Don't look like it HURTS you to serve me, SALATHAI

Dear Salathai,

I think I have now had one of the worst service experiences in my entire life at your restaurant. A tip... when your restaurant sells pint-size portions... no refills... no bonuses... maybe you'd better think of making up for that with superior service.

Tonight, your server looked at me... like it actually *HURT* her to ask me what I wanted for dinner. When I asked if any of the drinks were refillable she flat out told me "The Soda Water". SO ... I said "That sounds fine... I'll have that... it's refillable, right?" she said, "yes"... gave me an annoyed look and then looked back at my dinner partner to get the order.

She didn't even LOOK at us while hurriedly gathering up the menus... with an incredibly sour expression on her face... at which point I asked her ONE more time "The Soda Water is refillable?" and she impatiently nodded at me.

THEN...

it strangely took a whole 20-odd minutes for the DRINKS to arrive... I got exactly *one* ice-cold glass of soda water and my partner got his one glass of ice coffee....

Another 15-20 minutes later... the tiny portions of food arrive. We looked at the food... and knew instantly... we would still be hungry when the meal ended.

We then tried to savour the meal as long as possible. During the *entire time* we were eating, the server didn't check on us once. In fact... didn't even look at our table, smile our way or even acknowledge that there were people AT the table.

All the while... at the table *right next to us* I notice... that they put their drink orders in place... and it took about 1 whole minute for their drinks to arrive... and they didn't get just a single glass of soda water... they got the *entire bottle*... along with an icy-chilled glass.

Finally, frustrated that my "refillable soda glass" had stood empty for the entire meal... we had to flag down a server for one of the OTHER tables in order to ask him "Is the Soda water refillable?" at which point... he says "No. None of our drinks are refillable".

Great... so now... I've found out... that the server LIED. COMPLETELY LIED. Not once... but *THREE* times.

However... *second* our plates were empty... she materialized out of nowhere and asked "So will there be anything else" ... which came out so quickly and almost snarled... she had made it painfully obvious that she really hoped she just would not HAVE to serve us anymore... so we simply asked for the bill.

half a second later... BAM... the bill is on our table... and the moment my partner pulls out his card... BAM.. there she is to take it and ring it through! Just couldn't WAIT to get rid of us!

Appropriately enough, since there was absolutely no service to speak of (besides the bare minimum of *actually* bringing the food to the table)... we did not leave a tip. She simply had not earned any sort of service award.

No. I'm not a believer in tipping "just because". This server had managed to turn what was a very good day... into one that made me feel ripped off.

So... Thank you SalaThai... I now know what bad service truly is... and I will *never* recommend anyone I know or anyone who reads this blog to go to your restaurant. Change your servers or maybe give them a little hospitality training.

Sincerely,

Dee