"Not Friendly"

So I got a guest complaint this week. Like a real, “I’m so pissed off I’m going to write corporate,” guest complaint. The long, occasionally rambling, email detailed how everyone was rude, the food wasn’t very good and I “Wasn’t rude, just wasn’t friendly.” Also at one point they were afraid to tell me about a problem with a drink because they were afraid of what my reaction would be.

Here’s the thing, almost all waiters will reach a point where they shut down on a table. Most tables I have a good connection with and are friendly with, other times, I give good service, but that’s it. I made the decision to not invest a lot of time or energy in this table pretty early on.

As I approached both women asked for plastic utensils and then one went one step farther and asked for, “A glass of boiling, hot, hot water,” so that she could dunk her plastic utensils into. At that point I figured any energy I put into that table wouldn’t be worth the effort so they got service that, “Wasn’t rude, but wasn’t friendly,” it’s called being professional and polite. They pointed out that other servers were friendlier than I was, but what they probably didn’t realize is those guests weren’t as difficult to deal with.

As far as being afraid of my reaction about a complaint about their drink, I don’t buy it. Were they concerned I’d do something to their drink? Seriously? I don’t need to lose my job and there are cameras everywhere at my restaurant. That might happen at lower quality restaurants, but I’ve worked in restaurants a long time and I’ve never seen/heard/or done anything to anyone’s food. I’m a professional, sadly, I do this for a living.

So my advice is if you want your server to be friendly to you, you might try being friendly yourself. I don’t really get expecting your server to be friendly. I just had a business lunch and I could even tell you my server’s name an hour later. She was cheerful, and polite, but I didn’t really want to interact with her. She did her job, did it well, and that was all I expected. And no, I didn’t ask for plastic utensils.