February 2015 Restaurant Questions

[Joe]

The month of February is rapidly coming to a close. But I seem to have a number of restaurant questions, so I'll let them rip.

1. What is the best way to get your waiter's or waitress's attention? I seem to be often ignored. I ran out of coffee one time, and my waitress was on the other side of the restaurant. I called out to her--"Renee! Renee!"--but she either didn't hear me (although I was practically shouting) or chose to ignore me. I saw another waitress passing by, and asked her to bring me another carafe of coffee. "Sure, sure," she said. Then did nothing. I flagged down a third waitress, who finally brought me the carafe of coffee. But it was not really her job, it was Renee's job.

So what do I need to do? Bring in a coach's whistle or some other obnoxious noisemaker?

2. There have been several occasions where I have been seated but not waited on. Do I really need to write down the time I was seated and keep track of the time I had waited? Should I get up and leave the restaurant? Should I ask for the manager and tell him to go f*#k himself?

3. I often have trouble getting the bill. I ask for the bill. Then I wait. And wait. And wait. And wait.
Do I really need to put a time limit on when bringing me the bill would be acceptable (say, within the next five minutes) and tell the waiter/waitress that I will deduct one percent from the tip they otherwise would have gotten for every minute they are "late"?

I try to interact in a friendly manner with my servers, but I sometimes find that what I get in return is treated like a doormat.

 

[Amy SF]

Wow. It looks like you’ve experienced some really lousy service. Is this everywhere you eat, or at just certain restaurants?

One thing I think you can do is find the restaurant on Yelp and post a bad review, detailing exactly why. Restaurants these days seem to be very sensitive about bad reviews.

Another thing you can do, if you can’t get your waitperson’s attention, is to find the restaurant owner or manager and complain, loudly enough for everyone to hear. Perhaps even threaten to post a bad review on Yelp.

I rarely eat out, so unfortunately I don’t have any other ideas.

ETA: If you tend to eat out by yourself, that's probably one of the reasons why it's hard to get anyone's attention. A party of customers, especially a large party, translates into an expensive order, which restaurants like, obviously. They don't think one person will place an expensive order, so one-person parties have less priority. Sucks, doesn't it?

 

[Joe]

I have experienced lousy service, but luckily this has been the exception rather than the rule.