where ever you need to seat us. We'll sit where ever you put us." (I've waited tables before so I know about 1 server have 6 tables and another only having 1-not fun!). She seats us be the door coming in. Ok, not bad, friends are there and we can chat across the way a bit. It was not extremely busy, but there were guest scattered throughout the room.
7:15pm-Waitress (also the apparent hostess) returns to take our drink orders. In total, we had 1 unsweet tea, 1 Sprite, 1 milk, & 1 water. She returns with the tea, sprite and water and sets them down and leaves. 5 minutes later, she returns stating, "We're outta milk. What else would you drink?" My little guy says, "Water is fine." She returns again 5 minutes later with his water. Little guy is asking us in the meantime, "How do you run out of milk, Mom?"
7:30pm-Waitress returns to take our order. I ordered the Baked Chicken Spaghetti, and asked for my bread to be the dinner rolls instead of the honey croissant. Her response was, "We're all out of dinner rolls and the croissants." My response was, "Then please just bring the Texas toast. That'll be fine. My son here will have the 'something something shrimp dinner, little guy will have the childrens grilled cheese." Hubby also gave her his order, which she refused the dinner side salad and gave him a choice of 2 veggies with his order. So he ordered steamed veggies and a baked potato with butter/sour cream.
8:00pm--Waitress-"Your order will be here soon, we're just waiting on your spaghetti." She leaves before I can mention that son's water is empty and request a refill. She also promptly avoided our table for the next 15 minutes. Meanwhile, you can hear the commotion in the kitchen with all the young servers/staff goofing off, calling names, etc. Hubby and I were like, "WTF?"
8:15pm--Other servers bring out our food, setting it on the table for me to pass out to the correct person. Here's where it gets interesting. My spaghetti was 'cut up' into small pieces like you would do for a small child that doesn't know how to wind it on the fork. Son's shrimp dinner to say the least was nasty. Only had 3 small to medium size shrimp on the rice and the rice looked like it had been originally been meant for this dish but had run low and just thrown in what veggies they had left to 'make it go further'. Youngest son's grilled cheese was half together, not that big of a deal, but how do you seperate 2 slices of bread that have been welded together with cheese and it is now cold and impossible to pull apart and re-apply? Hubby's potato was there, uncut, no butter, no sour cream. No bread, any at all and son's drink was still empty. Our server came by shortly there after and the standard, "How is everything?" I calmly and politely (hubby was impressed by my manners this time) stated that we were not please with how our service was being handled, we had no bread, son's water was still empty (had never been checked) and hubby still had no butter/sour cream and asked her to please make the order correct. She just kind of gave me a blank stare, turned and walked away. She brought a new glass of water for the son, 2 slices of bread for 3 of us and the B/SC for hubby.
While we quietly ate our dinner, it sucked btw, we overheard another waitress telling another table that they were out of bread, period. They were also out of noodles for the spaghetti (explains why mine was cut up--bottom of the kettle I suppose). They had also run out of a couple other items that were requested.
8:30pm-Waitress be-bops back over to our table with a pitcher of water to refill hubby's glass of Sprite. He politely refused, letting her know that he'd had Sprite, not water. She asked if we'd like anything else. My response was, "Just the check, please." She brought it out shortly. I paid the bill for the 4 of us, all $43.05. I refused to leave a tip-her job was short of having me get the food order taken, prepared and delivered myself.
What really ticked me off was that I am always polite to the staff when we dine out. When I order, I always say please, thank you, etc. I gather the menus from the kids and always politely hand them back to the staff. I maintained my composure with this girl the entire time we were there yet she never even apologized for her lack of service (the food is not her fault--I can forgive terrible food for great service). It was almost like she couldn't comprehend that anything was wrong. From the time we entered until the time we left was a little over 1 1/2hours. That is rediculously long as we've eaten in much nicer places and even with the wait time to get a table we've not been there that long.
If she had just apologized for the wait/screw ups instead of acting like this was how it was done, I would have probably left her a minimal 10% tip instead of the big fat ZERO that I left. I always tip, this was a first time for me. We had just eaten Friday night at the Huddle House and the service/waitress was so good that I left her $6 on a $22 ticket. She was worth her weight in gold.
Was I wrong to not leave a tip at all? There was no manager present that I could tell. If there was, he/she was amongst all the childish behavior going on in the kitchen. We could hear them yelling back and forth to each other, telling jokes, running from one another (could see through the door to the kitchen from where I was sitting). I do know the owner and intend to inform him of what happened because noone should have the service we had that night and his business is in serious jeopardy if this is how his restaurant is being run. He probably has no idea that things like this are occuring. So, how would YOU have handled this situation?
