Do you ding the cook when he undercooks the food? If it’s cold in the center, it might not have been all that hot to begin with.
Heh–yeah, that was exactly the tone they took. It wasn’t that they were mad, they honestly didn’t get it.
If you want tap water, they will look at you because it’s similar to going to an Italian restaurant and eating the bread from the complimentary basket to be full - it ruins the calculation. In General, food is cheaper (and spiced a little bit hotter) and the drinks make up the difference. If you are thirsty, you can go buy a bottle of water cheaply in the supermarket (lowest starts at about 0,30 Euros) and drink it outside. But if you drink in the Restaurant, you pay the rent, the electricity, and all the wages added to the drink.
If you don’t want fizzy mineral water, say you want a quiet “Stilles” Mineral water (Aqua minerale naturale in Italian). You can order 0,25 l, a glass, a big glass 0,5 l (half a pint) or even a whole bottle of 0,7 l if you know you are thirsty. Often a big table will order several bottles of water (together with the wine) so you can refill yourself as you like, and all pay together at the end.
I’d also recommend the Apfelschorle - apple juice with mineral water - against thirst. It’s the cheapest alternative to Isotonic drinks, less sweet than apple juice alone, more taste than plain water.
Which is exactly why I took my complaint to the Manager. But apparently I am not allowed to include in my complaint the service charge for service that was poor?
Hence the cultural confusion. That’s (from an American point of view) very, very weird. Complementary water is just expected in the way napkins and silverware are expected.
Heh–I eventually figured that out
MMmmm! That sounds good. I’ll have to try it next time I’m over there.
This… this must be sigged. Saved. Something. The asterisks look like rock ‘n’ roll eagle wings.
OK. Pages and pages ago, it seems, ianzin asked if I would mind if he got to deduct 15-20% for poor service.
If I give you bad service (actual bad service- mistakes in your order, forgetting refills, long wait for your food [whether or not the wait is actually my fault]- not Spring1’s UNFAIR service) then I will talk to my manager and get you either a) a coupon for next time b) a free dessert c) food comp’ed from your bill or d) some other solution that pleases you. I know when I haven’t done my best with a table, and I try to make up for that. So in that case, you will be getting a reduced bill. And I’m ok with that.
I wait tables for a living as well, (I’m surprised it took my eight pages to finally post in this thread,) so I have a question for Springs1:
You say that what is FAIR is for you to get your drinks first if you sat down first and I greeted you first. Ok, I understand that. But what about the following scenario, which happens a lot of busy weekends:
I greet you, and ask what you want to drink. While taking your drink order, I see the hostess seating me at another table of mine. I make a note to go there after getting your drinks. You and your husband both get margaritas (even if you don’t like margaritas, just bear with me and assume you ordered them.) I go to the computer and ring in two margaritas. Even if the bartender isn’t busy and has no other drinks to make or people to wait on at the bar, it will take a couple minutes for him to make them. It will take me less time than that to go to the second table and get their drink order. Is it ok if I do that? I mean…I’m still going in order. YOU ordered a drink, then THEY order a drink. I will still bring your drink out first, then theirs. Or do you have to have your drink before I even greet them? What if the bartender is REALLY busy, and it might take five minutes before your drink is up. Do I still have to wait that whole time before even greeting that next table? If I do greet them, and they only want water, which I can get in 30 seconds while your margaritas STILL AREN’T READY, am I allowed to bring them out, or does everyone have to wait just because you don’t have your drinks yet, and aren’t able to get them through no fault of mine?
The next scenario:
I do everything right, according to you. I greet you, get a drink order, bring the drinks, and give you a few more minutes to look over the menu if you need it. I greet the next table, and do the same thing. I go back to you, you order, and you get items that might take a little longer. Well done steaks, or even a medium rare steak, but it’s out biggest, thickest one, so it takes longer. I go to the computer and enter it, so it IS ordered first, then go to table two and take their order. They all get rare steaks, or are just getting appetizers as entrees, or fried food…ie, the all order food that takes half as much time, or less, to cook than yours. When there’s inevitably gets done before yours. is it ok to bring it out while it’s still hot, or do I have to wait for it to get cold so you can get your food FIRST, just because you ordered it first ,even though it’s done second?
YES, unless you get your jollies DISRESPECTING Spring, and don’t plan on getting TIPPED.
