THE DINNER HOUR IS ON THE WAY

On Monday this week, my family decided to try out a Chinese food place based upon a junk mail menu and coupon.  The restaurant, BEI JING Chinese Restaurant in Fresno was touting its grand opening, and they had free delivery with orders of $20 or more.

With gas prices being what they have been, and everyone too busy to go pick it up, the decision was made and the order was placed.  The next hour went by with some of us claiming to be starving to the point of eating the chihuahua, but he was saved by the door bell and our food delivery!

The relief of the delivery was quickly replaced by puzzled looks as the boxes were opened and we got to check out the food.  Our order seemed to be reasonably straight forward: chow mein, sweet and sour chicken, egg foo young, pan fried rice and bbq pork.  This was the worst looking Chinese food I have ever seen is all I could think.  We had just paid $33.00 for this food plus a tip to the driver and I couldn't bring myself to take more than a nibble.

However, three of the family members felt that they were too hungry to not at least try to eat the gruel, and so they placed limited portions on their plates.  It's a brave and hungry soul that will eat something that our dogs wouldn't eat.  The bbq pork for instance did not have a drop of bbq on it.  It looked like it was dipped in sweet and sour sauce and tasted like a hybrid of cardboard and styrofoam.  The chow mein was made from spaghetti noodles and did not have any flavor.  The worst dish was the fried rice-made that way because the rice had obviously not been fried.  It was white with some scrambled eggs mixed in and so starchy and sticky it could have been used as a glue backing.

FOOD HAS TO BE GOOD, PERIOD

I couldn't let this go like this.  For $33, I had the expectation of edible and tasty food.  I collected up what I could from the various plates and combined it with the food that wasn't eaten and called the restaurant.  The lady that answered at BEI JING claimed that she didn't understand English enough to speak to me about any problems with a food order.  She took my number and I waited for someone to call back.

In about five minutes, an employee of the restaurant called to ask what was wrong.  I told her what I felt was wrong with the food.  At first, she claimed that she didn't understand what I meant by calling and claiming the food wasn't good.  I explained it to her again, and told her that I wanted to give the food back for a refund of my money.  She didn't like this idea and told me so.  She said that they had to pay for the food to cook for me and that they shouldn't have to refund anything.

I countered with the argument that no one should have to pay for food isn't prepared properly and isn't edible.  She seemed to agree to this idea and offered to give me 50% of my money back as long as I bring the food back myself.  Apparently she felt that they had enough money invested in delivery to us so the return would have to be on my dime.

I went with my associate Raul Martinez and we took the food back to the restaurant.  When we arrived, the place was pretty much empty.  We stopped at the register where an elderly Asian lady was standing and told her we were the people returning the order.  This is where the order return went awry.

GUEST SERVICE TRAINING WAS CANCELED THAT DAY

She motioned to another employee to come over to the register with her to help out with the return and suddenly, we were surrounded by their entire staff of five.  I'm guessing that two of them were the cooks, one the server, one the owner and one the utility person.  What their role was to be in this return was unknown to me as a restaurant manager.  I was trained to handle guest services without calling out my staff for moral support.

The elderly lady opened up all the boxes that we brought back and immediately began to argue that too much of the ood had been eaten already for her to consider any type of refund.  She and several others started muttering that the food looked fine to them and that they had never had any complaints before.  Raul tried to explain that several of us had tried to eat the food even under the circumstances, and this meant about half of the total order was eaten by four people (which was very little of the food).

The elderly lady then stated "Of course, people like you always do."  I was surprised and somewhat aggravated at her comment.  Was she making a statement about my race, my weight or about what?  My response was "excuse me?"  The group once again burst into chatter, this time in their native language and they sounded riled up.  I decided that this was never going to be resolved in a civil and professional matter, so I agreed to accept $8 for the sweet and sour chicken box, since it had the most returned.

The elderly lady handed me the money and continued to defend her position that it would cost her money to refund my order and that no one else ever complained so why were we?  I countered to her that as a professional manager, I was trained to not assign the blame for poor food served by my restaurant on the paying customers.  I explained that there will always be times when an order isn't prepared satisfactorily in the eyes of a guest, and that it doesn't matter if the cooks, the servers or the manager believes that the food was prepared correctly-it only matters what the guest thinks.

IN THE END, EVERYONE LOSES ESPECIALLY THE BUSINESS

In this case, the guest was told to take a hike and not look back.  After all she said, I am the only one complaining.  Well, that won't be the case forever if this restaurant doesn't learn the fundamentals of food presentation and preparation and couple that with a decidedly better disposition towards their guests when something is brought back to them.  The restaurant staff acted as if the food return was either a scam on my part for not bringing back every bite, or that I was attacking them personally for bringing the food back.

But the bottom line is simple-it never pays to treat a guest like they are trying to steal from you with a food return.  Even if that is truly what was happening, attacking a guest in front of the entire staff and then keeping it up while another guest was waiting to be seated sends the wrong messages to everyone.  And, after 20 years in food service, I can tell you from first hand experience that there is no reason to think that a food return is an attack on you personally.  The guest doesn't know you and they aren't blaming you in person (usually anyway).

Here is my recommendation for future potential guests of BEI JING Chinese Restaurant located at 1414 E. Shaw Avenue, Fresno CA 93710:

To the Manager/Owner: You need to think about the fact that you are in an intensive guest service oriented environment when you operate a food service facility.  Your business depends on two major factors-service and food quality.  If you can deliver on those two items with class and distinction, you will minimize complaints and have carte blanche on menu selections and menu pricing.  If you feel that the guest is only a means to an end so that you can make the mortgage, you are doomed to business failure and rightly so.

To Potential Guests: I strongly recommend that you skip this place at all costs.  If you are looking for a good meal, go to Kowloon Kitchen down the street at the intersection of Clovis Ave and Shaw.  They have been in business for 30 years and they know how to make a good plate for the right price.

And, they don't make you feel like an ass for not eating their food.