Inconsiderate customers at Vivocity

Here's an interesting letter from a patron of a restaurant in Vivocity who witnessed
the behaviour of inconsiderate customers. Melissa Seet wrote to the Today newspaper which published her letter today (June 23):

The long wait

Inconsiderate customers make it tough for service staff to do their jobs

"LAST Saturday, at 9.15pm, I was in a group of 14 persons hoping to have a meal at a popular F&B outlet at VivoCity.

We called ahead to try and reserve a table, but were informed the restaurant had a no-reservations policy on weekends. However, the man on the phone was kind enough to tell us that if we could arrive within the next half hour, he would set aside a table for us because another group had finished their meal and looked like they would be leaving soon.

We hurriedly made our way to VivoCity only to find the group still seated and chatting away. We discovered that the group of seven youths had, over a period of three and a half hours, clocked up a bill of just $30.

The service staff told us they had presented the group with the bill just before we arrived, but they said they were not leaving and simply asked for more water. When a waiter asked again if they were about to leave so the restaurant could seat another group of patrons, they threatened to blog about bad service.

At 9.50pm - knowing full well that we were standing there waiting for them to leave - they told the service staff that they were not leaving till 11pm. They did not place any more orders.

We felt sorry for waiter because he was patient and polite, but powerless to address this situation, and had to put up with threats and bad manners. It was obvious that it was an act of childish rebellion, youngsters testing the boundaries of customer service and exerting their rights to be served water and to occupy the space for as long as they wanted, without regard for other patrons.

The restaurant was in a dilemma: Insist that these patrons pay and leave, or force us genuine customers to wait indefinitely.

Ungracious customers need to take a good, hard look at themselves, and recognise the part they have to play in keeping up service standards."