I am just entitled as anyone else to get things just as they are when you wait in a line. At a typical Wendy’s, if I place my order for a combo. Then, the cashier doesn’t get my drink and gets the next person in line’s order, that is wrong right there. Then if the cashier actually fixes their coke before my coke and hands them theirs before mine, that’s even more DISRESPECTFUL!
I don’t care WHERE you are, it’s DISRESPECTFUL for the CASHIER to let someone CUT in front of someone else’s turn.
She dropped off 2 sides salads for a couple at another table. As far as what is wrong with it, think about it, WE ordered our food first. There’s no forgetting about who ordered first, because at Red Lobster, the servers make the salads a manager told me. So she just got finished making the side salads when our food was fully cooked. Think about it with common sense, what takes longer to prepare, fried seafood or side salads that the server makes? She knew WHO ordered first.
What’s wrong with it is she let them CUT in front of OUR TURN! It was OUR TURN, NOT THEIRS! WE PLACED OUR FOOD ORDER around 11:15a.m. or so and didn’t receive it until around 12p.m. or so. We asked for that food FIRST. They asked for theirs second. Any DECENT, CARING HUMAN BEING would act like this was a LINE as if it were THEM WAITING in a LINE, would THEY want someone to CUT in front of THEM when they are REALLY HUNGRY. I seriously doubt she would have liked it.
It’s common sense what is wrong with it. You have a tray with food or drinks, you hand them out in the order in which they were taken in, it’s that simple. You don’t get to decide to let customers cut. That’s not nice, is it? I wouldn’t have done that to her. I would have made sure I brought the customers their hot food first since they ordered first. That’s the “MORALLY RIGHT THING TO DO.” You KNOW that’s the truth!!
I don’t get why you cannot see WHY this was UNFAIR of the waitress to do to us? She had all 4 items on her tray(2 sides salads, 2 entrees), but decided to hand the customers that ordered their side salads that weren’t even in the BUILDING when we placed our entree orders. HOW RUDE! I cannot understand HOW you cannot see that it’s just as rude as someone trying to CUT in front of you when you are in a line?
NO, I am saying it’s wrong to hand things out in the wrong order. You know that’s the truth. It’s wrong for a cashier or a server to let some customer CUT in front of another.
Springs
let me reverse things on you. Let’s say I go into a restaurant before you, then you and your husband come in. I order a salad and a steak, then the waitress comes and gets your order.
I order my drink first and order a very complex drink that requires blending, you order water. Should she bring your water to you before she brings my drink?
She comes out with my salad AND yours. She comes to my table first and starts to drop my salad off. I notice it isn’t right and won’t accept it. So she needs to take it back to the kitchen.
Okay–should she drop YOUR salad off or go back and correct my salad and serve me first. I was there first, it isn’t my fault that the salad got messed up. By your logic, you shouldn’t be served before me–is that correct?
So we get past the salads. Now it is dinner time. My steak I order very well done (something I would never do–but let’s do that for the sake of this experiment). You order something much simpler that takes half the time to prepare. Should your order wait under the warmer until I get my steak? Again that is what you are stating here isn’t it–to be fair?
I would like to hear your thoughts on this scenario.
You answered your question:
I pay attention when my food is coming and when I have asked for something what they do right after and if it’s taking a long time, where the hell they are with my refill or the check or whatever I have asked for.
I can tell by the fact that if you didn’t see that table seated, then you saw this couple sitting there as you were waiting for your food, well DUH, you know you placed your HOT FOOD ORDER FIRST, especially with a no brainer like comparing the time it takes to prepare 2 side salads vs. fried seafood. You know who ordered first if you pay attention. I do, because I want to know WHY it takes whatever amount of time and how to tip. I care about my time, you obviously don’t care about yours or your hard earned money to know what amount to tip if the server deserves a certain amount.
Maybe you personally don’t care about how long you wait for something, but honestly, you would rather have your refill as fast as you could? Be honest with me now. If you don’t, WHY THE HELL are you ordering it at that time then if you want it 10 minutes from now or longer?
Also, I don’t know ANYONE in their right mind that likes waiting. You say you don’t mind, but when your mouth is filled with spicy foods or really thirsty, I am willing to bet you feel differently then, wouldn’t you? You may not mind waiting, but the rest of dining society wants their refills NOW, NOT 2-10 minutes from now, NOW! If you don’t want that refill, don’t order it then if you don’t care when it comes. Try that one for size. I don’t know ANYONE that loves waiting. I don’t like waiting for anything just as any normal person. If I could always be first, of course I’d want to, wouldn’t you, wouldn’t anyone?
