Metrolanes — Local services in Waitematā

I called a week prior to make a karaoke booking for 2 hours (10 people), on the 14th May 2022 @8:30pm. The staff member that I was on the phone with took down my name and confirmed my booking. Upon arrival, out of the 10 only 7 of us showed up. I walked to the counter, where I was greeted and proceeded to tell him about my booking. He literally had no clue as to what I was referring too. I gave him my name and was informed there was no such booking. I informed him of what the booking consisted of, which was 2 hours of Karaoke for 7 people (originally 10). He told me that because they were closing at 10:30pm I could only have the room for and 1hour and 30mins, as they would need to clean the room before closing. I said okay that is better than nothing. He said that he will go and prep the room and come back and get us. 20mins passed, he never came back (literally never came back). We approached the counter again and asked what is going on? The 2nd staff said, we just had to wait, 30mins pass and mind you it is now 9pm. We approached again, this time speaking with a 3rd employee. Thank goodness he actually did something. Because we were getting really annoyed. They put us into one of the small rooms (1-5poeple max), it was a tight fit, but we made it work. We were given 2 mics, both kept cutting out and one was even flat. We let them know, was told the others were also flat. Once our time was up, we come out, it was passed 10:30pm. which there was no signs of the place closing anytime soon, there were still a lot of customers bowling.

All in all, the customer service from the first 2 employees that greeted us were horrible. As for the ones that actually helped us out thank you. But I definitely will not be...

Booked 2 of the mini bowling lanes weeks in advance for a birthday party. Turn up and we weren’t on the mini lanes because “all of them are out of order”. We go on normal lanes which were a struggle for the younger kids, but they have them to us at the mini bowling price. They said they told us so on our booking email that we wouldn’t be able to do mini bowling, but that wasn’t the case at all.

Nearly every frame was missing pins, and it would breakdown every 2 or 3 goes on both lanes and a “technician” had to repair. After our first game the kids were over it. It took over 1.5 hours for 1 game due to all the stoppages. I spoke to the “technician” who said “I would change your lanes, but we only have 3 others that work, and I can’t guarantee they won’t do the same thing”

I asked why it was so bad - “the owners refuse to fix anything and won’t hire a technician- I work in the bar”.

I went to ask for a refund for our second game and the woman behind was rude - “I’m not refunding you for both lanes as one lane didn’t have that many issues”.

I could believe it. “I’m not giving you free bowling - I already gave you a discount!” Yeah, a discount because of their error.

I told her I didn’t want free bowling as we just wanted a refund for the game we wouldn’t use. She eventually muttered under her breath and processed the refund, thrusting the Eftpos terminal under my nose and didn’t say a word.

Don’t waste your time with this place - it was good, but not anymore. The owners...

From the start the staff were clearly uninterested and not well trained/supervised. I called to make a booking, was told “just come in and see, if not you can wait” If she said they were busy I would have understood, as it was a Saturday and needed to book well in-advance. But tried anyway, as was suggested. It was not busy a fair few lanes free at this point. Upon arrival staff were clustered chatting on the other side of the counter not at the tills though. When they saw us arrive a staff member came to us but there was no greeting, not even an acknowledgement. Once served we were not told our lane. We walked around to find it and did. Once there there was food and cups left from previous customers. We were then moved over 2 lanes because of a larger party, which we were okay with but the space was just big enough for my group of 5 and the other group 12. The food remained as well. The bar was not well staffed either 1 person with a half a dozen people waiting. Did not serve in order of who was at the counter first also. Fries were over salted and over cooked. Half way through our first game another group of 5 was added to the lane next to ours. In a section that was ALREADY too full. Went up and told the staff it was too full also, luckily there was someone there that knew that there was not enough space and moved the new group over to another lane. Overall poor customer service and...