Monday at 5:15pm we pulled into a nearly empty parking lot. This was the first indication that all was not well. We piled out of the car and walked up to the door where we found a sign saying that Tony Roma's had closed that day and would be reopening in three days time as a completely different restaurant. Dan and I looked at each other and decided that we'd make due by heading to another nearby restaurant, but which one we wanted to wait for input from others before deciding. While Dan got the kids back into the car I happened to see a young lady wearing a Tony Roma shirt get out of one car and head towards another. I walked towards her to find out what had happened. She told me that the management had made this decision and no one at the restaurant had known anything until Saturday at closing (which is why no one told me when I'd called that day). With the Tony Roma's in town closed now we would have to find a way to exchange our gift certificates somehow (but that is a future blog entry).
So now we are trying to figure out where to eat. More phone calls are made in which it is determined that 5:30 was a bad time for everyone to try and make it across the river (rush hour traffic is terrible for west-side commuting) and that no one was going to be there at 5:30 anyway. We did ask people for opinions and the only restaurant mentioned was an Italian place just down the parking lot called Zio's. The two who mentioned it said they had good food for about the same price we would have paid at Tony Roma's. More calls were made in which we solidified Zio's as our choice and it was revealed that one group would not be able to come dropping our number to 17.
With that we headed over to Zio's and walked in the door around 5:30 or so. The hostess asked how many and I told her 17. She looked a bit worried, but said that they would put some tables together and be ready for us in about 30 minutes. I told her that it would be fine since we weren't all there yet (in fact we were seated before the last of us arrived). In hindsight, I'm not sure it was wise to mention that we had originally attempted to go to Tony Roma's, but I was hoping they would feel complimented that this was our first choice when that fell through. Who knows.
I'm not entirely sure the process involved in waiting on tables, but I'm guessing it involves getting drink orders, filling drink orders, getting food orders, turning in food orders to the kitchen, picking up food orders when ready, delivering food orders to the table, periodically checking in to make sure there is nothing else needed (such as drink refills, dessert items, etc.), preparing and delivering the check, and then, depending on the restaurant, acting as cashier upon payment of the check. As we sat down the waitress (very friendly individual) made the rounds asking for drink orders and having been informed that there would be different checks determining who would be part of which check. The groups consisted of: Dan, myself and the kids being paid for by my father (my step-mother was out of town) who would also be paying for my sister, Sandy, and her friend; My sister, Karma, with her husband and daughter; Dan's mother and step-father; and Dan's sister, Sarah, with her husband and three (and a quarter :P) children.
A quick note about my father: We had originally intended to pay for ourselves. My father, however, was at the other end of the table and approached first. He promptly indicated that he would be paying for the "birthday girl" and her family at the other end. From past experience, Dan and I have learned to not contradict him when he does this. The waitress conveyed the message of whom would be paying as she took our order and was corrected regarding the information about the "birthday girl" whom she thought was me.
Our drinks arrived and our food orders were taken and we thought it might be nice to go ahead with the presents while we waited for salads and appetizer. I admit that the presents didn't take very long, but it was still quite a wait before we got our salads. There was no sign of the appetizer. My salad was the last one to be brought out. I had ordered the Italian dressing, but had asked for no pepperoncini. The waiter who brought my salad stated "Italian dressing, no pepperoncini" and handed the plate to me. I set it down and found the pepperoncini staring back at me from right next to the Italian dressing. No worries, I thought, sometimes things are missed.
We finished our salads and only then did the appetizer appear. That was consumed and we waited. And waited. And just when the kids were ready to stage a revolt, our food appeared and waiters and waitresses started distributing everything. When all was said and done we found that we were one dish short. My husband and sister had ordered the same item, but only one had come out of the kitchen. It took us a few minutes to finally flag down the waitress, but we got the oversight corrected and within a few minutes Dan had his dinner as well. I had ordered the Chicken Parmigiana. There were two breaded chicken breasts on a large pile of spaghetti noodles. The chicken had melted cheese and sauce and wasn't bad. The noodles, however, were only somewhat warm and fairly dry without much sauce at all. (Opening and eating the leftovers the next day I noticed the chicken was also burnt along the edges.) My sister's and sister-in-law's husbands both ordered the Pepperoni Chicken and were dismayed to find that it consisted of very little chicken at all. They did have a lot of noodles, however, which put the quantity in par with the price even if the quality fell short. The food was also very filling and rather than Dan and I each ordering desserts as we had originally planned we asked the waitress if they had a small dish of ice cream that our daughter could have as a birthday treat. She informed us that they actually had a small birthday sundae that they could bring out, complete with a candle. We agreed upon this.
