Should I write a letter?

[Little Retail Rabbit]

Pizza Express is my favourite restaurant (and I love how if you go to the nearby cinema you'll often get deal vouchers for P.Express on the back of your tickets sometimes! ), and I've loved going there ever since me and my college friends all had a Christmas dinner a our local one about 8 years ago. I generally go to our local one, as you can get deals/vouchers and its relatively affordable for a retail-slave-cum-writer-artist and a singer/songwriter when the two of us want to have a meet up (my friend and I don't have a lot of money so we like to be thrifty ). Pizza Express has always been my fave.

But recently, the service has been downright terrible. My family and I went on my birthday and we were waiting well over 45 minutes for our meals. Everytime my dad (who is polite but rather intimidating) asked our waitress how long it would be, she always said the exact same thing- it'll be 10 minutes. 20 minutes would pass, my dad would ask again, she'd say the same thing and he'd say "Well, you said that 20 minutes ago!" My dad was getting more and more annoyed (but did not raise his voice or anything) and she was getting more and more flustered, and eventually, the manager came out and told us that our ticket had been lost. He apologised, and my dad said "well, why did she keep saying only 10 minutes?" The manager said "Well, they just like to tell the customer what they want to hear." My dad told the manager that he personally would rather hear the truth. Our order was put front of the queue, we got it pretty quickly, and we ended up with free desserts and coffees, but I was pretty disappointed by the experience. However, I figured it was a one off...right?

Nope. Recently, me and my singer-song-writer friend decided to have dinner there and have a good ole natter and catch-up. It was a lovely evening so we sat outside and we were generally enjoying ourselves. But for love nor money could we seem to flag down a server at any point- and no...it was NOT busy. At all. I felt the waitress taking our orders was a little but blunt, a little rude, and when we wanted to order more drinks (it being a very warm evening), whenever we tried to get anyone's attention we were just ignored. I need to repeat- it was not busy. It took ages to order dessert, and then we were sitting around for at least half an hour. After a while, we realised no one had come to take our dessert plates away and ask if we wanted the bill. So I started trying to turn around in my seat and catch someone's eye as they went passed, but they completely ignored us for a good 10 minutes.

We were not rude at any point. We've both worked in customer services, we're working class girls, and we like to tip.

I have noticed however, that both cases had something in common. On both occassions, we had deals or vouchers. You have to let your server know when you order, so they did know. Dad did wonder at one point back on my birthday if the fact we said we had vouchers was the reason why we were getting poor service. Well, my friend had a code for some money off that evening. And they knew about that too. The meals ended up being a real bargain but it was a real pain that we had to put up with such snotty service.

Eventually we DID get our bill. Everytime we did get served by someone it seemed to be a different person. I do not believe in tipping if the service is poor, so we did not tip.

I'm considering writing an anonymous letter (anonymous because I don't want to be the sucky customer who's just doing it to get a free meal- remember, this is my favourite restaurant) and making a complaint about the poor service and perhaps suggesting giving the staff extra training. I don't want someone to lose their job, but I'm not prepared to eat there again if it continues. I do feel that it was mainly down to ignorance on the part of the staff and perhaps investing in some extra training would result in some better service....should I do it?

[Beki710]

I think you should. If you make it clear that you are doing it not for any free meal etc then they might take it a bit more seriously. I like eating in Pizza Express as well, and I've eaten in several different branches. I've found if I've got vouchers the service tends to dip. Even If I do I will always tip and be polite. Why should I be treated differently just because I'm getting a discount? I can really relate to this.

[Little Retail Rabbit]

Oh I'm interested to hear I'm not the only one who has experienced a drop in standards coinciding with vouchers! Yes, I will definately make a point of saying that I don't want or expect any freebies, just want and expect good service like I've had in the past. Why allow the vouchers to be printed at all if they didn't want them to be used? They obviously want customers to come to their restaurants!

I'm always polite and always tip (if the service deserves it). I can only think of 2 occasions (including the one mentioned above) when I didn't tip and both of those times was when the service was poor. The other time was in a Max and Erma's in the US- I'm generally a leeeetle bit more forgiving towards American servers due to the fact that in America, you guys tend to get a bum deal. I don't know if its every state or not, but I think it sucks that in the service industry in the US tips come under the wage and without the tips the servers may actually make less than min.wage. However, that is not the case in the UK (it would be TOTALLY illegal here) and so if the service is poor I have absolutely no qualms in refusing a tip. I tend to tip otherwise, even though it is certainly not obligatory, just because I think it is good manners. Its still a stressy job and I appreciate that.

(I only mention the differences between the UK and US as I know a lot of the members here are American.)

[Sapphire Silk]

I think you should do it, but put your name on it to be taken seriously.

It's unlikely anyone but corporate will see it since it is a complaint, but the complaint WILL go down through the district manager to that store's manager.

[Akasa]

Make sure to mention that the quality of the service you received took a nose dive when you presented vouchers. After all who would want to use them if you'll be treated so shoddily? And isn't the reason behind them to bring in business? Is this the impression they want to make on customers who may be trying the restaurant for the first time?

[bainsidhe]

I think you should do it, but put your name on it to be taken seriously.

This. It may not be right, but complaints without a name aren't treated as a valid complaint. At least in my experience.

[EricKei]

This. It may not be right, but complaints without a name aren't treated as a valid complaint. At least in my experience.

