Surly service

Ever had such surly service that you’re afraid to complain? Recently, I went with my amazing aunt Julie, over from London for the weekend, for a few drinks and a bite to eat in a south Dublin pub.

As soon as I decided to have a drink and leave the car parked overnight, we both knew we were in for at least three bottles of white wine. Julie’s nails, but I’m weak, so I needed to prepare my body for the onslaught by consuming a great new invention called food.

The food was standard enough, pretty much what you’d expect from cod goujons and chips in a pub: perfectly pleasant but relatively forgettable. What I can’t forget is the service.

We both made every effort to be polite to the waiter, who was so visibly bored by his job that he was only short of stomping his foot and storming off before we finished ordering. On several occasions, we tried to get his attention only to be dismissed with a curt “I’ll be with you in a minute, ok.” The man oozed contempt and disdain, and was only short of snapping his fingers in our faces and telling us to get our own goddamn fish and chips, girlfriends (This was all, I must point out, before we’d made it half way through the first bottle).

As we plowed through the wine, Julie and I had a great larf speculating on the causes of his misery, and soon concluded he’d just been dumped. Surely he was just having a bad time – nobody could be this rude and work here for long. We didn’t bother complaining because we didn’t particularly care; I can handle surly service as long as my food is ok and arrives promptly, and we didn’t want to spoil our fun. But we later discovered, through other sources, that obnoxious rudeness is his permanent stock-in-trade.

Over on the always hilarious and informative service blog Well Done Fillet, the waiter Manuel has some excellent advice on how to deal with bad service:

“And how can I help you sir?”, is what I said but I was thinking, please don’t kill me, please don’t kill me, please don’t kill me with your oversized comedy hands.

“Aye just checking you have my table booked….cos if you don’t I’ll get you in a head lock”

The arse nearly dropped out of my world/pants.

He laughed heartily, I laughed nervously and in the rush to find his family’s/gang’s name on the booking sheets I went temporarily blind. That didn’t help to be honest. But I found his reservation for 16 and all was well again. As it turns out he and his family of gargoyled faced siblings and offspring were actually really lovely people.

The moral of the story being, if you want great, and I mean really really top notch, service then scare the waiter out of his tiny mind with violence. He’ll be refilling your drinks and bringing free bread until you own him.

Have you ever been shocked by surly service? And how important is it to the enjoyment of your meal?