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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Not eating there

116 replies

bordellosboheme · 06/04/2014 17:26

Long story short. It was a friends birthday and she invited 15 of us to a local pub for lunch. She had reserved us tables. As soon as I arrived the manger said to me.... 'We need your tables' there are other people coming after you. I asked her what time she needed us out (baring in mind we had booked) and she refused to give a time, instead saying 'I'm sending the bar manger up to speak to everyone'. Wibu at this point, to flounce off and not order a meal as I felt under time pressure and treated badly. Gutted as had not seen my mates for ages. They later came around to the house and apparently the woman treated them like that too. They were annoyed too. We were spending a couple of hundred quid there probably.....

OP posts:

lilrascal · 07/04/2014 01:03

"howls with laughter"? wtf? op never said that

Monty27 · 07/04/2014 01:15

A set time is normal in a busy restaurant. You were late.

lollerskates · 07/04/2014 05:42

Of course customer service staff laugh about unreasonable customers behind the scenes It doesn't make them "nasty pieces of work," it makes them human beings.

dulldeirdre · 07/04/2014 06:15

No Lolla, it makes them unprofessional

LottieJenkins · 07/04/2014 06:25

I am guessing that you being 20 mins late made the whole group delay ordering their food making the manager fed up!!

lollerskates · 07/04/2014 06:55

No, Dullard, it makes them normal human beings.

Ragwort · 07/04/2014 07:29

The 'service' sounds horrendous; I have worked in hospitality and yes, tables do need to be turned, restaurants are a business etc etc but there are much politer ways of managing this sort of situation and I can quite understand why the Op felt upset and embarassed. Too many restaurants act as though the customers are doing them a favour by turning up.

Once, years ago, the service was so awful that a group of 20 of us actually got up and left as the food was being served (we hadn't actually eaten anything) - things like a customer being served two pieces of chicken and then when another guest asked for her chicken they actually took one of the pieces off the first plate .

Customer service in this country is often terrible and so many of us put up with it. . I did myself last week, I'd asked for a rare steak and it was clearly medium-well done when it arrived and I was too embarrassed to say anything.

ThinkAboutItTomorrow · 07/04/2014 07:38

Lollerskates post at 22.01 'I can only imagine how she had gone into the kitchen and howled with laughter'

Sorry, should have referenced.

Yes, waiters are only human. Been there, done that. But never dealt with a customer in such a way she might have left the restaurant in tears.

I'm just shocked by how ok everyone thinks that is.

BeeInYourBonnet · 07/04/2014 07:56

It does annoy me when I feel there's a time pressure on my meal, however this is common practice especially for early bookings and this is always explained at the time of booking, and also on arrival at restaurant IME.

I would be interested in EXACTLY what the manager said to OP, but I do think being reduced to tears sounds very OTT.

The meal was your friends BIRTHDAY celebration OP, and YWBU not to suck up your feelings about the restaurant and put your friend first. She must have felt mortified about the whole thing. You should have stayed for your friends sake, and then complained quietly after your friend had left or left a TripAdvisor review.

In summary,its not all about YOU OP!

Pipbin · 07/04/2014 08:14

I would like to know what the couple who left without paying said.
If it was a large table booking was there one bill for the whole table? And if so did they just refuse to pay their share?
They should have paid. Even if the service was bad I assume they ate the food. If they complained and the manager reduced the bill fair enough, but to walk off without paying for food you have eaten is not on.

ilovesooty · 07/04/2014 08:15

Rudeness from the manager would have been unacceptable but I doubt very much that she was rude. I think the OP is trying to excuse her own poor behaviour and painting a picture which justifies it.

ThinkAboutItTomorrow · 07/04/2014 08:27

Agree not paying isn't acceptable but the fact someone else found the service that bad has sort of made me assume that she had a point on rude and unpleasant staff.

bamboobutton · 07/04/2014 09:07

i think the staff were fucking rude and if i had been lectured about how long i could sit at the table if i turned up on time-

"The landlady had said exactly the same to the birthday girl who had arrived early"

i would have walked out there and then and then they would have lost the whole booking.

if they can't manage table timings properly then perhaps they shouldn't be running a restaurant.

but you wbu for being late.

im quite surprised at the amount of people that think stroppy waiting staff is fine, are you all French?

