Absolute refusal

I would like to take the time to share our experience at Mimmos East Rand Mall last night.

Firstly we got to East Rand Mall and was pleasantly surprised by the new look. Job well done.

We decided on our way to the entrance that we feel like dining at Mimmos.

Walked into Mimmos, was met by friendly staff that took us to a table and I had to go to the ladies. My husband asked her to give us 5 minutes. 10 minutes later, the lady came to take our drink order and we at the same time ordered food as well, as we were on our way to pick our kids up from the airport, returning from a week long rugby tour.

She explained the specials to us, hubby and myself decided to take the “buffet” special and we ordered 2 pizza’s for the boys at the same time. Asking her to prepare it at the same time as our time is limited. My husband went downstairs, and got himself 5 chicken wings for “starter” and 20 minutes later, our pizza’s arrived. Our waiter left and returned with our drinks.

At this point I would like to emphasize that I most probably had the best pizza I have ever had in my life, my husband and myself decided that if we go to Mimmos again (as we do often but at the Meyersdal branch), we will take the time to drive to this one as the pizzas were fabulous.

20 minutes into our meal, I got a message from the tour organizers to state that the boys will be arriving at the airport in 10 minutes (40 minutes earlier than expected), I started looking for our waiter as at this point, she never came to the table again and the take away pizzas was still not there either. We asked another waiter to please call our waiter and I told my husband that I will go to the ATM to draw money for the parking ticket while he pays. On my way down, I could see the other waiter looking for our waiter and as I reached the outside of the store, she came into the store busy talking on her cellphone. I showed her that my husband is looking for her upstairs.

In the meantime the male waiter went to the table and asked my husband if he can be of assistance to which my husband asked him if we can take our pizza for a take away as we hardly had time to eat, he took the pizza’s and said he would put it into boxes for us.

Our waiter then returned, stating that we couldn’t take the pizza for a take away as we ordered from the buffet menu. (by the way, she never told us this and there is also no mention of this on the banner standing at the front door)(I can fully understand that the “no take away” rule applies if we were on our 2nd or 3rd pizza)

My husband then requested from her to please find out if we can pay full price for the 5 wings he had and also for the pizza as we hardly ate and had to leave as our minor boys are waiting at the airport. She then just said NO, you can’t do that… Not having the time or energy to discuss this further, we stood up and went downstairs to pay. I then asked her for my sons pizzas to which she responded “they are busy making it, should I cancel it, rudely”. They have just rolled out the dough…. I then said to her that I asked her nicely to make sure the pizzas are ready at the same time as our pizzas and that if she took the time to come to our table more often and spent less time on the phone outside, we could of explained the situation to her again…

I am so disappointed in the service, and the fact that we had to stop at Mc Donald’s to buy the boys and ourselves more food as we left Mimmos still being hungry and the pizza I paid for, I had to leave behind for I don’t know what reason as I am sure they won’t serve it to someone else… (well hopefully not)

We were more than willing to pay full price but this wasn’t even an option to the waiter and I feel that is totally ridiculous… I did not discuss the situation with the Manager as I did not have the time and in the entire time we spent in the reception discussing the take away pizzas, the manager never approached us once to find out if he/she can assist.

I feel that this could have been handled way better and that they could of tried to be a little more accommodating.

What started off as awesome experience , turned sour very quickly….

And I don’t expect any special favors, just wanted to share my experience with you so you can work on how similar situations can be handled as the way ours was handled last night, was definitely not the best possible way.

Needless to say, we walked out of the restaurant, hungry, frustrated and without food for my boys… BUT paid full price for half pizzas as it was not MINE TO TAKE…… RIDICULOUS!