Dinner at Sentosa Restaurant Wyong Rugby League Club

A disastrous night, not for me but for some other unlucky diner. What can I say about this place, Sentosa Restaurant, after what I had witnessed a few weeks ago.

I was visiting the Central Coast on Tuesday, a few weeks ago, and it was suggested that I try out the Sentosa Restaurant at the Wyong Rugby League Club.

I was feeling a little hungry for some Chinese food, so I thought, why not.

I headed for the Restaurant, which had a line up of people making orders, I thought this must be a popular place with all these people standing and waiting for their meals.

While I as waiting I perused the menu which hung on the wall, a bit expensive I thought, however, it must be good if all these people are here to dine. As I approached the the girl taking the orders, I saw another sign saying, all meals $14.50, that was almost half price, now I knew why so many people were there.

How long does it take!

I gave my order to the lady, Crispy Pork and fried rice, I do like the pork from time to time. She [lady at the cash register] gave me a buzzer, and told me it wouldn't take very long.

Now in these instances, with buzzers, I usually take notice of the people standing in front of me, so I can gauge how long it would be before my meal would be ready,

There was three men in front of me, within five or six minutes, the first two men went and collected their meals.

The third man, sitting with his partner, pointed to the hot section as if it was his order and he would be getting up next, which was good because mine would be next after him, I was getting pretty good at reading body language by now.

Next minute, my buzzer went off for me to collect my meal, by this time I was starving, and yet this other man was still sitting and waiting for his meal, While I was collecting my meal, I had a quick look at what he was pointing at previously, and sitting there was a dish with prawns wrapped in bacon obviously getting cold, and I wondered if that was his meal.

Well, I had finished my meal, fifteen minutes or more had passed and this man and his partner still had not been given their meal.

Talk about conflict at the counter!

Being a food critic, not only do I judge the quality of the food but also the quality of service, if you haven't got good service, it does not matter how good your food is, bad service will drag your establishment right down to the ground, and this is where Sentosa has failed miserably.

I decided to stay and wait to see how long it would actually take for this man to receive his meal, however, around the twenty something minute and five other customers later, his buzzer went off.

Guess what, the meal of prawns wrapped in bacon that had been sitting there all this time, was presented to this man. Now I myself was getting very aggravated at this very poor service, and it wasn't even my meal.

I was sitting close enough to hear the conversation.

My table was close to the counter so I was close enough to hear the conversation between the customer and the young girl presenting the food, which is one of the worst case of customer service that I have seen in a while.

The man asked why his meal took so long and why was it sitting on the bench for such a long time. The girl replied with, it had not been sitting there very long at all, to which the man replied, that he had seen the meal placed there over fifteen minutes prior, and it would be cold by now.

The girl said she would heat it up in the microwave.

What! I thought, you have to be kidding me.

What! I thought, you have to be kidding me, what kind of service do you call this, but it gets worse.

The man then told the young girl, he didn't want it heated up in the microwave but to have a new dish cooked again, in which the girl responded in a very loud voice so everyone could hear her, "Don't tell me how to do my job!"

This is bad customer service, especially in a time when restaurants and cafes are vying for customers, one would think that you would be giving excellent service to attract customers, not send them away with such rudeness.

The supervisor of the club offered to refund the cost of the meal.

I approached the man a bit later, and asked him if he got an apology for the girl's offensive behavior, he told me that the night supervisor of the club, had apologised and offered to refund the cost of the meal. However, the restaurant was not part of the Wyong League Club and were contractors. The supervisor would have a word with the owner and get him to call the man to offer an apology.

I gave the man my card and asked if he would let me know what the owner did to rectify the situation.

Four weeks later he called and told me he had heard nothing from the owner, nor the club with a follow up.

My opinion.

In my opinion, the #SentosaRestaurant at #WyongLeaugeClub is a definite no go.

The food in it's self is rather ordinary and not worth the full price, or for that matter the $14.50. Service from the staff is of an extremely low quality. I notice that the Sentosa Restaurant is closed during this recent covid event and would sincerely hope that in this time the owner would either teach this girl and other staff how to treat customers properly, or give the position to someone else who has a more affable attitude towards customers.