CountessOfRule · 07/04/2014 09:19

Not that many comments saying staff were showing best practice.

Plenty saying that OP is startlingly ill-mannered BU.

Pipbin · 07/04/2014 10:19

"The landlady had said exactly the same to the birthday girl who had arrived early"

But what did she say? If it was 'just to let you know that we do have another large booking after you do we will need the table later', then that's ok. If it was shouting 'you need to eat quick so we can have that table' then it's not ok. People's attitudes are what's important here.

Pancakeflipper · 07/04/2014 10:26

Oui Bamboo

ThinkAboutItTomorrow · 07/04/2014 10:40

If the staff had said 'you are fine for a couple of hours but we do have a booking after that' I think it is fine and normal. However the OP explained that she hadn't specified a time, which means basically saying - please can you be quick, we need the table.

If the landlady had said 'exactly the same thing', and I was the birthday host I would have been pretty pissed off.

Original poster

bordellosboheme · 07/04/2014 10:43

I was perfectly happy to work with the manager so when she said she needed the tables (for some more important people it seemed) I asked her cooperatively and politely when she needed us out by. She refused to give a time frame, leaving me on edge. 30 mins, 1 hr, 2 - she refused to say. All she could say was she was sending the bar manager up to have words as if we were naughty school kids (about to give her hundreds of quid). Yes, it was her delivery, body language and hostility that was awful. I was nothing but polite and wanting to work with her, on her timings, but she made it impossible.

OP posts:

elQuintoConyo · 07/04/2014 11:00

You're the Queen of Sheba and I claim my £5.

coldwater1 · 07/04/2014 11:01

Next time don't be late! I have 9 kids and i have never ever been late for anything, i am always hanging around because i am early! I always wounder at uni how half the group manage to be late, i am always early, live furthest away and have 9 kids. Most of them live right near uni with direct routes, one or no kids but are always 30 mins late and its ways the same people.

Original poster

bordellosboheme · 07/04/2014 11:17

Whoopie for you and your 9 kids cold water.

OP posts:

polarpercy · 07/04/2014 11:33

In all fairness regarding being late sometimes it really is out of your control, even if you factor in/allow time for delays. Short of leaving hours and hours extra for some journeys the worst will happen. But, there are ways of behaving!

I hate being late and go out of my way to allow extra time but still got caught out at the weekend. Left to do a journey that normally takes 20 minutes max, allowed an extra 20 for delays! Found a major road near us shut, with no advance notices or warnings earlier in the week on the road and no notices on local radio (travel on this road every day so would have seen!). Traffic was diverted down through a series of far too small villages, leading to long delays. Then arrived in the destination city to find more road closures and works, and diversions down streets so narrow cars had to take it in turn to pass down. This meant we ended up being 25 minutes late to meet friends for a meal.

Although we apologies profusely to the restaurant, who were very understanding as obviously we weren't the only ones having problems getting in. But, I think acknowledging that despite circumstances being out of our control we were still the ones who were late massively helped.

polarpercy · 07/04/2014 11:34

*apologised profusely

Quinteszilla · 07/04/2014 11:38

I was once late for an appointment because I got trapped between my car and the wall having a mug of coffee in my hand, as the wing mirror snapped out and I could not wedge myself further in to get the door open, or get past the wing mirror now it had opened, and lost my car keys down on the floor, and had to place mug on roof of car, in other to fetch my mobile out of my pocked to call my husband to rescue me, for him to run across the yard in just his underpants, and for neighbours dog to tear himself lose and starting to chase him, and him running across the neighbourhood in his underpants, chased by a yappy yorkshire terrier, you get the gist.

But I was only 5 minutes late, as I was early in the first place. Strange things happens!

AlpacaPicnic · 07/04/2014 11:41

quint wins the thread.

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