09/01/09

Very Poor Customer Service

by buster19335

We tried making reservations for a night during Restaurant Week. Even though they won't usually take reservations for 7:30 on a Friday night they do take them during this special week. When I called I was told by the person answering the phone that they don't take reservations during service hours but she took my name and number and told me I would get a call the next day between 10 and 3. Two days later I was called back but missed the call. When I called them back I had to leave another message and never got any call back. After another message and no call back I decided my money would be better spend at another restaurant.

02/09/09

rude host and waitress, great food

by bdahsmom

I went with a group of 4 during restaurant week on a Friday at 8:15. We had reservations for 6 but the other couple had canceled an hour before so my friend who made the reservations called to let them know and they still insisted on charging her card $50 for the no shows. When we arrived at the restaurant my friend went to speak with the hostess who was ignorant and rude. She told my friend that she could not get the money back and that was their policy. even though the place was on an hour wait and the table would get filled immediatley. this is a horrible policy and the hostess needs to get a different job, preferabley in a place where she needs no interaction with other people. Our food was great and so was the service until our waitress gave us the dessert menu and reminded us that it is restaurant week and that they were on a wait, implying that we needed to eat our dessert fast and get out. UNBELIEVABLE, seeing as they just charged us an extra $50 for the canceled reservations. I would love to return because the food is good, but the staff is terrible, they need to get some training on how to treat the customers. I would give them four stars for the food and 1 star for the staff.

• Pros: great food
• Cons: rude staff, horrible host, horrible cancellation policy

01/28/09

Worst Service in Center City

by foodphile

A friend and I just had dinner at Mercato for restaurant week. Mind you, this is a recession, it was not as crowded as it could have been. We showed up and waited over half an hour past our reservation time - this is a "work night," lovely how little respect they have for our time, but no apologies, no, instead they deliver to us two salads one WITH SHARDS OF PORCELAIN IN IT. My very polite friend points out to the waitress that there are shards of porcelain (plate? someone else's plate?) in her salad, which she had been chewing and potentially swallowing during her enjoyment of the entire first course. The waitress's response? "Oh, I'm sorry," and walks away. If any of you have watched HBO's "Oz," you will know that putting shards of porcelain or glass in somebody's food can MORTALLY WOUND THEM, if this waitress or her incompetent manager had realized the same and also the legal liability they at that moment had on their hands, they would perhaps have discounted the price of our food, thrown in some favors, but no, only rudeness can follow rudeness at our dear Mercato. I used to love the food at this place but the hostess - tonight is the 28th of January, 2009, whoever worked tonight should be fired - is unbelievably rude, incompetent and unaccomodating - it is hard to savor great food when it takes 30 minutes to sit down after the time for which you made a reservation (when three tables have been set for parties of 3 or more, which you are not, and they have remained sitting there for the entirety of your wait in a drafty doorway). The service is not generally a sore spot but, I'm sorry, if you deliver someone pieces of sharp porcelain in their salad, you should do more than have the waitress (not the chef, not the manager), meekly say, "I'm sorry." I have been a faithful supporter of Mercato for over three years now, after tonight's experience I don't think I will ever go back.

• Pros: Food - though relatively mediocre
• Cons: Service, hostess, Shards of Porcelain in Salad