That’s because you don’t mind waiting for what you order, but I do. I feel that mother with the crying baby should have some respect like mothers do in church and go outside or something. Bring a bottle in a diaper bag. I don’t like screaming babies either, but I would WAYYYY RATHER have my stuff FIRST than to wait some extra seconds to have the baby quiet down. My ears can stand the wait compared to my stomach.
How do you know that your food and their food was ready at the same time? Maybe she had finished the salads, and was just about to take them out when your food finished up? In that scenario, the salads won, and should rightly have been served first.
I’m obviously not getting all the service that I have coming to me. Previously, I had only expected to get my food correctly and my drink refilled quickly when I ask. And I tipped extra if they brought refills without me having to ask. Obviously, I should be watching the server every second to make sure all actions are performed in the exact order they were requested (no matter how much longer it will take them to serve by going back and forth and back and forth) rather than, say, socializing with my tablemates.
Maybe it’s because I’m more than five years old? MOMMMMMY!!! Jimmy got HIS food first!!!
I had more to say, but on preview I see that others made my points first.
I just thought of something. I went out to breakfast with my sister once, and we got free fruit cups and danishes (that we didn’t order) before our meals, and I got an Oreo cookie with my hot cocoa. How dare the waitress order for us!!!111eleventwentythree!!!
Sorry, I don’t have the caps/bold/stars thing down yet.
Yes, because she is having to wait for the bartender to make the drink, so either she does SOMETHING ELSE with her time or just stands there. That’s 100% TOTALLY DIFFERENT than having 4 items on the same tray, which 2 of them were hot food.
If she had a pina colada on the tray that was yours that you ordered first and I had ordered a water second, she should only be going get that pina colada and not even having both on the tray even. Let’s say she did have both on the tray due to that right after she fixed the water, the pina colada was ready, so both are on the tray. IF YOU ORDERED FIRST, YOU SHOULD GET YOURS DELIVERED FIRST, REGARDLESS of if our waitress passes by my table or not.
If I were the server, I would immediately take care of the side salad that was wrong by taking it back to the kitchen and NOT SERVE the side salad to the other customer. It’s only fair MISTAKES take TOP PRIORITY OVER ANYTHING ELSE!!
After I would get it fixed, then I would bring out both, handing yours out first, then the other customers.
This is still very different. My entree you said took half the time, well do you expect your side salad to come out with your entree if you didn’t order it like that? Same thing here. She shouldn’t wait to bring me mine, because she isn’t being unfair to you. Your steak is still COOKING. It’s not on the same tray and that you just handed out things in the wrong order. If your steak was on the tray with my steak, which you ordered first, so your server should serve your steak first before mine.
Another example, if you just asked for your check, then as our server walked by, me and my husband ask for a couple of refills. You would be fair by getting the check BEFORE our refills. Do you understand being fair is things that the SERVER CAN CONTROL?*
If Jane Doe asks for a side of ranch when her meal is delivered along with a refill, then as the server passes by Joe Schmoe asks for their check, and then John Doe asks for a refill.
Here is what I would do and expect the server to do:
- Go get Jane Doe’s side of ranch and get her refill, then deliver it.
- Go get Joe Schmoe’s check.
- Go get John Doe’s refill.
See, you’d probably get Jane and John doe’s refills together to minimize steps. I would be fair and do the task in the order in which they were taken in.
This example is one that the server has complete control over(unless for some reason the ranch is not ready to go)(some restaurants have to-go containers already ready and the server just grabs one).
that is NOT what I said. Your steak is done–it is sittiing under the warmer, slowly getting cold. My steak is still cooking. So if you wait until my steak is done, your steak will be cold. You are okay with that because it is fair. Is that a true statement?
So, you want the server to go back and forth and back and forth and back and forth and back and forth and back and forth and back and forthand back and forthand back and forthand back and forthand back and forthand back and forthand back and forthand back and forthand back and forth, instead of just bringing everything in as few trips as possible, thus to make EVERYONE’S wait for EVERYTHING (drinks, taking order, getting served, getting refills, getting checks) INCLUDING YOUR OWN WAIT TEN TIMES AS LONG? Have I got that right?
Good. All you servers, do that from now on. For everyone. There, problem solved. And Springs1 can now never again complain about waiting for anyting at a restaurant.
Did I do the capital-y bold-y asterisk-y thingy right?