Many of you who travel and eat out a lot are familiar with the disappearing server routine. It can happen before your order is taken and you may or may not be nursing a drink. It also can happen, and this is typically the case, when you receive your drinks and you place your order with the server and he or she mysteriously disappears. It might happen when your meal finally appears and the next time you "experience" service with your waitress is when the bill comes. And this is what the server expects 20% for? I think not.
With my son and I, we placed our order, received the appetizer and then our meal arrived, without our order of french fries. The meal was delivered by someone other than our order taker and she seemed completely uninterested in us or our lack of fries. In addition, our drinks were getting near empty.
As those in the trade know full well, the failure of the server to ask patrons whether they would like another beverage - specifically the alcoholic variety - accounts for million of dollars in lost revenues. This clearly reflects poor training, lack of adequate floor supervision and inattentive management. In this case they were soft drinks, but lunch in Florida, in 85 degree heat, with hot food - you don't survive on only one glass.
OK - so we begin eating. I corral another waitress "responsible" for the table next to us and ask her to please see to our fries. A minute later the manager stops by our table. He asks if everything is alright. My son, quite astute to how customer service is delivered, notices and tells me that this manager never looked either of us in the eye. He was asking if everything was alright without asking anything. He was in what I call a customer service fog. He never looked up from the floor. Did he like my sneakers?
I mention we haven't received our fries. He mumbled something and left. Meanwhile, surprise, surprise our original waitress all cheery and glad to please anyone and everyone, shows up with the fries, 3/4th's of the way through our meal. After she puts the plate down she disappears again like Samantha on the old Bewitched TV show. No refill of beverages.
So, the food was acceptable, but, as I said at the outset, the service fair to poor. I don't recall how we got our bill. As a experiment, I flagged down the "other" waitress - the one who I asked to get our fries and who apparently found our "original" waitress and told her to get crack'n. I slipped her $5 and said thanks for your help. She leaned into me and whispered how she really appreciated "it" since all of her tables today have been tight with the wallet. For the record, she did try and refuse the money.
Bottom line, I'm not impressed. The manager was a whimp. I
would put him back in the kitchen or wherever he came from. He needs more
customer service and leadership training. His lack of experience and
assertiveness led to our server's disappearance. At least three to five more
"times of contact" should have been made by her. She failed doing her
job. The system failed to provide the service promised. Next time we'll go over
to Hooter's and give them a try.
