Waiting in queue for cinema

The-Truth

Herbalus wrote: »

You've come to the same conclusion as the complaint lady, which is to disagree with me that service was slow

The biggest cause of slow service is actually slow customers. They don't know what they want, have lost their money, the simplest of tasks like making a basic decision becomes impossible to them. The classic evidence of this is Supermarket self service tills. You wait so long because the customers have to operate them and it's like watching paint dry watching people use them!

Why have you assumed it was the staff being slow rather than the customers?

Valli

iclayt wrote: »

Herbalus this actually drives me mad as well, at our local cinema you walk in and at the front there is a desk that sells tickets, however there is always a sign up saying it's closed and to buy/collect tickets from the food counter. I don't want to have to stand behind 15 people all queuing for vast troughs of popcorn when all I want is a ticket. They don't usually try to flog me any food anyway so I don't think it's solely to make extra sales. I think there should be a fast track til for people who don't want food/drink. Hang on, that would be the closed ticket desk...

Our local cinema (c1new0rld) closed the dedicated ticked sales desk some time ago and tickets are bought from the food counter now (unless you have pre-ordered when it's a self-service machine).

I think it's a cost-cutting measure as fewer staff are needed to do FOH sales if they all work from the one counter.

Azari

Reading this thread I've realised that we've not been to the cinema for some considerable time.

I don't think we ever made a decision to stop going but a number of factors have made it less and less attractive.

The stench of popcorn.
The persistent annoyance of people forever checking phones (clearly they're not exactly
engrossed in the film ).
The unbalanced sound systems.
The unhelpful ticketing arrangements.

Added to which we have:

Nice, big, flat screen TV's.
High resolution DVD's
Very fast release of DVD's after cinema release.
The ability to watch a film at the exact time you want to.

And, all in all, it seems the impetus to put up with all the irksomeness of a cinema visit seems to have just about disappeared.

And with the money you save you can easily afford to eat out more often, or go to the theatre, so it's not as if avoiding the cinema means you spend more time stuck indoors.

NBLondon

Valli wrote: »

I think it's a cost-cutting measure as fewer staff are needed to do FOH sales if they all work from the one counter.

Yep - very likely. And if the staff are on zero hours contracts (the junior ones are at that chain) they can be shuffled around to meet the expected number of customers that shift. Plus the upselling - making it slightly harder for parents to ignore pester power for popcorn/drinks when they are standing by the stuff.

gregg1

Alidolly wrote: »

Slowest service ever - McDonalds at Menorca airport. Took AN HOUR as while there were 4 women at the tills, there was only one guy actually cooking any food...and that was painfully slowly. Captive audience as well but never again.

There isn't a McDonalds at Menorca airport!!

wealdroam

gregg1 wrote: »

There isn't a McDonalds at Menorca airport!!

Perhaps that's why it took an hour to get the food.

marliepanda

Herbalus wrote: »

You've come to the same conclusion as the complaint lady, which is to disagree with me that service was slow. The response was simply (plus the usual waffle about sorry for inconvenience) that "staff work very hard to be efficient and serve customers promptly", which ignored the entire point of the complaint that they were not working very hard to serve promptly.

So the complaint has been dismissed out of hand with a suitable "naff off" email and no addressing of the actual complaint, which was not that there was a long wait overall (I expected that on a Saturday night), but rather that staff were making no visible effort to do anything about the queues.

Maybe you are just wrong? They no doubt have access to the till records and maybe your complaint was not correct. Maybe they encourage them not to rush people through and you were being impatient?

Azari

marliepanda wrote: »

Maybe you are just wrong? They no doubt have access to the till records and maybe your complaint was not correct. Maybe they encourage them not to rush people through and you were being impatient?

Maybe.

But it's much more likely to be as Herbalus stated.

At establishments such as a cinemas or fast food chains, you tend to get the gamut of staff, from those who work quickly and efficiently, despite the abysmal wages, to those who are indifferent, at best.

Herbalus

The-Truth wrote: »

The biggest cause of slow service is actually slow customers.......
Why have you assumed it was the staff being slow rather than the customers?

Must say I'm a little surprised by this comment, which has also come from a few others.

I have assumed anything. I know it was slow service, because, well, I was there. Watching. I saw it. That's how I know. I was standing a few feet from the counter the whole time, and could hear every word that was said. So I know that nobody paid in pennies, no customer was dithering about what film to see. The staff simply weren't bothered about how long it took them to do anything (and yes, I do know the difference between me thinking they're slow and them factually being slow - it was the latter).

daytona0

Azari wrote: »

Maybe.

But it's much more likely to be as Herbalus stated.

At establishments such as a cinemas or fast food chains, you tend to get the gamut of staff, from those who work quickly and efficiently, despite the abysmal wages, to those who are indifferent, at best.

Which conveniently boils down to the hiring policies and the wage level set by the company ie they aren't going to change a thing despite Herbalus being unhappy.