St Davids Hotel, Tempus Bar

So, after a fantastic night on a team building event creating our own pizzas a few of us retired to the Tempus bar in St Davids Hotel.

We approached the bar and got told by a young lad with blonde hair (Possibly Phil was his name)

take a seat i’ll come to you

he was very abrupt, he didn’t make eye contact and a smile would of obviously cracked his face.

We sat and waited about 10minutes then the young guy, see above description, approached our table and from about 2foot away from the table he started asking for orders and made no eye contact with any members of the group.

Considering this is a 5 star hotel, the customer service was terrible!

What a disappointing end to a great evening.

EJG

Car Tax Radio Cars, Oldham

We stayed in Oldham lastnight and got a taxi to the Etihad Stadium to watch Coldplay.

The driver was fab, had a good chat and warned us about rip off drivers that are about.

After the concert we found ourselves stranded in Manchester City Centre unable to get a local black cab to take us to Oldham 😦

So i phoned the hotel we were staying in and they gave up the number of the firm that dropped us off. 20 mins later we were picked up.

Massive thanks to “Car Tax Radio Cars” of Oldham

EJG x

Costa Coffee, Hilton Park Services

Firstly, What is the matter with people? Why is it so hard to smile??

So costa coffee at Hilton Park Services was busy today, fair enough but that is no excuse for a lack in customer service.

There were 3-4 gentlemen in front of me who when they went to pay presented “Bea”, the cashier, with what i presume was a scottish £20.

She looked at the gentleman as if he had two heads, she then went on to say “i wont accept that as it doesn’t have the word sterling on it”

This I can understand but a few points here:

1) She didnt explain to the gent she just made a statement
3) She didnt politely ask for a different method of payment
2) She didnt look him in the eye when explaining this issue
3) no appology nor a smile

He didnt look very pleased leaving the till area.

Then it was my turn to pay, again without a smile Bea demanded my £6.98, so I presented her with my card which she put in the machine then almost threw the pda machine at me.

I paid, she managed to force a thank you and i left with my two coffes an unhappy customer.

Come on people its common decency to treat people with good customer service.

EJG x

Halfords, Cwmbran

So today I needed to purchase a cycling helmet and cycling padded shorts, so I thouht the best place must be Halfords.

So on my lunch break I went across to pay them a visit.

After finding what I wanted I was stood in the bike section looking a bit lost as to what to choose.

Thankfully after a warm smiling welcome from one guy and a

good afternoon, can I help you?

from another I felt comfortable to ask for assistance.

Big Thankyou to the 3 young guys that helped me out in Halfords, Cwmbran today. Service with a smile, very friensly and very welcoming.

I now have EXACTLY what I needed.

EJG x

Douglas Willis Butchers, Cwmbran

Hi all, Sorry I have been away for so long but fear not I am back.

So yesterday I was sat in work contemplating what to have for lunch. I could of had a sarnie from one of the two sandwich vans that visit my offices, I nearly went to KFC but no I decided I wanted something really nice.

I wanted a Douglas Willis roll 🙂 their food is fab, I love the quality of their meat and the premises are always clean looking.

So I left work at 1pm and headed to town to get my much needed lunch.

I arrived at the butchers where there was a lady about 25 serving on the food to go counter. As I got there she was already serving a gentleman.

I noticed instantly that she obviously has no ability to interact with the public as she didnt make eye contact with her customer nor did she smile.

The one thing she did do was shout to her colleagues for someone to take the money for his order (due to hygeine reasons I understand the need for this) but instead of apologising to her customer for the delay she just handed him his roll and turned to me and said,

What do you want?

charming, whats wrong with a nice “what can I get you?” (a smile wouldnt of gone a miss either.

So with her stern, unfriendly attitude I gave her my order which she made and put on top of the counter, not even handing it to me, paid my £3.49 and left a very annoyed customer.

Now I truly understand that we all have bad days, in this case I think her tan was in danger of running, but do people forget that the customer is who we are working for? If customers don’t buy then employees can’t be paid?

I personally wont be rushing back to pay £3.49 for a port roll.

Please do not let this put you off buying their meat though as it is very nice.

For more info on Douglas Willis please click here

EJG xx

The Crown, Sebastopol

So today a few of us decided to go for Sunday lunch, this is becoming an “every week” craving for me whether I cook or we go out I feel the need for a sunday roast.

We decided to go to the Crown in Sebastopol, Torfaen. We’ve been a few times and its always nice and very reasonable.

