Dear waiter I stiffed the other night:

The BBQ Pit
21

Actually, we showed up at ten. The last call (both kitchen/bar closing) was at midnight, and the closing time for the restaurant is also marked as midnight. We ordered most of the food right when we got there; I only ordered extra wings at 11:30 because I was still hungry and the wings were really good. And I finished them in fifteen minutes, way before closing time. We also ordered another round of beers at 11:45 but since that only required taking out some bottles or pouring beer into a glass it is not that much work.

Actually, it is pretty stupid that last call is at midnight when closing hours are marked as midnight. If the servers are so eager to close ASAP they should get the manager to make last call/food run at 11:30 so that people can have a buffer zone to finish their food before being shuffled out, and the dishes can get into the dishwasher around midnight. There were also at least two other parties there (may have been more in the nonsmoking section) so obviously other people wanted to stick around a bit longer.

I could understand if we’d have ordered a smorgasbord at 11:30, or if I ordered the wings at 11:50. But I don’t think I was being that unreasonable.

22

I don’t know. Even when I worked at a McDonalds, we knew that we’d be staying at least an hour after closing time to clean up. I can’t see assuming that closing time is when the staff goes home.

Davenportavenger, if you can describe where you sat, the manager should be able to work out who your server was based on who was assigned to what section that night.

23

I don’t think you were unreasonable at all. My husband and my brother-in-law run a restaurant. Our closing time is 10pm for the kitchen and 11pm or so for the bar. We joke that it’s irritating when people walk in at 9:50 for dinner, but in reality, they are greeted with the same level of courtesy as someone who shows up at noon for lunch. We are open, and that’s it. 9:50 is not 10pm, so their food will be cooked and served with a smile. The way an independent restaurant stays in business is to be accommodating to each and every guest who walks in the door. No matter how close to closing time it is.

And that crap about the dishwasher was just that: crap. I’ve never worked in any restaurant that didn’t have a few unwashed dishes at the end of the night left for the next morning.

Discourteous servers like the one you had waiting on you will almost always guarantee that the customer will not return. Restaurants do not survive on one-visit customers, and that server should’ve known better.

24

Davenportavenger, you have every right to be pissed off.

If I were you, I wouldn’t just send a letter to the manager/owner – I’d send a letter to the local paper, too. They might be interested in an editorial piece about how bad customer service has gotten these days in local establishments.

And to think you PAID for the privelege of being sneered at all night.

25

Something similar happened to me at a place I go pretty often. Dude behind the bar was a complete asshole. Makes me not want to go back.

26

Right after I had graduated college, I was an assistant manager at a Bennigan’s in a college town nearby. I had the confidence of the real managers, and was allowed to watch over closing time.

Would the cooks bitch about cooking at 10:45pm (we closed the kitchen at 11pm)…sure. But as a group, they were so used to this that the grumping was mechanical (and I started as a cook, so I could identify). As a manager, I expected them to grump, and would have found it odd had they not.

Front of the house is different. If I had seen/heard of a hostess or waitress giving someone a hard time, I’d wonder two things:

[ol]
[li]Didn’t they want the money froma 4-top (or more…I’m not sure how many friends you had)[/li][li]Why didn’t they want to work in my Bennigan’s?[/li][/ol]

And let’s be honest…they were just delaying their cleanup, and delaying their time at the bar with the bartender’s free beer (beer is free, no mixed drinks!) (Liquor costs).

-Cem

27

302 S. St Clair Street? A quick Google indicates that it’s not part of a chain.

You might consider adding your comments here.

28

From a customer’s point of view, it also sends out a less than welcoming vibe if the staff starts vacuuming the rugs (literally under your feet in some cases) more than an hour before scheduled restaurant closing time.

29

Interesting find, Quartz! It looks like this is a place that prides itself on service; several of the reviews comment on how great the service is. I really wonder if there was something else going on–maybe the staff were all headed to a party after work, and that made them obnoxiously impatient.

Daniel

30

Wow, I’ve been to the Sharp Edge a bunch of times and never had a bad experience there. I think you just really got shafted by one particular server and I think that you should let the management know about it.

They usually have good food, good service, and I love the ‘Mystery Brew’.

31

Found their website and the owner is Jeff Walewski.

32

I have.

While I won’t defend the deplorable service experienced by the OP, I will say that I was once a dishwasher at a restaurant (not even a good one, either - it was Shoney’s), where every dish had to be clean before the dishwasher went home.

One time, a group of eight people showed up five minutes before closing, and ate their meals at an incredibly leisurely pace. I had to stand around doing nothing for two hours until they were finally finished before I could wash their dishes and go home.

