Guest User
June 29, 2024
My family hosted my mother’s after funeral service reception here recently and found the service slow, unfriendly and poor value for money. We had around 80 people attending and when our guests arrived there was nothing but empty cups on the tables with not a single staff member to be seen. I had paid for a package of teas, coffees, sandwiches, sausage rolls, scones etc which WE had to ask them to serve, after almost 30 mins after our first guests arrived. As it was a morning reception we assumed most guests wouldn’t want alcohol so didn’t include that in our option however, as there was nothing else offered to our guests on arrival many headed to the well lit bar and ordered their own drinks and paid for them themselves, much to my families embarrassment. When I realised the situation I immediately went to reception to ask them to open a tab at the bar for anyone wanting bar drinks. The hotel refused to change my service package from one without an alcoholic drink to the package with but were more than happy to charge high prices for the incredibly slow bar service using a single barman to serve 80 people. When my wife asked a member of staff when the teas and coffee was going to be serviced she was met with a very abrupt and unfriendly “give me a minute!..give me a minute!” answer. When the sandwiches drinks finally arrived (after some 20 mins) some guests had already left and by the end of the 2 hours we were there, some tables had no sandwiches left whilst and other tables had plates that looked like they hadn’t been touched. They should have been a central buffet table rather than individual plates which would have offered a better distribution. At £12.95 per person plus bar drinks I would say, overall, it was poor value for money and awful value for service. As it was a very emotional occasion I didn’t feel it was the right time to complain however the following day I made a complaint to management but just received the some lame excuse about that’s how they conduct funeral purveys and don’t serve sandwiches until everyone is seated. Looking back I wonder if they’ve ever hosted a funeral purvey before.