I phoned at 10:30am and spoke to Lynn who booked us in, fab prompt service on the phone.

Table was booked for 1:45, we arrived on time but had a 15 minute wait while the table was sorted and some guests left.

Anyways we sat at our table and i was very dissapointed to not see any relevant menu board so we had no way of knowing what starters or meats for mains were available which led to us having to ask the waitress when she cam to take our orders.

We placed our orders and in an acceptable length of time our food was ready, they even gave me an extra bowl and cuttelery for my little boy.

Overall great food, good service and excellent price.

Thanks

EJG x

If youd like to visit the Crown, its locater opposite Pages chip shop and their number is 01495 740387

ASDA Electrical Dept, Cwmbran

So lastnight i ran into ASDA in a flap looking for a cable I knew nothing about.

After searching for 20 mins i finally spotted a green shirt, all I said to the ASDA employee was

im looking for a printer cable to set up a printer

and the guy took me straight to the product, scanned to check stock, got on his knees and looked through the shelf and found me exactly what I needed.

THANK YOU

I didnt catch his name but he was a tall young guy, dark (maybe wavy) hair and glasses.

Excellent customer service.

EJG x

Rude, grumpy people ….

So this is slightly off topic but what is it with rude, grumpy, obnoxious, ignorant (and so on) people ?????

I mean we all have our days but PLEASE leave your issues and attitude at home …

In work last week i encountered a very rude man in our warehouse who, instead of stopping and explaining that I was in the wrong, decided to shout across the warehouse at me in a very rude tone. A simple

Sorry love but that doesnt go there, could you put it “there”

would of been fine but no my colleague and I had

oi! that can’t go there, sort it properly

after all I dont work in and very rarely visit our warehouse.

Also today some woman who entered the train platform after me decided to barge past me to get on the train, without so much of an appology. This isnt an underground, trains will not leave if your half way through the door. It wasnt even rush hour and there was clearly loads of room on the train.

I’ve actually started to point it out to people now and they are not happy i’m pointing it out but someone needs to, maybe if we were more polite and smiled more we would live in happier times ???

EJG x

Smiling is contagious,
you catch it like the flu,
When someone smiled at
me today, I started smiling too.
I passed around the corner,
and someone saw my grin –
When he smiled I
realized, I’d passed it on to him.

I thought about that smile,
then I realized its worth,
A single smile, just like mine,
could travel round the earth.
So, if you feel a smile begin,
don’t leave it undetected –
Let’s start an epidemic quick
and get the world infected!!!

Harvester, Cwmbran

Hey all well it was my birthday today so we went to the Harvester Cwmbran.

The service was brilliant, Cerri greeted us at the door with a smile and said

table for two?

so she showed us to our table asked us if we would like to order drinks while we looked through the menu then promptly served us our drinks.

She checked if we were ready to order and offered more time.

She checked if everything was ok with our meals about 5 minutes in.

Everything with her service was great always polite and smiling.

We were served by the same person all evening, we will definately return.

Shame not everyone can have the service level of Cerri.

EJG x

Gravy Train, Cwmbran

So about 6 weeks ago my partner and I decided to try The Gravy Train
in Cwmbran for Sunday carvery.

We got there about 13:30 it was fairly busy, when we got there we waited by the door to be seated, a young girl acknowledged us and asked

how many?

so I said table for two please, she then had an abrupt chat with another young girl behind the bar about which table was free.

Once they’d decided which table was free we were asked to follow her, we got to the table she pointed at it then walked off. There was no

“have u been here before, can i get you drinks, or a your server will be with u shortly”

no she just walked off.

Ten minutes later the manageress/owner leant over my shoulder (where i couldnt actually see her) and in a very unfriendly way with a face like a smacked backside, she asked if we wanted a drink, so we ordered some cokes and went up to get our food.

The guys serving the meat weren’t the friendliest but the food was fab.

Not one person asked if everything was ok with our food during our meal, and no one came to see if we needed more drinks while we were sat with empty glasses.

So after an unfriendly welcome, a manager and waitress who obviously didnt want to be there and an annoying wait for our drinks we were finally faced with a nice young lady who was smiling (that was the first smile we’d seen) and sheasked if we’d finished and took our plates, she also asked if we enjoyed our meals and if we wanted a desert or any drinks.

I wish i’d of gotten her name now as she is the only reason I am considering returning there, although the food was great I refuse to go somewhere where the service level is so terrible.

So The Gravy Train @ Leisure Cwmbran you shall get another chance.

EJG x