Horribly over priced and terrible customer service

My husband and I took our parents to the Famous Butchers Grill Cape Town to have dinner over the weekend and were left very disappointed at the service. When the bill came there was a dispute which we addressed with the manager on duty, Johan, who didn’t seem one bit concerned and left us with no option but to settle the bill and we left feeling very angry.

My dad and father in law each ordered a 600g rump steak but were not made aware of the costs of this order and the fact that if you order the steak at the counter that there is a different cost to the menu. On the menu, a 200g rump is R170, 300g R195, 400g R220 but we were charged R510 for one 600g rump. This is absolutely insane, you can order 2x300g rump meals and still be cheaper than this.

Our waiter, Happy, said he knew he should have told us about the cost but didn’t. He said when he placed the order, he saw how expensive the steaks were but didn’t know what to do so didn’t mention it to us. The manager on duty, Johan, who we were told was very new, told us himself that the price was crazy and he feels for us because he would never pay that for a steak but unfortunately could not do anything for us. We raised the issue that no one made us aware of the costs and was told that we should have been informed but unfortunately there was nothing that they could do now.

My husband and I invited our parents and another couple there for dinner and felt very embarrassed at these costs. Our table left the restaurant feeling very upset and felt that it wasn’t addressed properly. If the waiter and manager acknowledged the restaurant was at fault then why could they not have offered to do something?

Before going to social media, I decided to contact a manager via email and give them an opportunity to sort this out but I could not get anywhere. Lara, the Conference Manager, told me that there is no one else who I can raise this matter with but surely there is someone other than a Conference Manager that can assist with complaints. She told me that if guests want a specific cut of meat and grams that is not on the menu, then this is a specialised order and that they cannot be held responsible for the fact that we ordered a specialized meal item as these items are SQ. Absolutely disgusting as we would not have ordered these meals if we knew they would have cost R1,020 for 2. The cuts of meat were rump, which is something that you can order off the menu so I don’t understand how it was a “specialised cut”. She then brought up the fact that we used the entertainer on our other meals so we already saved money. I feel like we were judged (on the night) and by Lara because we used the Entertainer. It shouldn’t matter if we used Entertainer or not, one of those steaks still costs more than the price of 2 meals so we still lost out as our guests only budgeted one average meal cost per couple.

After our experience, we will not be going back and nor will we ever recommend them to anyone. Complete *******!