Below is a copy of the email that I already sent to the feedback on applebees.com.
"I am writing to tell you about the terrible experience I had at the Applebee's in Edgewood Towne Center yesterday. I have never had an experience so bad. Things continued to get worse the longer we waited. Normally, when there are problems, the waiting staff and/or the manager come out to apologize and attempt to fix the situation. This manager came over initially, but then proceeded to ignore us until the end of the evening. Our visit lasted 4 hours! Not because we were lingering, but because the food was extremely slow, the drinks were slow, calculating the bills was really slow, and it was all together very terrible. At my job, we often have goodbye lunches for various staff and we just had 30 or so people eat at the Applebee's in West Mifflin and we were treated appropriately and in and out withing 2 hours. Yesterday, we only had a party of 11 people and we were there for 4 hours! And no, the restaurant was not that crowded. Our initial server was named Reid. Reid started out by being pretty competent in getting our initial drinks and appetizers (though I was ignored initially and had to inform him that I still needed a drink). Reid then took our party's orders (split checks) and put them in. Meanwhile, while we were awaiting the food, Reid did not come back to check on us or give us refills and my one friend waited for a draft beer for almost 30 minutes. Finally the manager and another server came out. The manager said Sorry, Reid lost your order so the manager and another staff member proceeded to take the orders all over again including the drinks and the food orders. The manager apologized and said that she fired Reid. Some refills were brought out and we were assured that our food was coming. One of my friends ordered 2 pitchers of shots of Washington Apple or Washington Red. The wait staff then came to the table with 11 separate drinks. When questioned, they said that they could not bring out the drinks in a pitcher, so instead just brought each person their own shot glass. Our party toasted my other friend (Did I mention we were celebrating her birthday?) then continued to wait. While we waited, once again, no one came to check on us.By this point, our party had been served a lot of alcohol and very little food so people were hungry. We asked for the manager again but she was nowhere to be found. Meanwhile, Sherri replaced our server. Sherri was very nice, but said that she was not supposed to serve tonight, she was supposed to bus tables. And the responsibility of this 10-person table was put on her alone, which was bad management, considering that she was new. We continued to wait, while other groups came, ate, and left. Finally, our food came out approximately 9:45 pm. As you can probably guess, it was cold, wrong, and did not taste that great. Some of us ate ours, some of us didn't and tried to give it back. When my friends gave the food back, it was brought back out and it was hotter, but not really good. I had the Veggie Patch Pizza. It was okay. It's been a really long time since I've had one so I couldn't compare it to anything. Plus I'm sick with a cold with laryngitis (the reason that I'm writing rather than calling) and that could have affected my tastebuds. We continued to ask for the manager to address the issues. The server became really frustrated and even went outside to find the manager (maybe she was doing carside or smoking). The server came around to confirm everyone's orders before she printed the bills and we confirmed our orders. Even though we were still unhappy. Meanwhile, the staff came to sing happy birthday to my friend. But she was so unhappy at the way that we were being treated and of course she felt like it was a reflection on her birthday. They then brought the bills out and of course they were completely wrong.
By the way, the friend who requested the pitcher of shots, each shot was rang individually and the total was $71! She was not warned that she would be charged in that manner when they brought out the individual drinks. But she paid it because we drank it. We were all charged full price for our food. I never received my bill. Not because they were comp'ing my bill. But I guess because it was mixed up somewhere. I requested my bill three times. It was never brought to me. (I later found out that my other friend on the other side of the table had also ordered a veggie patch pizza but when her bill came out, she was charged for two. Of course, they took off the additional pizza of her bill. But we didn't figure that out until later) My other friends were charged for drinks that they didn't order and double orders of food were charged on people's bills. It was completely ridiculous. I assume that in the flurry of trying to re-take the lost orders, some orders were taken twice, maybe? Complete mayhem. It was around 10:30 pm by this time. Of course, we again requested the manager because she never came back to address the slowness of the food, the incorrect bills, the bad service, and the wrong orders. WE waited and waited for our bills to be set straight. The manager finally came out and spoke with my friends who had sent their food back but were still brought food. When they explained that they had asked for the food to be taken off because the no longer wanted it (due to the poor quality and such), they were told that the staff had decided to heat the food and give it back because that was the main issue. The manager agreed to take it off their bills but took the food back with her (because by this point, it had been bagged for my friends). I don't know if she was throwing it away or giving it to other people. I hope that those platters weren't re-served because once food goes out, it's done. Anyway, The rest of our party then became upset because the manager had not addressed anyone else's concerns. We then told the waitress and the manager eventually came back out. The manager then, instead of apologizing for the bad service, food, bill confusion, made excuses. She stated that she had come out initially to address our lost orders and had fired the staff (Meanwhile, we saw him in the back even after he was allegedly fired). The manager did not seem to understand what we were upset about. We then asked for the names and contact information of the stores manager and of the district manager. This manager then decided to lie to us and tell us that was the same person. But having worked in food service, we knew this wasn't true. She then explained that she could not take anything off of our bills, which of course we knew was not true. She brought us the business cards for James Och, the manager. I assumed that he had his own telephone line. While we waited for our payments to be processed (which was continued mayhem, they told my one friend that his credit card wasn't charged because they instead used his giftcard. He asked to see the receipt to prove that they did not run his card. That took another 20 minutes of arguing with another waitstaff whose name I don't know but her attitude was nasty), I decided to leave a message for Mr. Och. I called the number for James Och at 11:04 P.M. - it was the store's number and I asked what hours Mr. Och worked. I was not given the answer and instead Daralyn was put on the phone. So I said, "Hello. My name is Maryn and I'm sitting here at this table, waiting for you to come back out here and address these issues and my friend is still waiting for his credit card. And oh by the way, I STILL haven't received my check." She then let me know that Mr. Och would be in Saturday at 10 A.M. I can assure you that Mr. Och is taking a lot of phone calls right now from our entire party because of the poor treatment we received at the restaurant.
I understand that food service is hard and that there are issues. But what makes all the difference in the world is your server and/or manager coming to check on you and refill drinks while the food is cooking, questioning if we are okay. Someone apologizing for the incidents and accepting responsibility for it rather than ignoring us. Customer Service is all about relationship and empathy rather than apathy would have made us all feel better.
Many times, a proactive manager, who offers to give a little something prevents later complaints.
I was expecting at least that everyone's bills would have been given a 10-15% discount. Or maybe the manager could have offered everyone a free mini-dessert. Anything to acknowledge that the restaurant screwed up my friend's birthday dinner.By the way, Daralyn's response to our complaints was "well, you can call the survey on the bottom of the check."
Our anger could have led us to get up and leave because at that point, we would have been justified in doing so. But we didn't. We paid full price for a terrible meal, terrible service, and a terrible manager. We were finally done at 11:30 P.M. I can tell you that I will not return to this Applebee's ever.
Okay, this email is really long, but I hope I've made it clear that our party had concerns about the food, the service, and especially the manager. I would encourage corporate to investigate the Edgewood location, maybe even send some people undercover on a Friday night. Because they are ruining the reputation of your fine restaurant, which i usually enjoy!
If you have any questions for me, please don't hesitate to contact me. Hopefully my voice will return soon!
Thank you
mformley
P.S. Our replacement server was friendly and the cheesesticks were delicious!
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