Vent: Re wetherpoons in the midlands

Lou67

The story is: my daughter and I went to Wetherspoons today for lunch, and I ordered a crumble with some custard for me, and a tomato and cheese panini for her. We got 2 drinks too; a coke and a cappucino. Total bill: around twelve pounds...

The food came out about 10 to 12 minutes later, but the panini was a ham and cheese one, when we had ordered one with tomato and cheese. My daughter just grimaced, (as she is a vegetarian,) so I picked the plate up and ran after the waitress and said 'excuse me, but this is ham and cheese and we ordered tomato and cheese.'

The waitress said 'we don't even have tomato and cheese panini on the menu,' and I said, 'well you must have, because we couldn't have ordered it, and the guy at the bar who took the order wouldn't have been able to select it on the till.'

So she said 'where's your receipt?' and came back to the table with us, and I pulled out the receipt and sure enough, it WAS tomato and cheese and NOT ham and cheese! 'oh yes it should be tomato and cheese' she said, and swanned off with the meal and my receipt.

7 or 8 minutes later, we were still waiting, and my meal was going cold. I didn't want to eat it, as I wanted to have my meal with my daughter: THAT was why we went out; for a meal together, NOT for me to have my meal while she sits there twiddling her thumbs, and then for her to eat hers, while *I* sit there twiddling mine!

So I went to the bar and spoke to a girl serving and explained what had happened, and she went to chase the food, while I went back to the table.

Two minutes later, the original waitress came out, with the (correct) meal, and I was just about to say 'thank you:' but before I could say anything, she said in a rather shirty manner 'it's taken *this* amount of time because we had to cook the meal from scratch again.' Like it was our fault!

I said 'well, it's just that my food here is going cold while we've been waiting' and she said 'well, why have you not started to eat it?' and I said 'because I want to eat to 'with' my daughter, not have us eating our meals 10 minutes apart,' and she said 'well as I said: they DID have to cook it from scratch,' and I just sighed and said 'yeah whatever then...' because I was getting peed off, then I stood up and walked off to go fetch the ketchup. When I got back to the table, she was gone.

There was not ONE single attempt at an apology, or an acknowledgement that it was THEIR fault and not ours, and the waitress had a proper attitude problem. The younger waitresses are pleasant, but this one was mid 40s, and a proper stroppy bint.

And after we left, I realised that she didn't even bring the receipt back!

I was going to complain, but my daughter said 'nah, don't bother; we got our food in the end, and the service and food is normally fine here...Maybe she is just having a bad day.'

But is this something that deserves a complaint? And should I have complained at the time?

What would you have done?

Blackpool_Saver

Will be another person forced to work in a low end job I should imagine. Very poor service but then it is Wetherspoons and not a high end restaurant

System

If you had complained at the time to the manager you probably would have got either the meal for free or a free drink. However some people don't like making a scene so don't like complaining.

Personally I think you should do one of the 3 things

1) - Complain to head office.
2) - Don't bother complaining but post a negative review on tripadvisor
3) - Just forget about it.

spacey2012

It is not a restaurant, it is an eatery.
In restaurants you dont pay up front.
And if they mess you about, you dont pay at all.

Fire_Fox

Complain to the manager, although it's possible that was the manager ... ham for a vegetarian or people of certain religions is totally unacceptable.

I wouldn't eat in Wetherspoons having had tepid food there twice (body temp or less). They clearly don't use their temperature probes which makes you wonder what other elfin safety is being flouted.

aileth

When she said made the comment about it taking so long because they had to cook it from scratch again, I would've said something like, "Well if you had gotten it right the first time, we wouldn't be in this mess, would we?" To be honest, I'd take it as an experience and avoid going there again as you didn't complain at the time.

Lou67

goater78 wrote: »

If you had complained at the time to the manager you probably would have got either the meal for free or a free drink. However some people don't like making a scene so don't like complaining.

Personally I think you should do one of the 3 things

1) - Complain to head office.
2) - Don't bother complaining but post a negative review on tripadvisor
3) - Just forget about it.

LOL, thanks. I think I will probably end up doing number 3, but if it occurrs again, I'll complain to the manager straight away. I didn't know that they were not actually a restaurant though: what is the actual difference between an 'eaterie' and a restaurant?

Whether they are a restaurant or not: the service should still be good. I still paid good money for two small-ish meals and two drinks and got a rude waitress who acted as if it was MY fault that THEY made a mistake.

We go about twice a month though (and my daughter goes with her pals twice a month on top of that, and we have never had an issue before...

Idiophreak

Lou67 wrote: »

The story is: my daughter and I went to Wetherspoons today for lunch, and I ordered a crumble with some custard for me, and a tomato and cheese panini for her. We got 2 drinks too; a coke and a cappucino. Total bill: around twelve pounds...

This is the bit I don't understand...£12?? I'd have thought it would be more like £8-9 in wetherspoons....you can get a whole meal and pint for something like £5 in there...For £12 you could have gone any number of places and had a much better quality lunch + coffee...

System

Idiophreak wrote: »

This is the bit I don't understand...£12?? I'd have thought it would be more like £8-9 in wetherspoons....you can get a whole meal and pint for something like £5 in there...For £12 you could have gone any number of places and had a much better quality lunch + coffee...

I'm confused by this. Are you implying that the OP is lying about the cost? I don't see why they would.

£6 each for a drink and food seems about right for a weatherspoons. Although I admit i've not been to one for years!

Lou67

Idiophreak wrote: »

This is the bit I don't understand...£12?? I'd have thought it would be more like £8-9 in wetherspoons....you can get a whole meal and pint for something like £5 in there...For £12 you could have gone any number of places and had a much better quality lunch + coffee...

£12 for the two. Not £12 each. That's £6.00 each, (for the meal AND the drink) which is pretty close to the £5.00 you stated. So like 'goater' you have me confused too.

Idiophreak

goater78 wrote: »

I'm confused by this. Are you implying that the OP is lying about the cost? I don't see why they would.

No, not at all...my point is just that people go to wetherspoons and put up with questionable food and service because it's dirt cheap.

If it wasn't dirt cheap, I don't understand why OP wouldn't just go somewhere decent to eat for the same money.