33

I concur. I worked in about 6 different restaurants as a boy growing up in the 90’s as either a busboy or dishwasher and not a single one of them (even the skeeviest ones) would leave even a single dirty dish till the next day. The dishwasher was ALWAYS the lowest paid person, but also the last one out of the facility every night.

God I hated that fucking job…

34

You are not playing fair. You are basing your opinion of an entire restaurant, wishing a really good bar to close and trashing it on the internet because a douche bag server was acting like an ass. You admit yourself that you did not get to speak to a manager, that you have made no attempt to contact the ownership or upper management and you are still bashing them online. That is a load of crap if ever I heard one. I am service industry myself, and if you claim to be as well at one point in your lifetime, then you should know that the attitudes and opinions of the staff rarely represent the opinions and attitude of management. How in the hell can a problem be solved if the problem is not brought to the attention of someone who can do something about it. And to assume that any person on staff would catch the back of that big of an asshole is dumb. And as someone who is supposedly an ex-waitress then I can assume that you have also been in a few kitchens, and as a chef it offends me on a moral level that you would even begin to assume that something would be done to your food or beverages if you were to return. I have been working in restaurants my entire career and I can say with 100% confidence that I have never had an employee or coworker who did something deliberately to a food or beverage item as a way to get even with a customer. Not to mention- as I am sure you are aware as an ex-waitress, that the kitchen and the FOH staff rarely get along well enough that a cook would ever go out of their way to help a server bus a table least of all sabotage someones food. That is assinine and statements like those that you made are inflamitory and retarded. You are only expressing your own ingnorance in making statements like that and I would love to know at what previous places you worked so I can avoid them like the plague, anyplace that employees people that would behave that way are not places that I would dine at.

Bottom line- grow a set and talk to someone at “your favorite bar” and see what can be done about it. I cannot image that your comments would be disregarded and you may be able to work something out. But to write off an entire restaurant because your server was cranky, having a bad day, just broke up with his girlfriend, was tired, stubbed his toe, had cramps or whatever reason he was being a little bitch is stupid. And to trash them online without giving them a chance to defend themselves or correct the situation is immature, stupid and very shortsighted. Sounds to me like you are just too chicken to confront the issue and this passive aggressive bullshit is just to make you feel better. I happen to LOVE that bar, I am there quite often, and it offends me personally to hear this kind of shit, especially when it is an issue that can so easily be resolved by GOING TO THE SOURCE! You think you are the only one who ever had a complaint about this guy? Doubtful, and if it really is “your favorite bar” then I suggest you make some kind of effort to resolve it as opposed to the trash talking internet shit.

35

Hi, bigcheese, welcome to the Dope. As a guest, you probably don’t know that it is part of our culture here to not quote the entire OP when addressing it in the thread. It is also part of our culture to insert lots of paragraph breaks so that our posts can be easily read. Yours is very difficult to read.

I attempted to plow through it, and as far as I can tell, the gist of what you’re saying is that davenportavenger is in the wrong to complain about a restaurant on the internet where the restaurant can’t defend itself. Well, you’d best get used to that if you want to hang out in the Pit. Sometimes we complain about things here instead of real life for a variety of valid reasons, including that we feel like it. You can take his internet complaining personally if you like, but that probably won’t be very good for your blood pressure.

As for your first paragraph - sorry. I can’t figure out what your point is at all.

36

Seriously, email the manager and ask if you can set up a time to meet at the restaurant. I’d try to do it in the evening on the same day of the week as your last visit. That way, you can point the server out and say, “Yeah, that’s the douchebag right there, and this is what he did…”

If it’s one of your favorite hangouts, I say fight for it.
As bigcheese* noted, no chef is going to mess with your food. And the solidarity of the waitstaff is rarely so strong that they’ll risk their jobs and tips in order to put a booger in your brau. They probably don’t even like each other that much.

If you really want to set things right, as opposed to just bitching, Lute Skywatcher has located the manager for you.

  • welcome to the Dope, bigcheese. Not a bad first post, not bad at all. It was even a good Pit Post. Hope you stick around.
37

Oh, leave him the hell alone, Lou.

bigcheese has as much right to pit DavenportAvenger for a mispitted pitting as DA had for mispitting the pitting in the first place.

As for technical marks, yeah, paragraph breaks would have been a nice consideration, but the finesse of quoting is only developed with time and practice.

38

I believe it is.
I googled “sharp edge Bloomfield Pittsburgh” and got this

BTW, I used the contact page and sent a link to this thread.

39

I am surprised at the number of people who will drive miles out of their way to go to another store, of the same chain. because of one employee.

40

While I agree the waitress was way out of line, and you were completely in the right, by law, servers cannot be compelled to pay for stolen items or walk-outs.

I’d rather she got her ass canned.