The Most Common Restaurant Complaints and How to Overcome Them?

According to Fortune Business Insights, the global food service market is likely to shoot from $2,646.99 billion in 2023 to $5,423.59 billion by 2030, at a CAGR of 10.79% in the estimated period. Thanks to restauranteurs’ sheer efforts to retain the older customers with their loyalty and attract new ones to flourish their restaurant or food business; however, it is of paramount importance that customers are given satisfactory quality of food dishes and the best services.

Why is addressing patrons’ concerns important?

Customer is king in any business and for a restaurant, patrons mean everything. Dissatisfied customers will stop other potential patrons from entering your restaurants and, therefore, it is important that you pay utter attention to serving your customers with the best possible services and tasty dishes.

In this guide, we list the top complaints that most customers have for a restaurant; whether you are thinking of venturing into a restaurant business or already running one, this guide to building customer trust will help you flourish your business.

Common complaints by restaurant customers and how to address them?

Customers of a restaurant would have several concerns and you need to address them as early as possible in order to retain and heal the damage. A delay in solving their queries and concerns will end up in unwanted consequences of losing businesses.

Quality of food and drink

This is probably the most common concern restaurants face especially from new customers. The quality of food and drink is the backbone of your restaurant business. Any eatery or café with bad or substandard taste would be the last thing a customer would expect. With unprecedented competition in the market, every restaurant is in the race to improve their food and drink quality.

• How to address it: Bringing in the best chefs who know the taste of residents – local and international would be of great help. The list of ingredients and the amount of them make a big difference in preparing any dish. According to the local test, an expert chef would be able to make the best dishes.

Poor customer service

This could be an umbrella term for any unwanted consequences at your restaurant from waiting too long despite the table booking to delays in food serving and low-quality food. When you get a review of poor customer service, it is important for restauranteurs to talk to dissatisfied customers and know the exact reason.

• How to address it: For a new restaurant, it is important to take feedback from customers immediately after they have their food. In fact, most restaurants prefer asking about how and what customers feel right from when they enter (for ambiance) to their order placement. Keeping a restaurant manager who should look after such concerns is beneficial.

Poor implementation of order instructions

This is one of the common restaurant complaints observed by owners especially when the customers are quite choosy about their orders. Patrons often give cooking instructions to waiters or servers when they are peculiar about their orders. While many people prefer not to eat too much spicy food, a small chunk of people love chilis and peppers. The ignorance of cooking instructions may result in havoc in case the eater is allergic to some items (such as nuts).

• How to address it: Training the restaurant staff about the seriousness of cooking instructions works wonderfully. Both servers and chefs should be professionally trained to have patience and sincerity to follow any cooking suggestion or instruction by patrons.

Delayed serving of food

When there is no proper synchronization between an order taker and a cook, the result is delayed service in food presentation. In other words, a delayed serving of food is one of the most frustrating things for a patron, especially when they are hungry. It is important to pay attention to every order placed and the time should be considered in serving the dish on the table.

• How to address it: Many restaurants prefer putting a disclaimer that any dish ordered would take a certain amount of time (say 20-30 minutes) depending on the item, which is a good option to address this concern. Also, there should be perfect synchronization between the server or waiter and the cook so that the orders are conveyed faster and the cooks make the dish accordingly. These days, the latest restaurant technologies can help take orders digitally and the message is passed to the chefs immediately. This may help curb this problem remarkably.

Longer wait time

Especially observed during peak hours, festive seasons, and weekends or holidays, longer wait time is a terrible headache you would ever want in your restaurant services. While the entire management can go for a toss, longer wait time would frustrate patrons and they may leave the premises without even notifying you. Longer waitingtimes could be due to several reasons from tables under cleaning to delays in taking orders and preparing food dishes.

• How to address it: You can take the help of a restaurant management system such as Foodiv, an online food ordering system to help you automatize your restaurant operations especially taking orders online and preparing them in advance. Customized restaurant solutions also offer table booking facilities through which you can manage the time of customers’ arrivals and allot the tables accordingly.

Overpriced menu items

It has been observed that many restaurants, in the race to get quicker ROI, increase their dish prices which ultimately harm the restaurant’s image as patrons may find it costly and then never come back. While it is understandable that restaurants do need to recover the investment cost and start earning, keeping the high price of food dishes compared to other restaurants is not a good idea.

• How to address it: A thorough research should be conducted before setting prices for each dish. A restaurant researcher or expert from the food industry may help you carry out necessary studies. Keeping the price reasonable first is always recommended; one can then increase the price once the restaurant is all set and has built a customer base.

Absence of certain food items

Most restaurants are enthusiastic to serve dozens of dishes in their initial stages, but then gradually start withdrawing dishes that are not in demand. While this is a wise decision but then they don’t pay any heed to changing or updating the menu to remove those items not available. This results in the absence of certain food items and it actually frustrates the visitor.

• How to address it: When you remove any dish from serving, it is important to remove it from the menu as well. This is because visitors check the menu and order dishes accordingly and if a server or a waiter denies having the dish, the visitors would have a bad impression of the restaurant. Hence, you should always keep the restaurant menu updated. In the case that you run out of the stock of some dishes then you may put a temporary note on each table about the same. A digital menu is a good way to keep your card updated. You can have top-class restaurant menu ideas about it and also can add, delete, or edit items with ease.

Too spicy and too oily food

Different people have different food habits and a restaurant needs to understand such a favor. Especially, when patrons ask a server to prepare a dish with fewer spices, the message should be first understood by a person who is taking the order and then it is to be unambiguously conveyed to the cook or chef inside. The majority of common complaints about the food quality is too oily or too spicy food and hence, this is to be addressed.

• How to address it: A thorough training for servers and chefs would help them understand the seriousness of every bit of instruction by patrons. It is important that waiters, while taking orders, especially pay attention to any cooking instructions given by them. At times, waiters are also encouraged to ask whether the food should be prepared in a standard way or if the patrons want any modification. This helps in reminding patrons whether or not they have any suggestions or special requests for making dishes.

Ambiance and cleanliness issues

Most patrons prefer soothing ambiance and, therefore, they prefer restaurants where they can enjoy their food. While many café and restaurants have come up with live music, it is seen that patrons complain about the choice of songs or tracks being played. Ambiance is also an issue if the infrastructure of the restaurant is not appealing or is dull or too dark. Enough lighting and air conditioning or air ventilation are important in all restaurants. Cleanliness is something that most patrons don’t compromise on. If tables, wash areas, and restrooms are not clean, you are going to lose customers forever.

• How to address these: It is important to maintain the decorum of the restaurants and hence you must maintain peace and calmness. Some of the visitors, especially in groups, tend to make louder noises; the music being played in the café (live music) could be louder which may sound cacophony to patrons. Hence, it is recommended that you mention your restaurant as an eating place with live music. Plus, you need to maintain the best hygiene on tables as well as restrooms to promote a healthy ambiance to your esteemed patrons.

Ready to rock the restaurant business?

By keeping an eye on each of these complaints and their possible occurrence, you can maintain your restaurant with a glow and welcoming ambiance. Tasty dishes and remarkable services will help your food business grow manifold. Adding a feather to the cap, you can also go for a customized restaurant ordering system or platform that helps you manage your restaurant with ease.