How to Deal with Customer Complaints
A quick guide to dealing with complaints in the restaurant trade…
It’s not easy being in the restaurant game, any chef, waiter or manager will tell you that. Mistakes are made, bad nights are had, things go wrong, equipment breaks down, staff walk out etc etc. Sometimes it seems the whole world has teamed up against you and conspired to do everything possible to prevent you from serving food to the customer.
Nobody gets it right all of the time, not everyone will like the menu, the seating, the lighting, the waiter, the coffee, whatever. There are the professional moaners who go out to complain from the outset to the ones who tell you everything was very nice and then write a leter a week later complaining and asking for a discount. Complaints can vary in the nature of their delivery and the response should match the relevence of the complaint.
In my early years I recall a woman complaining to a manager that it was too windy outside and it had spoilt her plans so what was he to do about it, he apologisd for not being able to alter the force of nature and walked off leaving her to ponder the validity of her complaint.
Yesterday I was told of a complaint regarding the bar menu in one of the hotels. This is a bar menu which, in England means simple, less expensive traditional food. The menu features cheese on toast, steak and chips, fish and chips, beef stew and dumplings, corn beef hash etc….
The complaint? The menu was ‘too gourmet’. Work that one out.
So how did I deal with the complaint? I went in search of the cave this neandrathal had crawled out of and left him a turnip and a carrot as a way of apology.
Back in the real world, here’s a new dish from one of the restaurants where the food is ‘gourmet’!! A simple warm salad of red mullet with nicois vegetables and a particular favourite of my brother’s 
Red Mullet Nicose
Chef,
this is fertile ground - let’s have regular anecdotes from a hotel insider - naturally only from long left establishments of course.
Ahhh . . . The Red Mullet
The memories flood back - as do the hunger pangs 10 minutes after I ate it
Cheers
Rod
Diner awaiting the imminent arrival of her food via the waiter carrying a plate.
Diner: Waiter would you mind taking your thumb off my steak !
Waiter: You don’t want it to fall on the floor again do you ?
Round of applause - take a bow . . .
I thank you - I thank you - I thank you
I shall be appearing at the same venue all week !
June 19, 2009 @ 7:08 pm
Miles,
That red mullet looks a funny colour to me.
Customer complaints aren’t a rare thing in my job, but thank the maker I don’t face the general public.
You do a sterling job facing those pernickety sods. But I’m sure the beamingly grateful customers make you nearly bulletproof to it.
Rod,
“I shall be appearing at the same venue all week.”
Peaks Lane?
GDave
June 19, 2009 @ 8:36 pm
Rod,
Nice one, thought I’d throw you that one
Miles
June 19, 2009 @ 10:35 pm
GDave,
“but thank the maker I don’t face the general public” that’s what they say about me too!!!
Miles
June 19, 2009 @ 10:37 pm
I think its clear Miles… an idiot obviously came into the restaurant. Obviously lost on their way to Macdonalds where they hoped to learn the meaning of the word gourmet.
June 19, 2009 @ 10:49 pm
Sharon,
Well I think you’re right but I should be more calm about it. Karen from Rambling Spoon told me of her similar encounters with the word gourmet in America’s Middle West. Karen was, as ever more subtle than I, but then I also forgot that she writes for the American ‘Gourmet Magazine’…will I ever learn?
Miles
June 20, 2009 @ 7:25 am
Sharon,
funny you should mention Macdonalds.
Did you read about the female customer in Macdonalds who rang 911 police emergency services 3 times because the restaurant she was in had run out of chicken nuggets !
Cheers
Rod
June 20, 2009 @ 8:12 am
I read this nodding my head in commiseration and laughing at the same time. We keep a large chalkboard by the dishwashing section that servers scrawl the most moronic requests and idiotic questions they receive. We usually pick a winner every three months or so and erase the board to start over. I’ll write down some of the good ones.
“How many lobster tails do you get with the three lobster tail dinner?”
June 21, 2009 @ 6:35 pm
Dave,
Nice one, I always appreciate your input on these
How about this one: “I’m vegetarian but eat fish and chicken” or, after consuming a pre starter, starter, sorbet course and main course..”What desserts are suitable for me, I have a severe nut allergy”
Oh the agony of it.
Miles
Miles
June 21, 2009 @ 8:45 pm