A note about birthdays at restaurants: If you've ever had a birthday at a restaurant you may be familiar with different practices. Some restaurants will have a small birthday dessert which they will bring out to you singing. Others don't have a separate dessert (whither from costs or convenience), but are willing to gather the wait staff to make you highly embarrassed while singing to you. It may be because my father and daughter met the waitress with the birthday sundae during their wanderings, but I've never encountered a place where they don't at the very least sing or chant as a celebration. This was one of them.
As the evening wound down, Sandy had to leave a little early, and came over to say her good-byes. I thanked her for coming and asked if she had enjoyed herself. She replied that she hadn't. A little surprised (she had been one of the people who had been there before) and a little sad, I didn't reply, but told her bye and thanked her again. A little later my daughter rebelled at the idea of staying in her chair a moment longer and went wandering around with Grandpa. It was during these wanderings that the birthday sundae appeared and we sang "Happy Birthday" to her (she had already blown out the candle twice before it had reached the table so we skipped that part). She and my son dug in as the checks were distributed to the various groups. At first glance it appeared that they had gotten the checks wrong. It turned out that they had gotten the groupings right, but that two checks very close in total had been switched. Everything was paid for. Restrooms were used and we all headed home. Now, I cannot tell you the exact time, but I know it was after 8 when we finally left because it was well past bed time for the kids. That put us in the restaurant a little over 2 hours. At the time I walked out of the restaurant I would have rated the evening a 5 out of 10. The waiting seemed a bit long and the food wasn't great, but it was filling and the wait staff was friendly.
And now, as Paul Harvey used to say, "the rest of the story."
My sister, Sandy (who had left a little early), called me when we got home. She wanted to tell me that she had been extremely disappointed since this experience had been nothing like her previous experiences there. I allowed for the fact that we had a large group and that the wait was likely caused by the kitchen trying to get everything out at the same time. She countered by relating that she had spoken with the manager on the way out the door. The manager stated that a large party should not have had such a long wait, but offered nothing besides apologies for the inconvenience.
Every Tuesday and Thursday morning, I take my kids to my father's house where he watches them while I am in class. When I arrived the next day (Tuesday) he took me aside to show me the confusion on his check. They listed each item then showed a pre-calculated 18% gratuity (standard practice for a large party) and then a subtotal. Then they showed sales tax and a second charge (not labelled as a gratuity) for the same amount as the gratuity followed by the total. Based on how things were laid out, it appeared that they had charged the gratuity twice until you realize that the subtotal didn't include the first gratuity amount. He also pointed out a charge we had missed for the birthday sundae. Past experience shows that (most) restaurants won't charge you if they have a special birthday dessert, since it usually consists of something small and it's generally considered a "gift" to the celebrant. This wasn't the case here. He also had spoken at length with the manager, but again received nothing for the inconvenience besides apologies, which he did not seem impressed with.
The nail in the coffin came Wednesday morning when my cell phone rings while I'm trying to get the kids out the door for a doctor appointment. My sister, Karma, is calling me to get contact information for my mother-in-law. Karma didn't tell me the entire story, but this is what I'm guessing happened. Karma and Sarah's checks were similar in total and had been switched. I'm guessing that Karma had checked her online statement Wednesday morning to see which total she had been charged. She found that the total was quite a bit higher than it should have been and called my father to see what he had been charged. He hadn't been charged anything. She told me she was planning on calling my mother-in-law and my sister-in-law to see if they had any charges on their accounts and to get a total as she thinks she was charged for the entire meal (based on the total charge). She then went on to say that regardless of if they had been charged, she was intending to see that she was reimbursed for the incorrect charges based on the check she had been given. She'll have to comment here to confirm or deny my theories as well as let us know the outcome.
The bottom line? The rating I'm giving the evening has dropped to a 2... if that. And I highly recommend that you avoid this place in the future. What place? Zio's Italian restaurant located in the Cottonwood Mall parking lot in Albuquerque, NM. I now intend to post this on every review site I can find.
I talkedto mom this morning. What happened was she was charged the entire amount of the check. She called them and the person on the phone said that they could fix it when she came in. She took 45 minutes to get there and they told her that they couldn't fix it, that they need to summit it to corporate and it would take 7 days to get the $200 back in her account. She spent 2 hours in total to be told that they couldn't fix it. Your mother-in-law told her about their webpage and my mom sent them a very nice but pissy letter. 40 minutes later she got a phone call from corporate. They told her that they don't do refunds at the corporate level and that the restaurant is capable of the research needed to fix the mistake. They looked into it and what happened was because my mom's card was a debt and it was swiped first the entire amount was charged to her, the other cards were charged and then reversed because the amount had been paid for.
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