Poor Service

[Fiona]

On one visit stateside, teh service was appaling so no I didn't tip & the waitress had a stand up row & no I didn't back down, However, i did eat at a Ramsay restaurant yesterday (new one in Versailles) and both the food & service were a credit to his empire!

[AmericaWestCMH]

All I care is that my order is correct and my drink is refilled in a reasonable time frame. If the service is bad once, I don't really care. If it's consistently bad, I just avoid the place in the future.

Not worth getting worked up over...

[kitchenelf]

Originally Posted by Fiona

On one visit stateside, teh service was appaling so no I didn't tip & the waitress had a stand up row & no I didn't back down, However, i did eat at a Ramsay restaurant yesterday (new one in Versailles) and both the food & service were a credit to his empire!

Surely bad service isn't confined to "stateside" And Ramsay's restaurant better have both good food and good service.

[miniman]

We went out today to a Beefeater resturant. We booked in for 5pm, knowing we had to be at the ice rink for 6.20 (just around the corner). We we were seated OK, debated the menu choices and had an order in by about 5:10. 5:35, the starters arrive and we demolish them and wait, wait, wait for the plates to be cleared. We mention at this point we need to be gone by 6:15 to get to the show. The mains will be 5 mins - 10 mins later we mention it again and another 5 minutes till the meals arrive. We have to bolt them - shame because it was good food. The waitress was good and bought the bill while we were eating so I could settle quickly. She suggested that we should have said at the beginning but I feel an 1hr should be sufficient time to enjoy a menu at a run of the mill eatery and she was not in evidence when we did start to be concerned, in fact no where to be seen for most of the meal. Another family sat nearby said it was common to wait and they had once had to wait for an hour to get their food. I didn't leave a tip.

The question is how much does the appreciation of good food set against bad service. Do you keep going for the food or give up and say that you are not willing to wait for that length of time.

[Essiebunny]

A problem with the food does occur in the kitchen, but when a server brings something which is clearly bad and is surprised that you refuse it, that is the servers responsibility, as well.

We recently visited a local family restaurant for breakfast and my dh ordered steak and eggs. When it came out, the steak actually smelled spoiled so he refused it. The waitress was very upset that he didn't want it and was actually rude. She must have had no sense of smell.

Needless to say, we will never return to that restaurant and she got no tip.

[KitchenScrapbook]

Here's my opinion: Training good waiters/waitresses is SO important to a restaurant... for me, the eating out experience has as much to do with the atmosphere, how friendly and relaxed the server was, and how well you were treated as much as, if not more than, the quality of the food does. Ha, maybe this shows I'm a woman as opposed to a food critic... atmosphere is important to me.

We (as in my husband and I) tip 15% minimum for bad service, more for good service. They get such low pay per hour and yeah, maybe the bad servers don't 'deserve' a good tip, but we tip anyway and are just more likely to not go to that restaurant as much again. THAT is why I think a training program is so important... bad service and unfriendliness makes people tend to not go back or at least have a negative thought when they think of that restaurant, I think.

[babetoo]

Originally Posted by KitchenScrapbook

Here's my opinion: Training good waiters/waitresses is SO important to a restaurant... for me, the eating out experience has as much to do with the atmosphere, how friendly and relaxed the server was, and how well you were treated as much as, if not more than, the quality of the food does. Ha, maybe this shows I'm a woman as opposed to a food critic... atmosphere is important to me.

We (as in my husband and I) tip 15% minimum for bad service, more for good service. They get such low pay per hour and yeah, maybe the bad servers don't 'deserve' a good tip, but we tip anyway and are just more likely to not go to that restaurant as much again. THAT is why I think a training program is so important... bad service and unfriendliness makes people tend to not go back or at least have a negative thought when they think of that restaurant, I think.

pretty much one can get decent food anywhere. good service is not so easy to find.

when i managed a hallmark store up north in ca. service was what i taught the most. it struck me that people could buy a card or gift , even in the grocery store. we had to make their experience in our store good enough to be the place they chose.

we did what we called "the hallmark jerk" meaning whatever u were doing even running the check out, u were to jerk your head to say hello to each and every person, that came in the door.

often older people would pull up in a car and we would go out to their cars and get the list of cards they needed. we then picked them out , rang them up and took back to the customer in their cars.

food is even more personal and bad service ruins the experience.

babe

[Corey123]

Right!!

If you're going to pay them for good service, then you should get it.

If you don't get it the minute that you walk through the door, then just walk out even before you are seated. Eateries come a dime a dozen, and there are too many fish in the sea!

[Maverick2272]

Originally Posted by Corey123

Right!!

If you're going to pay them for good service, then you should get it.

If you don't get it the minute that you walk through the door, then just walk out even before you are seated. Eateries come a dime a dozen, and there are too many fish in the sea!

I would at least give it a chance. I can't count the number of times I have gone to a restaurant and had a snotty unpleasant hostess but a great waitress and great food.
If I had walked out right away I would never have had the chance to tell the manager that his hostess needed more training or a new career but his wait staff and chefs/cooks were great.
Now he has the chance to do something about that, of course if he doesn't then that is a different story altogether as he would more than likely loose my business.

[Barbara L]

Around here, except in family run restaurants, servers don't seem to stay very long. So it would be especially silly to not go back based on the service of individual servers. If we received consistently bad service (which has not happened) I would figure that maybe management was behind it (policies that cause the servers to come across as rude).

Barbara