Agreed. Put your name on it. Does everyone there know you by name?

I would say mayyyybe give them one more shot, sans voucher. If the service still sucks, something's changed at the restaurant, for the worse. At that point, complain again and just never return. If you suddenly get wonderful service, leave your usual tip but take the manager aside when you can and explain things to him.

As for me -- I've only used vouchers a few times, but it's not made any difference in service. The one time I had to wait an exceedingly long time with a voucher, it was at a place here that used to be legendary for great food and lots of it, with stellar service. I found out thru the grapevine that all of the above had gone down hill in the last couple of years...AFTER I had paid for my voucher. I didn't wanna waste the money by letting it expire, so I went anyway.

I probably should have been worried when I saw that they were handing out those little light-up beeper things to tell people when their food was ready >_< (normally these are used to tell you when your table is available). It took around 25 minutes for 2 po-boy sandwiches and cheese fries to go -- from a po-boy shop. Anywhere else, that would have taken less than ten minutes, even assuming that they had to drop some frozen fries and cook them first! It wasn't even remotely busy, either, maybe 4 people in line at any given time during my entire stay, tables and bar were maybe half full, and they do not do any table service aside from cleaning the tables. The sandwiches, once known for being big and yummy and overstuffed, were small for the price, still mostly yummy, and definitely not overstuffed. They forgot the "extra gravy", too, even tho it was printed on my receipt.

(for denizens of NOLA -- This place is a legendary, award-winning shop, too...It used to be...er..."Umbrella's" poboys, they were renamed a few years ago when the original location got bought out; the people at the new place...let's call it "Macey's"...were supposed to have been all the awesome people who jumped ship and took the recipes with them after the buyout.)

[Merriweather]

Make sure to mention that the quality of the service you received took a nose dive when you presented vouchers. After all who would want to use them if you'll be treated so shoddily? And isn't the reason behind them to bring in business? Is this the impression they want to make on customers who may be trying the restaurant for the first time?

I'm not saying it's right, but I can see why some servers would be tempted to put in less effort when vouchers/coupons/free offers are used. Since most people (in the US at least) base their tip on a percentage of their total bill, when that total is lower due to a coupon, then the tip is less as well.

My husband and I take advantage of some of the buy one meal & beverages, get one meal free coupons in our local neighborhood paper. It means we get to eat at some of our nice local mid-range restaurants now and then even on a strained budget. But we do always make sure we tip on what the meal would have come to without the coupon, rather than actual total - why should the server do the same work but get a smaller tip just because corporate or management is offering discounts or free meals? Unfortunately, from talking with many restaruant people, I've realized that not everyone thinks that way.

Just my 2¢ - like I said, not condoning it, just offering a possible explanation. Of course, servers shouldn't assume anyone with a coupon will tip less, but if in their experience it's more than likely, you can at least understand their thinking, even if you don't agree with their actions.

[Little Retail Rabbit]

I'm not saying it's right, but I can see why some servers would be tempted to put in less effort when vouchers/coupons/free offers are used. Since most people (in the US at least) base their tip on a percentage of their total bill, when that total is lower due to a coupon, then the tip is less as well.

My husband and I take advantage of some of the buy one meal & beverages, get one meal free coupons in our local neighborhood paper. It means we get to eat at some of our nice local mid-range restaurants now and then even on a strained budget. But we do always make sure we tip on what the meal would have come to without the coupon, rather than actual total - why should the server do the same work but get a smaller tip just because corporate or management is offering discounts or free meals? Unfortunately, from talking with many restaruant people, I've realized that not everyone thinks that way.

Just my 2¢ - like I said, not condoning it, just offering a possible explanation. Of course, servers shouldn't assume anyone with a coupon will tip less, but if in their experience it's more than likely, you can at least understand their thinking, even if you don't agree with their actions.

This would be the case if this were happening in the USA, where tips often make up the overall minimum wage. But this is the UK, where tipping is only obligatory and regardless of tips, the worker will still recieve the same wage because to make the tip the wage is illegal here. Its why I'm more sympathetic towards American waiting staff- they do the same job as a waiter working in Britain but the Brit is far more likely to get paid more. So yeah, sorry, I'm not trying to be rude when I say this, but your 2 cents doesn't really count in this case, because it really is more about 2 pence, if you get my meaning ^^;; It would be understandable if this happened in an American restaurant but it didn't.

[EricKei]

Since most people (in the US at least) base their tip on a percentage of their total bill, when that total is lower due to a coupon, then the tip is less as well.
.

To their credit, the place I've gotten restaurant vouchers from thus far (livingsocial and groupon) both set aside a nice obvious spot on their vouchers to say words to the effect of "Remember to tip your server! A good customer tips on the value of the meal BEFORE deducting the voucher discount!"

[PepperElf]

But this is the UK, where tipping is only obligatory and regardless of tips, the worker will still recieve the same wage because to make the tip the wage is illegal here.

Technically if the server doesn't make enough tips to reach minimum wage the establishment has to make the difference. There's been some threads about establishments attempting to chastise servers over it, but ... if I remember correctly punishing the worker over that is illegal.

[Ree]

Just a reminder that this is a thread asking whether the OP should write a letter of complaint about lousy service.

Please do not turn this into yet another discussion of tipping and wages and employment laws.

Stick to the actual topic of discussion.