So, here's last night's accounting of what happened:
7:00pm-Arrive and tell the hostess there are 4 persons and that we request non-smoking seating area. Her response is, "Well, where do you want to sit?" Our response is, "Where ever you need to seat us. We'll sit where ever you put us." (I've waited tables before so I know about 1 server have 6 tables and another only having 1-not fun!). She seats us be the door coming in. Ok, not bad, friends are there and we can chat across the way a bit. It was not extremely busy, but there were guest scattered throughout the room.
7:15pm-Waitress (also the apparent hostess) returns to take our drink orders. In total, we had 1 unsweet tea, 1 Sprite, 1 milk, & 1 water. She returns with the tea, sprite and water and sets them down and leaves. 5 minutes later, she returns stating, "We're outta milk. What else would you drink?" My little guy says, "Water is fine." She returns again 5 minutes later with his water. Little guy is asking us in the meantime, "How do you run out of milk, Mom?"
7:30pm-Waitress returns to take our order. I ordered the Baked Chicken Spaghetti, and asked for my bread to be the dinner rolls instead of the honey croissant. Her response was, "We're all out of dinner rolls and the croissants." My response was, "Then please just bring the Texas toast. That'll be fine. My son here will have the 'something something shrimp dinner, little guy will have the childrens grilled cheese." Hubby also gave her his order, which she refused the dinner side salad and gave him a choice of 2 veggies with his order. So he ordered steamed veggies and a baked potato with butter/sour cream.
8:00pm--Waitress-"Your order will be here soon, we're just waiting on your spaghetti." She leaves before I can mention that son's water is empty and request a refill. She also promptly avoided our table for the next 15 minutes. Meanwhile, you can hear the commotion in the kitchen with all the young servers/staff goofing off, calling names, etc. Hubby and I were like, "WTF?"
8:15pm--Other servers bring out our food, setting it on the table for me to pass out to the correct person. Here's where it gets interesting. My spaghetti was 'cut up' into small pieces like you would do for a small child that doesn't know how to wind it on the fork. Son's shrimp dinner to say the least was nasty. Only had 3 small to medium size shrimp on the rice and the rice looked like it had been originally been meant for this dish but had run low and just thrown in what veggies they had left to 'make it go further'. Youngest son's grilled cheese was half together, not that big of a deal, but how do you seperate 2 slices of bread that have been welded together with cheese and it is now cold and impossible to pull apart and re-apply? Hubby's potato was there, uncut, no butter, no sour cream. No bread, any at all and son's drink was still empty. Our server came by shortly there after and the standard, "How is everything?" I calmly and politely (hubby was impressed by my manners this time) stated that we were not please with how our service was being handled, we had no bread, son's water was still empty (had never been checked) and hubby still had no butter/sour cream and asked her to please make the order correct. She just kind of gave me a blank stare, turned and walked away. She brought a new glass of water for the son, 2 slices of bread for 3 of us and the B/SC for hubby.
While we quietly ate our dinner, it sucked btw, we overheard another waitress telling another table that they were out of bread, period. They were also out of noodles for the spaghetti (explains why mine was cut up--bottom of the kettle I suppose). They had also run out of a couple other items that were requested.
8:30pm-Waitress be-bops back over to our table with a pitcher of water to refill hubby's glass of Sprite. He politely refused, letting her know that he'd had Sprite, not water. She asked if we'd like anything else. My response was, "Just the check, please." She brought it out shortly. I paid the bill for the 4 of us, all $43.05. I refused to leave a tip-her job was short of having me get the food order taken, prepared and delivered myself.
What really ticked me off was that I am always polite to the staff when we dine out. When I order, I always say please, thank you, etc. I gather the menus from the kids and always politely hand them back to the staff. I maintained my composure with this girl the entire time we were there yet she never even apologized for her lack of service (the food is not her fault--I can forgive terrible food for great service). It was almost like she couldn't comprehend that anything was wrong. From the time we entered until the time we left was a little over 1 1/2hours. That is rediculously long as we've eaten in much nicer places and even with the wait time to get a table we've not been there that long.
If she had just apologized for the wait/screw ups instead of acting like this was how it was done, I would have probably left her a minimal 10% tip instead of the big fat ZERO that I left. I always tip, this was a first time for me. We had just eaten Friday night at the Huddle House and the service/waitress was so good that I left her $6 on a $22 ticket. She was worth her weight in gold.
Was I wrong to not leave a tip at all? There was no manager present that I could tell. If there was, he/she was amongst all the childish behavior going on in the kitchen. We could hear them yelling back and forth to each other, telling jokes, running from one another (could see through the door to the kitchen from where I was sitting). I do know the owner and intend to inform him of what happened because noone should have the service we had that night and his business is in serious jeopardy if this is how his restaurant is being run. He probably has no idea that things like this are occuring. So, how would YOU have handled this situation?
I went to a MMA event here in my area last Friday. It was my first live MMA event and was truly awesome! 
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