Went to grab some food at Pizza Hut with my lovely lady yesterday. I always seem to somehow convince myself that the service in Pizza Hut in Bury will be ok this time. And every time I am proved unequivocally wrong in my optimism. This time was no exception.
We had a voucher for 50% off the food. This was reason enough to try it again. Besides, Pizza Hut pizza is the best pizza there is. No arguing, it just is! I will hear no more on the subject. This being the case we have visited numerous Pizza Huts in our time and have usually found the service to be acceptable and usually good. Although I do wish they would adopt the policy that seems to be standard in every other restaurant in the world and seat you at your table, hand you your menus and utter those immortal words, "Can I get you any drinks?" I really don't mind waiting 10 minutes for service if you've brought me a beer. But waiting 10 minutes to then take all the order together, then waiting for your drink is unacceptable. In Pizza Hut in Bury this is only amplified by the fact it can be longer than even 10 minutes before they take your order, despite asking staff repeatedly for service. That's if you actually see them on the floor of the restaurant. And If I see one more member of staff cleaning a table when I'm sat trying to place an order I really won't be held responsible for my actions.
Anyway, last night's meal (if you can call it that... maybe food fiasco is a more appropriate phrase). We walked in the door and a waitress walked past us. Not uncommon for this Pizza Hut. What was uncommon was she acknowledged us, "I'll be with you in just a second", she said. Things were off to a good start. Almost immediately a second member of staff came over and showed us to a table. Maybe this was going to be our night. He handed us our menus and muttered something incomprehensible and walked off. Maybe not. After about 15 minutes of trying to attract the attention of anyone in black we finally were able to place our order. Now, why is it they don't work like other restaurants and have waiters/waitresses with there own area? The waitress serving the tables around us seemed very efficient (I think she had wandered into the wrong Pizza Hut). But no, this Pizza Hut has a policy of the person who seats you is the person who serves you. Not efficient at all. Eventually Numpty (this is the name I have allocated to our mumbling waiter) took our order (just as I said I was about to go to Frankie And Benny's next door instead) of a garlic bread with cheese to start, a carbonara pasta and a tango for Sharon, a medium Italian supreme with no mushrooms and a Bud for me. EVENTUALLY he brought us the drinks. We had now been seated about 20 minutes and just got our drinks. Our garlic bread with cheese followed soon after and was fine. It usually is to be honest.
Main course time came. After another 20 minutes and a second drink order that is. The second drink order didn't come, but the food did. We complained about the drinks and started to eat. At least we would have done if the food hadn't obviously been ready for that entire 20 minutes we were waiting and was now cold. My pizza was passably warm and I was hungry so I started. Sharon's, however, was as cold as it would have been if it had been in the fridge for an hour rather than the oven. This is not exaggeration. If you put your finger in it, which I did, it was well below room temperature. We called over a waitress (Numpty was nowhere to be seen) and after convincing her that it was cold (she seemed unwilling to believe us initially!!!) she took it away and said a new hotter one would be brought. We collared the manageress and told her of the problem and that we STILL hadn't had the second drinks. She promised to provide us with free desserts and to get on the drinks immediately. I said I wasn't interested in free desserts, I wanted the meal I had ordered and something doing in that respect. She offered us Sharon's course for free. Acceptable. She went to "immediately" sort the drinks and was then visible for the next 5 minutes doing anything but bringing our drinks. Eventually she spoke to Numpty who brought us drinks with an apology. I think it was an apology anyway, he was in full mutter mode. I heard the bit where he said the drinks were on the house. My hearing is good like that. Sharon's main course arrived as I was finishing mine (hardly ideal) and was obviously the same meal she sent back, but put back in the oven due to the burnt sauce around the edge. She was too hungry to argue and got stuck in. I must add I got a perverse pleasure out of watching the manageress burn her hand on the now scalding dish whilst trying to hold onto it and deliver some waffling excuse.
Food finished (although drinks not, due to having to wait so long for them) we asked for the bill. Numpty now seemed to be making an effort, not to get a tip as that was a laughable notion at this point, but in damage control. He brought it and noticed the 50% off voucher and whisked it away to recalculate the bill. Unfortunately he chose this moment to be fast and not give me chance to see the bill first to check for the appropriate discounts. He brought the recalculated bill back and I checked over it. He had taken the drinks off, but had not taken the pasta off. So I had to call him back over and explain the situation. He took the bill and went hunting for the manageress. She must have confirmed this as he brought yet another revised bill. Now, basic maths would say that if you've calculated 50% off something, and you then need to discount the entire item, you just take a further 50% off. Nope, Numpty took the full 100% off the already 50% discounted bill. HORRAYYYY, his ineptitude actually worked in our favour for once! This heavily amended bill now came to a whopping £8.12. Not so much a bargain, more compensation for an endurance in restaurant torture.
Unfortunately the next time I want a pizza I will almost certainly have forgotten all this and proceed to put myself through something similar again. A shame since the Pizza Huts in Manchester, The Trafford Centre, Bolton and Liverpool are all really quite good. Just a little too far to drive. Well, the Bolton one isn't too bad, but is slightly further away than Pilsworth and always seems a bad idea until we're seated in the one in Bury wondering why our drinks STILL haven't come. The best Pizza Hut I've ever visited is unfortunately in Orlando, Florida and is definitely too far to travel. They even had Superman The Movie on the TV in there, AND they sold draught lager. Heaven.
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